Our 5 cents: Hoover Max extract 77

For a long time we have needed a carpet cleaner. I would say we have needed on since Dexter started walking. hmm coincidence? I think not. Well I shopped around for one for about two months. Mostly I was waiting on Phillip to say we had enough money to get one. Well finally he said we could get one and I had already decided on the Max extract 77. I decided to buy is directly from the manufacturer and buy a refurbished one so we could save some money and get a good product still. I have bought a lot of things refurbished so I really was not worried. I knew what I was getting into. Usually the products work great but are not packaged as fancy. They are usually also cleaned well so they look new.
More after the cut.
Well I ordered it, got a confirmation email and was waiting on my shipped email. After about a week of not getting one I was going to call the company because we were going on vacation that week and I didn’t want to get it while we were away. But that day I got it. I am one of those people that just get really excited to track my packages so that was a little disappointing but still I got to open a big box so I loved it. Dexter also loved the big box. In fact we still have it, its not very good anymore but he loves to craw all over it so I can’t bear to get rid of it yet.
After I opened it up and put it together I read the user manual and waited for Dexter to go take his nap so I could clean the floors. I was actually excited to clean! Finally he went to sleep and my cleaning could begin.
Immediately I noticed my cleaner had a switch that had two settings wash and rinse. In the manual it said that some come with the automatic rinse on pull back and if your cleaner has this switch then it does not. The problem was that I had paid for a model with this feature. I was pretty upset that I did not get what I paid for but I thought okay well it wont be to bad to keep having to switch it. I would like point out that I was also 8 months pregnant. According to the manual the model I have I was supposed to push the machine back and fourth twice so a total of four strokes. This machine is so incredibly heavy I mean it’s a lot to push back and fourth. And having to switch it from rinse to wash was very tedious. I really really do not like doing this.
After about 4 rows of cleaning, about 1/4 of my living room it was time to change the tanks. Bothe tanks were easy to remove. the one with the dirty water leaked all over though. It was really gross. Having to run to my kitchen with a leaking nasty tank of water was no ideal. When you empty it you can do it two different ways, where is a spout you can pour the water out of or you can basically remove the whole top of the tank and dump it out. both worked equally as well. There was some dirty water left behind but not to much. The clean water tank was easy to fill/ You just put hot water in it. I like having the two different tanks. I makes you really sure that you are using clean water to was your floor with.
When I got to the big spots on my floor to clean I was excited to use the power scrub button. This was the main reason I bought this cleaner. It made it sound much easier to get your big spots up with. I had read that the power scrub button was in the handle. Mine was not. I looked all over the machine. there was no power scrub button. Now I was ticked. The two things that I wanted most on the cleaner were not there. I stopped cleaning went back to the website and checked to make sure I ordered the right product. Sure enough I did. It said right in the description that it came with a power scrub button and auto rinse on pull back. I decided to finish cleaning the room and give their customer service a call.
I ended up having to fill and empty the tanks about 4-5 times. The cleaning was okay. I had pre-washed most of my stains and most were gone. Just where people walk in the most was still dirty. Also the stains from my sons crystal light red drinks were still there. The rest of the carpet looked great though.
The other neat thing about this cleaner is that it comes with attachments to clean the tile flooring in my house. I was really excited about this because I don’t like to mop. Ever! It actually cleaned our kitchen floors better than it cleaned the carpet. Except it did not get in the grout, that is still needs to be scrubbed. But overall it worked pretty good.
Like most carpet cleaners it came with attachments to clean the couches and other upholstery. It got our couches pretty clean, nothing spectacular. The tool was really easy to hold and use.
My overall thoughts on the Max extract 77
PROS
Comes with lots of attachments.
Can clean hard floors
Easy to set up
Not complicated
CONS
Heavy
having to switch from rinse to wash
No power scrub button
Not easy to store
Doesn’t clean as well as it should
You have to change the tanks a lot
The dirty tank drips when you take it out
Would I recommend it to a friend? no.
My saga with Hoovers customer service.
Because of Hoover I will most likely call the customer service department of a company before I buy a large purchase again. Yes it was that bad.
The first guy I talked with was an idiot. He told me I was wrong and that no machine came with those features. I told him to go read the website and he would see it listed them. He also told me to not do what my manual told me to. At this point I just got off the phone with him.
The next day I talked to a very nice lady who seemed to know a lot more about the cleaners. She was shocked that mine did not come with these features. She actually owned one and was able to tell me a lot. She tried asking a manager about how they could fix my handle. She wanted to see if she could just send me a new handle with the right buttons on it. She told me she would call me back the next day when she found out.
She never called me back.
About a week after that I spoke to someone new, telling them my problem all over again. They also did not know the products they sell and were so confused on what I was saying. She actually tried to tell me the button was there I just couldn’t see it. Oh great I have an invisible button! I just decided to call back and get someone new.
She did call back, she told me that she would email me a return label and that I could return the unit and they would refund me my money, PLUS what I paid for shipping! OH WOW. you are going to refund my shipping because you sent me something different than what I paid for?! How great… ::rolls eyes:: I told her that all I wanted was the machine I paid for. She told me she could not do that because, and I am serious that she said this, that machine was 300 times more than the one I paid for. Really? That machine is over 52,000? Really. I know people exaggerate but this was not a good time to. When dealing with customers you should not say crap like that. So I settled for just getting our money back. I gave her my email address and she said she would email it by the end of the day.
A week later I still had not gotten the email. By then I was full blown pregnant. About to have Max, and I no longer had time to be calling them every day to try to get this fixed. After having Max I still had not gotten my return address label. I was thoroughly annoyed with this machine sitting in my foyer all boxed up waiting for something to happen. So I called back I tried to get some answers but no one knew what I was talking about. The people I talked to acted like this was the first time I called! I am so annoyed with them. I still have the machine, No one has tried to fix this problem. It just really annoys me that their website was wrong and no one in their customer service knew anything about my problem every time I called I had to repeat myself.

Pictures of the Max extract 77