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A Customer Service Nightmare in Singapore!!

Jun 7, 2006

Rating: 6 out of 10 (Good)
Pros: Very practical (if it works!)
Cons: Unsuitable for non-business users
Opinion:
Within a few months after purchase, the LCD screen of Dopod 900 suddenly turned white for no apparent reason. I'm a heavy business user and rely a lot on the Dopod. Given that the device was still under warranty, I returned it to the local distributor, SiS, certainly expecting it to be repaired within a couple of days. Little did I know of the nightmare that was about to start!

In short: In the course of almost 6 weeks, SiS was unable or too incompetent to get the spare parts from Taiwan delivered to Singapore to allow for the repair of the device. I lost count but would estimate that I called Sis perhaps 10-15 times. Every single time I was promised that someone calls back and, with one single exception, I never ever received any phone call from them, telling me when the device can be collected.

I work for an MNC in Singapore which imports and exports products from 10 different countries and we are able to airfreight or courier parts to any place in Asia Pacific overnight. Yet, SiS could not manage to get a single LCD screen flown in from Taipei, despite my offer to bear freight and other charges although, as I said, the device was still under warranty. Yet, my pledges remained unheard!

I brought my Dopod for repair on 12 April and got it back (yep, in a repaired state!) on 21 May! I can only warn everyone to stay away from any product which is distributed by SiS (although I don't know how much fault lies with HTC, the Taiwanese manufacturer of the Dopod. Perhaps they are similarly incompetent when it comes to supplying spare parts?).

Think carefully before you spend S$ 1,700 on such a toy. It's extremely useful and practical (though heavy), no doubts, but the service quality does not justify such an investment in case the darn thing breaks down.

D.