My teenage son is in a garage band with three other teens. They all have worked hard for minimum wages to save money for instruments and equipment.
He went to Rockhouse Music in London looking for a good, used P.A. system to be used for vocals.
The owner showed him a system, assuring him it worked fine etc. and it would cost $400.00 Canadian. ($460.00 with the tax)
My son put a $100.00 deposit on it. It took all month for the band to come up with the rest of the money, but on July 31, 2002, they paid the balance and took the P.A. system home to practice.
It worked for the first 5 minutes and then blew a fuse. The fuse was replaced the same day by the band, ( a simple 3 amp - slow blow fuse, like the type used in cars) but it still didn't work. It was then discovered that a tube inside has also blown.
I called around looking for a replacement tube and found out from the maker of the P.A. system, Fanon/Courier, that the system my son had bought was over 30 years old and they don't make the replacement parts for it anymore.
We then contacted the owner of Rockhouse Music and he was immediately difficult.
He said he would not refund the money, and accused us of "tinkering with it" or using the wrong speaker wires etc.
I assured him that all we did was replace the fuse and nobody had been "tinkering" with it, and that I could not find a replacement tube for it.
After two different conversations he agreed to fix it. He said he would not charge for labour, just parts.
We took the whole thing in on August 7. Two weeks later he had not called back and one of the other boys in the band's father called him. It was not yet repaired, and had not even been looked at yet, so the father asked for a refund.
Again he went into all the "I'd be out of business if I gave refunds" and "I've got to put food on my table" routine and refused to refund the money.
I called him on August 30'th and asked him if it was going to be fixed and when and he started with all the excuses again.
He'd been sick.
He'd been busy.
His tech guy had ordered the parts and they wern't there yet.
His tech guy just came and went and he didn't know when I could speak to him.
He said he would pay for a minor repair but suspected it was the tranformer which had been blown by mistreatment by us etc.
I finally asked him what kind of a business was he running there because the boys had not been able to practice all summer because of this ongoing nightmare with the p.a. system.
He then said "Forget it - Come in and pick up your amp! " and hung up on me.
I think he knowingly sold an old, out-dated, over-priced system to my 16 year old son and has shown no remorse or concern whatever that it broke within 5 minutes of it's first use.
I think he should be exposed for being a rip off artist that preys on the nievity of young musicians, and cares nothing about customer satisfaction.
He has no ethics, no social skills and no class.
BOYCOTT ROCKHOUSE MUSIC!!!
Margaret
London, Ontario
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