Sears Repair Puerto Rico Is Lame – Buyer Beware
Sears Repair Puerto Rico is Lame
The appliances we purchased for upstairs were the Kenmore Elite and for the laundry room, the Kenmore H2 series. We have had the sears repair guy out for our oven upstairs and after charging us $125 for showing up didn’t even go into the house, he just said that an F-11 error meant we needed a new computer motherboard for around $900. Did we want to order it. I sent him home and unplugged the oven for a few hours. It has worked perfectly ever since.
The second experience we had with the sears repair guy in Puerto Rico was when they showed up to work on our Kenmore washer. He took the back off, found a dead mouse in the body and said sears policy is that he can’t work on the washer. I cleaned out the dead mouse, bleached and he still wouldn’t work on the washer. He just left. After waiting another week for the next repair guy to show up, the sears repair center apologized for the previous repair guys attitude and told me it wasn’t policy. So, as I suspected, he was just lazy and didn’t feel like working on our washer at the end of his day.
Now, a few months later, our dryer stopped getting hot. The first step was to check that we had propane and when that was confirmed we had to call for a repair appointment. I was on the fence on whether I should call sears repair or a local guy, but I went with sears because I don’t know anyone local and since we have friends staying at the house, I didn’t want to make them do the extra work. Well, sears repair in Puerto Rico has once again proved that they are so lame.
They were supposed to show up for an appointment 2 weeks ago but pulled a no call no show on us. Now, in order to get that appointment in the first place, we had to wait 2 full weeks! After waiting two weeks, and them not showing up, I called sears repair back and they told us that no one was there and we would have to reschedule. Do you want to guess when the next appointment was? Two weeks. Uuuuuhhhhhhhg. Ok, I’ll play along and book another appointment for two weeks out, but in the meantime, I got the number of a local appliance repair guy. Unfortunately, he was dealing with a family emergency so he couldn’t help us out and I still didn’t want to put our friends through the process of qualifying a local appliance repair guy in Rincon so we stuck with our sears repair appointment.
Here we are, almost a month after my first phone call to sears repair and they still haven’t shown up to the house to fix out dryer. I called to check up on the appointment and they told me the repair guy should be at the house between 12:45 and 1:45. Yesterday the told me between 8:00am and 5:00pm…so basically they want me (or Tony and Meghan) to take the full day off from work for a repair and just keep our fingers crossed that they are actually going to show up.
Man, sorry for the rant, but I’m super annoyed with Sears Repair in Puerto Rico. This is just ridiculous and my opinion of them is around an 8 out of 100. Lame.
October 25th, 2011 at 8:21 am
We had similar experiences with Sears repair, but then we’ve found that the bad attitude about customer satisfaction here is prevalent regardless of the product or service. Sears appliances aren’t that great, since they break down often. We have a local repair guy who fixes miscellaneous things for about $40 plus parts. But we had a problem with a Sears dishwasher and discovered that the Sears parts needed can only be obtained by the Sears repair guy, and there aren’t equivalent parts available elsewhere (we searched)! So they’ve got you by the short hairs. Our next appliances will definitely NOT be Kenmore. — Fran
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October 25th, 2011 at 11:32 am
My experiences with Sears Repair are the same as well. I didn’t think it was possible to be worse than the Geek Squad stateside, but Sears takes the cake.
I’ve written multiple letters to DACO (Department of Consumer Affairs) to complain, including one that has resulted in them getting fined $10k, but it hasn’t changed their service.
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October 25th, 2011 at 12:53 pm
Well…here is the prognosis. The dryer needs a new motherboard. The motherboard costs $260. Including the $129 service fee puts the total cost of fixing our dryer at $389.
For $500 we could buy a new dryer…but since we are already committed to the $129 service fee…it will only cost us $260 to replace the motherboard. Seriously? Next time an appliance goes out, I’m just going to buy a new one before I call Sears.
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October 25th, 2011 at 1:21 pm
I don’t understand why you have to pay for the motherboard if it is on warranty? I thought I was the only one with problems with Kenmore appliances but now I see that they are trash! My washer is not working well and the gas dryer since new has problems. The service wasn’t so bad in my case, but something that is new shouldn’t give so much problems. I think that maybe the issue in your case is that you live in a remote area and that’s why they are so lazy about going there. I’m not saying that’s a reasonable excuse but could be
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October 25th, 2011 at 2:14 pm
Carol – we bought the appliances in 2007, so they aren’t under warranty anymore.
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October 25th, 2011 at 3:08 pm
We haven’t had any problems with the Sears HE washer or fridge, but with trimmers and mowers we just RETURN them and they just give you brand new in the box ones instead of reapairing them. This may be the only place in the universe it pays to extend the warranty (or just consider everything replaceable and buy cheap). Should I reconsider the new french door fridge I have on order for 1200 bucks? BTW, the only trimmer to get is a RedMax from Puerto Rico Wire…talk about lack of service, a month to get a %$^@# spring that costs $2.50. When you order a trimmer get extra springs, a spool of line and an extra tap head so you don’t have to deal with them. Great machine but….yeah, “service.”
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October 25th, 2011 at 3:12 pm
Oh…you can get Sear’s parts on line faster than they get them (if they don’t have them). Needed a mower part that cracked. We bought a rear wheel drive self propelled mower and hated it, returned it after mowing everything and traded it in for one a third of the price. No problems returning it. Can’t go backwards or pull in and out with a self-propelled. Sear’s is great for that – returning things because you don’t like them with no consequences!
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October 25th, 2011 at 5:13 pm
SEARS SUCKS BIG TIME IN PR WILL NOT BUY FROM THEM EVER AGAIN!
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October 25th, 2011 at 7:03 pm
I have used Sears repair and they are always on time, always professional and always fix the problem right away. The reason you ask? I live on the mainland U.S. I don’t think your problem is Sears, I think its the people working for them in P.R. Sadly, as you have discovered, customer service is not a priority for many organizations on the island. I would suggest you check into two things. The first, we have our appliances plugged into surge protector strips – when we bought our washer and dryer at Sears our salesperson suggested we do that to protect the motherboard which is easily damaged with fluctuations in power. The second, Sears has a protection plan for which you pay $250 for two years it covers parts and labor. We got it for our refrigerator and it has paid off since we had close to $500 in parts and $250 in service call expenses that we did not have to pay because they were covered by the protection plan. It is worth it for newer appliances. I am sorry you are going through that. It is frustrating to try and get service especially when you are paying for it! Good luck.
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October 26th, 2011 at 5:39 pm
I and my family have been buying Sears products here in P.R. and have had little or no problems with their service. I guess I’m really Lucky! I too had problems with the motherboard of a digital dryer but because I had a 3 year service contract I was treated with respect and they did show up on time. I just bought a new washing machine and it malfunctioned after 2 weeks due to a brownout I think and they replaced it with another new one 2 days after I called my sales agent. I thought that was great service!!
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October 26th, 2011 at 8:47 pm
@santiago – Both are great suggestions. We don’t have any of our appliances plugged into surge protectors because we have a surge protector before our break panel that runs power to the entire house. But, now that I hear you suggest it, it only makes sense to spend $60 on three new surge protectors to see if that helps fix the problem.
Regarding the extended warranty. I agree completely, especially down here. Still wouldn’t have helped us though, we past the 2 year mark.
As far as Sears service goes, I have heard good and bad stories about them both here and on the mainland…so I’m not going to blame it on the island….at least not just yet
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October 29th, 2011 at 7:41 pm
Sears service sucks here in Maryland as well.
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