Complaint about Octagon Computer, Ozamiz City, Philippines

In October of last year I bought my wife Jean a computer from the Octagon store in Ozamiz City. I was assured that it was covered by a warranty but did not get a copy of it. In March of this year the computer started going south. When I came in April it was not working and we took it to the store.

They said they needed to send the parts to Manila to "verify" they were broken. Initially the problem was a hard drive, and they tried to sell me a hard drive. Then they said the motherboard was bad. Looking inside I could see one of the two memory chips was bad. So they sent the hard drive and motherboard to Manila, promising to fix the parts.

Well weeks and week go by and they keep saying "Oh yes it will be soon". Eventually they told me that they have a repair center in "Manila" and that the parts would be attempted to be "fixed" as opposed to replace. This whole time we keep paying P999 per month for Internet service cause we don't want to incur a re-hookup fee.

Finally after three months and lots of sales pitches to replace the whole machine, the parts were returned. The motherboard apparently works now (at least Jean thinks so) and the hard drive was presumably replaced. However they did not actually reassemble the computer, expecting more money for that. Jean instead has hired a third party to come over... put the parts in... and set the computer back up for her with software and configuration.

The people at this company lied to and ripped us off all through this process. They did not replace the bad memory chip either, although the computer will run on one it won't run as well... however Jean primarily needs it to talk to me. She might still get some use of it for school.

The failure of the parts I am pretty sure is the result of the heavy salt air, humidity, smoke, and such where she lives; this does not however free the company from thier warranty obligation. At one point I asked for a copy of the warranty and they said they don't have "Copies", just one store copy and they would not provide it or furnish us with our own copy.

I am now determined to alert other potential and current customers of the scam and lousy customer service we were put through. It is despicable to lie to good paying customer all along and then in the end screw them out of repairs they are entitled to. You mileage may vary but this company is a dog and I would highly recommend not doing a single peso worth of business with them. If you do (or with any other store) get copies of any warranty i writing. Because of the legal system in the Philippines and this being a big store the odds on actually getting a legal victory are slim to none.

There is another way however... make sure that you hold companies accountable for bad service and lies. Tell your friends as well of your experiences. If lots of people did this they would be driven out of business and only the ones who treated people with respect and fairness would remain.

~ BVA, North Bend, WA (USA)