I wish I'd seen this thread last year, as it would have saved me a lot of stress.
Last fall, the PSU on my Capcom Q25 crapped out. As Omar had helped me in the past when the MS8 chassis on my Q25 died years back and was courteous and knowledgeable, I reached out to him for advice. He confirmed that the issue was a PSU failure and offered to repair the board for me. Given how helpful he was before and how smooth of an experience it was overall, I was grateful for the assist and had no reservations about sending my power supply board to him for repair.
As things tend to go, the holidays were very hectic, but I found time to send the board to Omar, who confirmed receipt of it on December 16th.
A few weeks later, around New Years, I followed up to see if he'd had a chance to look at the board. Not to rush him, but primarily to see if he believed the board to be salvageable. He said he would work on it the first week of January and return it to me.
That week came and went, and I didn't receive the PSU, so I sent a follow-up on January 16, and he said he was almost done with the repair. He explained the board had a lot of leaky caps and he had to do a thorough cleaning. I thanked him, and even though he offered to fix it as a friend, I asked him for his PayPal info as I wanted to compensate him fairly for his time and handle the shipping costs. He didn't provide that info, but I figured he was just being cool and not rushing; no worries there.
With January coming to a close, I reached out to him again for an update. Omar confirmed the work was done, and once again said he'd send the board out that weekend, which never happened.
On February 9th, I pinged him again for a shipping update. He promised to have the PSU shipped on Monday the 12th. I followed up with Omar on February 15th to see if he had a tracking number he could provide me so that I could make sure to be home when the package arrived. On February 17, he responded, saying he'd find the tracking number and send it to me ASAP. Two days went by without a tracking number, and I was starting to get a bad feeling after so many missed deadlines (that he imposed), so I followed up again, asking if he had any luck finding the tracking number. He once again didn't reply. So, on February 22nd, five days after I asked for my tracking number and ten days after he promised to ship the board, I messaged him again for the tracking information.
Omar finally responds, saying he's on his way back to LA from Sacramento, but tells me not to worry and that "everything should be okay." Omar explains that he uses a business account to ship merchandise and that he thought they had picked it up, but it turns out they neglected to pick up my PCB along with a Naomi unit for another customer. He assured me, saying, "Don't worry, I'm honest, and I'll send it out,"—a refrain it seems many folks have heard repeatedly, judging from this thread. He promised to send the board out on Thursday and be there personally to ensure it goes out. I asked him to please provide a tracking number, something he was always very evasive about whenever I asked.
As I said, this whole experience was starting to put a bad taste in my mouth. I don't like to nag anyone, but with my board supposedly having been repaired for over a month, having to repeatedly check in to have it sent back to me was really starting to eat at me, especially as every promise Omar had made had resulted in a game of cat and mouse and needless follow-ups.
That being said, the Thursday that he promised the board would go out, I sent a polite reminder for him to get me the tracking information after it'd been picked up (keep in mind he told me he'd send it on the previous occasion when, in all actuality, it turned out there wasn't any tracking information to begin with). He responded aggressively, telling me I needed to "let him breathe," and expressed that had he known I'd respond like this, he never would have taken the job on. I apologized and stated that it'd been nearly a week since our last exchange, and, given the circumstances, I didn't feel like I was being pushy by asking for that information.
Well, surprise, surprise. It's now March 9th; over a week since he claims to have shipped the board. I have no tracking number to speak of, and Omar never followed up with me.
At this point, It's plain to see that Omar either did not complete the repair in January as he claimed he did and is dragging things out. Or, if that isn't the case, it's that he has no intentions of sending the PCB back to me. It's been nearly a month and a half since the job was supposedly completed. The fact that he couldn't spare 20 minutes to drop the board off at a post office tells me everything I need to know.
Thankfully, it looks like I should still be able to get the old beast back up and running despite this headache. Lemony Vengeance has offered to fabricate a solution for me, being the absolute gentleman and pillar of the arcade collecting community he is. Still, I thought it'd be good to share my experiences here so that nobody else in the community finds themselves in a similar situation.
Maybe he can chime in when he's back.
