In today’s world, where keyboard jockeys can be brutal to retailers via reviews and social media, nitpicking and complaining about any perceived inconvenience, I thought I’d do the opposite and send some flowers Orvis’ way.
One thing I didn’t mention about my Driftless trip: on the last day, in addition to catching a bunch of nice fish on my Orvis Superfine Carbon rod, I snapped the tip by the ferrule at the very end of the outing. 100% user error.
I used Orvis’ online warranty tools to send the rod in for repair, and now that it’s back in my hands, I’m happy to report the process was extremely easy and essentially painless.
I logged into my online account, went to the warranties page, and picked the rod I was sending in. The system had preloaded every rod I’d registered with Orvis, so this was a breeze, even though my model is discontinued. I filled out a brief online form, printed a shipping label, packed it up, and sent it off. There was a repair fee, but they didn’t charge me until the rod was on its way back.
Upon receipt, my rod was beautifully repaired, accompanied by a nice pre-printed thank you note and a sticker. You always win bonus points with a sticker. The whole process took about a month, door to door.
The detail I really appreciated was a field in the online form asking whether the rod had “sentimental value.” That way, if Orvis couldn’t repair it and needed to replace it entirely, they’d cap off the cork butt section of the old rod and send it back as a memento. As someone who once had their first real fly rod replaced with a different model without any notice, that’s just a nice touch.
I haven’t gone through the fly rod repair process in probably ten years, so maybe this is par for the course with other manufacturers these days. But either way, kudos to Orvis for a great customer experience.
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