ComplaintsforCAE Sound

• Initial Complaint

  10/24/2023

  Complaint Type:

  Service or Repair Issues

  Status:

  Answered

  More info

  Brought my ****** VS **************************** for repairs. I needed the about 40 capacitors replaced and four transport buttons replaced. I am part of a ****** VS **** *************** This is a common problem. The capacitors wear out with age, and it is a common replacement item. I reached out to all. members of the group and asked them how much they paid to have the capacitors replaced. Answers range from $200-$500. So far CAE sound has run up a tab of around $1500. And they have had my recorder for nine months now. By all accounts this is a basic electronics job. Take old capacitors out and replace them with new ones. Basic soldering skills. so, CAE has finished replacing the transport buttons, and they seem to work fine. But for some reason, *****, the technician at CAE said he is hesitant to replace all the capacitors. He has replaced some, but not all. Bottom line is this job should not have taken more than 90 days at the most. And thats a very very generous time estimate, and shouldnt cost more than six to $700 all included. my complaint is the job is taking way too long, its not even near being finished yet, theyve had it for nine months and charges are already up to $1500 and counting. So I estimate by the time they finish, if they ever do, it will be around a year and somewhere around $2000. That is a far cry from $200-$500. So my complaint is extremely overcharging a simple job, and taking way way too long to do some basic. simple electronics work. There are folks on my ************** that have done the job themselves with no experience and they said it took them a day or two. so far I have paid $685 and the recorder is not fixed. Also when I went in to talk to them and. discuss the work so far I discovered a new problem that was not there before CAE touched it. So, on top of all this, they have not finished a simple job, created a new problem, which Im sure they are going to want to charge me for fixing.

  

  Business response

  11/09/2023

  Work Order #*****
  ****** VS-**** Recap
  I see that this unit came in on March 13, 2023. We were asked to review a video illustrating how someone had replaced the Surface Mount Caps on the mother board. The Video made it look simple enough. We were also asked to recap the main power supply and fix the Transport Control buttons.
  From my notes, we began this journey by making lists of the values we would need to do these operations in April.
  On Monday April 17, I had emergency Open Heart surgery. This took me out of commission for a minute. By early June I was back in the saddle,on light Duty, and back at this job on June 6. After waiting on some back ordered parts, I was able to finish the ********** Supply and get the Transport control switches working. Unfortunately, I did not document where the *** cable socket connection is the correct one. The documentation in the ****** Service Manual is lacking in this detail, I had to reach out to ****** ***************** for help. I did not get an answer until August 8th. Then it would Boot up but not knowing how to operate this Recorder in its present configuration I was again stuck.
  At this point we failed to contact our client for assistance, things are just too hectic these days. In September I tried to operate this with some instructions from him over the phone but that was not successful, partly due to not having his Monitor, Keyboard and Mouse properly connected. We asked for some personal attention to check it out at this point in the process, it is prudent to check things out during a repair like this to see where we are. We did find it to be acting funny.  I did make it clear at that time that I would like to stop where we are and turn this over to anyone who would take this on.
  While you say that this is an Easy Thing I disagree.Replacing Surface Mount caps is tricky and risky, we have just had the experience where we were unable to save a ****** XP-50.
  My notes are a little fuzzy as the the exact date I had changed out 6 caps on the *********** In October I went back in to inspect my work to see what was causing the strange New Symptoms. Everything LOOKS OK. In the Decades gone by I had resources to lean on, other Tech, Factory support,replacement boards all of which has gone away, I am on my own. Got a little nervous that this job had gone south and maybe could not recover.
  After getting the complaint, we took another look and found one ribbon cable that did not get seated all the way. This made the Faders calm down.
  So, I do agree that the timing of this project has taken a long time. These days everything takes too long and too expensive here in the ************** **. We were promised that computers and the internet would make things happen faster and easier, but that is not my experience. Not to mention activities like this where I am distracted from working and demanded to do more OverheadThis activity has consumed about an hour and half to review everything and reply here.
  Summing up, there are many factors at play, Lack of Factory Support for old Instruments, Supply chain and Back Order Issues, unavailable parts, missing components for testing, being unfamiliar with the operational characteristics and my personal health. We did a study recently that revealed this data. I work 12-hr. day 5 days a week, but only get two Bench Time hours a day, the rest is Overhead to run the Business.
  While responding to this complaint, our client has been sending more emails. We did a study and will attach our Work Order Notes, but we have recorded 11 hrs. total time spent on this case.
  

  

  Business response

  11/17/2023

  I have worked it out with ****** yesterday!

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