Bad Service - PA Mart @ Sim Lim Square

I received this via email and thought I would share it with you readers.

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I would like to share my experience with PA Mart in Sim Lim Square.

I bought a MacBook during the IT show in Suntec Mall. Shopping around, I thought I found the best deal and with the friendly service from the booth girls, proceeded to buy the Macbook from PA Mart. The offer was a memory upgrade from 2GB to 3GB, including a free printer and screen protector.

They installed the memory chip on the spot but upon returning home and attempting to use the Macbook, it would not start and started to beep. Stopping the beeping and starting the macbook took 5 minutes of dongling the power cord and, pressing and holding the start button. I called the Asian customer service hotline who advised me to bring the Macbook to my point of purchase for an exchange as this was a faulty machine.

Bringing the macbook to PA Mart in Sim Lim, Mark changed the memory card but the problem persisted. He refused to make an exchange because I had registered the Macbook online with Apple. He advised me to call the local service centre and bring the Macbook there for repairs.

The local call centre said the problem would be the upgrade of the memory chip as the Macbook should be fitted with an equal memory module in each of the 2 memory slots. Hence the free upgrade to 3GB would cause a problem. I double checked this with the apple website and found it to be true. The call centre further explained that Apple's licensed resellers all know this and upon checking said PA Mart was not found to be their licensed reseller. He advised me to return to PA Mart for either an upgrade to 4GB or downgrade to 2GB.

When I returned to tell Mark about what the local call centre said, he asked his colleague, Azar, to do an exchange. We settled on 4GB which meant another S$45. Already unhappy that I'm topping up just to get the Macbook to work, Azar continues to astound me with his bad attitude and surly demeanor. His burly size ensures customer compliance. After installing the memory chip, he wanders off, leaving me to reattach a dirty screen protector and pack up.

I give credit that PA Mart eventually exchanged a faulty Macbook, but they appear to be dishonest in their selling practices.

1) Sending me on a runabout instead of exchanging the faulty Macbook.

2) Having to top up to get the Macbook working properly. S$45 is not a lot of money, but that free memory upgrade really isn't any free gift!

3) At the IT Fair, the memory chip was taken out of an unopened packaging. The subsequent times the memory card was changed at Sim Lim, PA Mart seemed to take random chips from behind a counter, leaving me to wonder if these are old memory chips or unauthorised ones. My queries on this were brushed off. Like I said, Azar is a huge man and I felt under duress. Mark later assured me that the memory chips had a lifetime warranty and I could return to PA Mart if there was any problems. I really don't know if I could trust that statement!

With bad publicity surrounding Sim Lim, I would not normally buy there but during the IT Fair, I failed to check if PA Mart from Sim Lim. I would like to advise consumers at the IT Show to be vigilant about the vendors. I would definitely avoid ALL Sim Lim vendors no matter where they set up their booths!

Kind Regards,

Fxxxxxxn (name edited for privacy reasons)

Author's addendum, added on 28/03/2009 - After seeing an apple advertisement in the newspapers today. PA Mart is an authorised reseller of Apple products after all. That probably meant they might be ignorant of their products which is a notch less than being dishonest!PA Mart is an authorised reseller of Apple products after all. That probably meant they might be ignorant of their products which is a notch less than being dishonest!

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