Lionel service does not answer the phone

Could be covid ,but I had the same experience 2 years ago.

Maybe there's a magic code or something?

Don't know, but dealers are having the same issue.

Last week I was able to get through after about 1.5 hours on hold.  They took care of my needs with no problem.  They did say this is the busiest time of the year for them.

Prior to that, I had called everyday for about a week.  Each time I was on hold for over an hour and I just gave up.  Some of the earlier calls went to voicemail, but those were not taking any messages.  This was during the Thanksgiving week so they may have been short handed.

I made a fairly large parts order during their sale and when received I found a few of the parts broken.  So I had to call to get replacements.

When Kalmbach Publishing Company eliminated their in-house customer service and sent the girls (all professional in their field) home, they started using a private CS agency in Tampa, FL.  That didn't work from the Get Go, so they hired another Fly-by-Night (???) agency in Big Sandy, TX.  Not much better.  The lady I talked to when I cancelled all railroad related magazine subscriptions a couple of years ago didn't know the first thing about Kalmbach when I quizzed her on who founder Al Kalmbach was.  She probably didn't even know that the company is in Waukesha, WI...???  I forgot to ask her!

Kalmbach also let the founder of Garden Railways magazine (no name to protect the person) go bye bye and after they did the magazine got thinner and thinner and now has ceased publication altogether.  Several subscribers complained on the GR forum, two mentioning the fact that they had just paid for new first time subscriptions not even having been informed of GR being discontinued...the complaints continued.

What can be said other than this is one H*** of a way to run a railroad publishing house.  I'm sure that founder Al Kalmbach, David P. Morgan, Rosemary Entringer, and Lynn Westcott (all RIP) are turning over in their graves to see what has become of their onetime great publishing company that dates back to 1934!

Is Lionel next?  Only time will tell.

Item: White River Productions is making plans to start publishing an annual in 2021 devoted to garden railroading.  So if you have a green thumb that needs new life, check out their site and read all about it for yourself.  Too bad OGR doesn't have a sister magazine devoted to garden railroading.  Seems like there are lots of O gauge garden/flower bed railroading in the UK and probably in North America too, so you see, it's not only large scale trains that run over critters in the great outdoors.

Lionel service has been terrible lately. I had a warranty RA in August, it took 3 weeks to get the RA, 5 weeks to get the loco back and was told to take it back to the dealer for a refund. The locomotive had a cracked shell, and they could not replace it. The dealer has refused and it is in the hands of American Express now as a filed a claim.

I placed an order for parts a few days ago.  I haven't received any email notifications.  Can I assume I will receive the parts or should I place the same order somewhere else?

I have been ordering parts all along through the web portal, they process the orders and I get them pretty quickly.  It's just the phones that seem to lack support.

@rick s posted:

I placed an order for parts a few days ago.  I haven't received any email notifications.  Can I assume I will receive the parts or should I place the same order somewhere else?

Disregard the message saying you'll get an email notification--you won't.  For inexplicable reasons, LIONEL has not removed this false statement from the parts ordering protocol.

@Trinity River Bottoms Boomer posted:

When Kalmbach Publishing Company eliminated their in-house customer service and sent the girls (all professional in their field) home, they started using a private CS agency in Tampa, FL.  That didn't work from the Get Go, so they hired another Fly-by-Night (???) agency in Big Sandy, TX.  Not much better.  The lady I talked to when I cancelled all railroad related magazine subscriptions a couple of years ago didn't know the first thing about Kalmbach when I quizzed her on who founder Al Kalmbach was.  She probably didn't even know that the company is in Waukesha, WI...???  I forgot to ask her!

Kalmbach also let the founder of Garden Railways magazine (no name to protect the person) go bye bye and after they did the magazine got thinner and thinner and now has ceased publication altogether.  Several subscribers complained on the GR forum, two mentioning the fact that they had just paid for new first time subscriptions not even having been informed of GR being discontinued...the complaints continued.

What can be said other than this is one H*** of a way to run a railroad publishing house.  I'm sure that founder Al Kalmbach, David P. Morgan, Rosemary Entringer, and Lynn Westcott (all RIP) are turning over in their graves to see what has become of a onetime great publishing company that dates back to 1934!

Is Lionel next?  Only time will tell.

Item: White River Productions is making plans to start publishing an annual in 2021 devoted to garden railroading.  So if you have a green thumb that needs new life, check out their site and read all about it for yourself.  Too bad OGR doesn't have a sister magazine devoted to garden railroading.  Seems like there are lots of O gauge garden/flower bed railroading in the UK and probably in North America too besides only large scale.

Do you have this stored away somewhere.   You sure seem to make this exact post a lot about Kalmbach

Big surprise there.  Been a topic for a long time.  It is what it is.  Your perserverence will get you there.  I wonder what service will be for the other company once they shut down.

EscapeRocks: Nothing stored electronically speaking; only what's left in my flaky memory bank.

@Bryant Dunivan 111417 posted:

Your perseverance will get you there.

Bryant is correct.  Others have gotten through but it definitely took some time.  I'm sure the season and the current crisis is a part of the problem but they have issues they need to address.  I'm looking forward to the day where we don't see these posts anymore.  Unfortunately I suspect the folks on the phones and CS reps are doing the best they can but the system itself needs a shot in the arm.

I just email about repair issues and they get back in a day or two. I sent three engines back ten days ago and one showed up Tuesday with a note saying it could not be repaired so we sent a new one.

I am happy with the service but the product Quality has gone down hill.

Gunny

All the parts I ordered came in today.  Thanks for the reassurance guys. 

Glad I saw this. Got a new LionChief GG1 which does not work. I figured it wouldn't be a big deal to get support. Now I see it will. This isn't how customer service should work.

Not looking forward to it.