Shitty MAXIS service, shitty Nokia phone too

My Nokia C6, which was purchased in September last year, was working fine until last Friday evening when it suddenly developed a serious technical problem. No amount of switching it off and on repeatedly, or removing the battery, could restore it back to working condition. It looked dead to me.

On Saturday, I phoned the MAXIS customer careline at 123, told them that my phone was on the blink and asked them for their recommendation. They suggested taking it to any of their MAXIS centres and said that their centre at the Northam Suite Hotel in Northam Road, Penang was still open until 1.30pm. Just bring your warranty card along, chirped the chap at the other end of the line.

Great, I thought to myself. I was just about to go out to the island anyway. Had an appointment at one o'clock and if I were to go out earlier I could kill two birds with one stone. So in high spirits, I made myself to the MAXIS centre only to be told, with nary a look at my poor phone, that I had to go to the Nokia service centre to get it repaired.

Needless to say, I was cheesed off and I made it known to them that they could have saved me a lot of bother if their staff manning their 123 careline had been trained better to give me the right information and not make me run around without a solution to my problem. That is the prerogative of the lousy civil service, not to be emulated or admired by the private sector corporations.

Today's Sunday. I have still to wait until tomorrow. So right now, I'm reduced to using my wife's old Samsung clam shell mobile phone temporarily. There are no bells or whistles on this phone; it's just a basic unit for making telephone calls and text messages. The worst part is that all my friends' telephone phones are now completely inaccessible. And how I miss the ability to check my emails on the spoilt Nokia C6.

Talking of Nokia, no matter how fast or how slow their service centre is going to repair my phone, or even if it can be repaired at all, I think this will be the last Nokia model that I'll be buying! Nokia's reliability seems to be gone and it's time to move on....