> Not a bad read really;
>
http://www.mossmotors.com/Forum/blogs/mossusa/archive/2006/10/30/Moss-USA-On
-The-Subject-Of-Quality.aspx
Hand waving and disingenuous misdirection towards their suppliers,
when what Moss should have provided long ago is a website with
detailed photos of every part they sell from multiple angles,
complete with dimensional overlays. (Its not like digital
cameras, disc space, and website bandwidth are expensive, all
three get cheaper every year.) Heck, they should enclose a
CD-Rom or DVD of the same stuff with every catalog.
Instead, their catalog provides little more than a photocopy of
the same exploded-view drawings that were lovingly hand-illuminated
by excommunicated Irish monks for Morris itself back when the cars
were new.
No one expects Moss parts to be "concours quality", in fact,
the Moss name has always been, and is becoming ever more
synonymous with cheap materials, sloppy castings, and loose
tolerances. We all know it, and we "expect" something that
they can't seem to bother to provide, which is a more accurate
and honest assessment of the items they are representing as
somehow "appropriate" for specific cars.
While the problems faced by Moss are understandable, they seem to
have lost touch with some of the finer points of the business, such
as sending MG-TD brake slave cylinder kits when they are ordered,
rather than MG-TF rebuild kits. Sometimes "close" is no help at all,
and an honest and accurate "we are out of the part you need" would be
more help to someone actually expecting to "keep it on the road",
moreso when the incorrect parts are discovered only after the cylinders
are removed, disassembled, and cleaned, damaging or destroying the old
seals in the process.
Sadly taking one's business elsewhere is becoming difficult. Even Abingdon
Spares has become a shadow of their former selves since the new management
took over, and staff with less experience started manning the phones. Time
was when one was assured of a valuable education and some entertaining
trivia
with every Abingdon purchase. Those days are gone forever.
Funny how these problems do not plague the owners of much, much older
cars such as Model As, Model Ts, etc. The Moss excuse of "our goal is
keeping them on the road" is a lame one. What one expects is fair value
for one's dollar, and when top dollar is charged, one expects a top of
the line part, or at least one that will fit and function as expected.
When one is forced to return and re-order what should have been a
"no-brainer", the customer loses confidence.
Moss may learn this the hard way, but they need to invest in training
the folks that answer the phones and take orders. They used to pride
themselves on how many of their employees drove MGs of various stripes
to work every day, but it now seems that their current staff not only
don't own or drive MGs, but have no knowledge at all.
In summary, while Moss should be commended on their extremely progressive
and innovative policy towards hiring the handicapped, I feel that they
may have gone a bit overboard when they apparently staffed the warehouse
with the developmentally disabled, gave all the order-taking jobs to
dyslexics, and put executive management in the hands of the criminally
insane.
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