Sewing Machine Repair – a Drama in One Act

I brought my machine back to the shop today, to get its buttonhole malfunction addressed.

After the tech greeted me and I explained the problem, he immediately shifted to a confrontational tone and claimed that all he did to the machine was oil it.

I said he must have done something, because the stitch length had changed and that I thought he had recalibrated something.  He told me that on this machine, there’s nothing to recalibrate, and reiterated that all he did was oil it.

I explained that buttonholes worked just fine before I took the machine in for service, and showed him the shirt I was wearing as evidence.

He responded, “I asked you if there was anything else wrong with the machine when you brought it in. Did you tell me there was anything wrong with buttonholes?”

“But there wasn’t anything wrong with the buttonholes”, I replied.

“You didn’t tell me there was something wrong, so I didn’t test them. So I didn’t need to look at that.”

He asked me what else was wrong, so I brought up the issue with the stitch length on backstitching, something he apparently didn’t test either.

Then he ticketed the machine for repair.  He didn’t offer to expedite repairs. Which prompted me to ask an important question.

“Are you going to charge me for this additional repair?”

“I have to look at it first.”

“But what happens after you look at it?”

“It depends on what the repair is.”

At this point, I was flabbergasted and appalled. They charged me $90 to do nothing other than oil the mechanism, by their claim. They didn’t do routine testing of any of the machine’s functions.  They broke my machine, acted like it was my fault it was broken, and now were ready to charge me additional money to fix their mistake.

I wasn’t going to put more money into fixing this machine. And I didn’t want to make yet another trip back to the store to pick up a still-broken machine because I had to refuse the repair estimate.

I said, “Thank you for your time and for doing business with me.”  Then I tossed him back the repair ticket, grabbed the machine, and left the store.

My partner Jim said, “I guess you decided to buy a new machine then.”

“Yeah, I just did.”

3 thoughts on “Sewing Machine Repair – a Drama in One Act

  1. SunGold

    Hilarious! I’m sorry, but this seems so ridiculous that it becomes funny. And…your sweet revenge…a new sewing machine…good for you.

  2. Ridley Fitzgerald

    Thanks for the tips for sewing machine repair. Seeing what you went through makes me want to find a good company to help me. Mine’s got some stitch length problems too, so hopefully we can find a company who’ll get that done for a good price.

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