Former Timmins Sears employee upset company not honouring extended warranties
As Sears Canada starts to liquidate its stores, a former employee in northeastern Ontario says she's not happy the company is no longer honouring extended warranties.
This week, Sears was granted permission to start liquidating. The company stated that extended warranties are now void.
Deb Nault worked at the store in Timmins for more than a decade. She lost her job when the store shut down in that city in July.
She says she worked in a variety of departments, including appliances and home furnishings.
Nault says she sold extended warranties for those purchases, and adds she purchased them for her own appliances.
"I'm not upset for me. I'm upset for the customers," she said.
"[Sears has] no right to do that, to the people of Canada."
Canadians 'had faith' in Sears
Nault says Sears used to have a trusted brand in Canada, but she feels that is no more.
"People had faith in [Sears] for years," she said. "Sears was an institute in every household."
Nault says she posted a message on social media, apologizing to customers she sold extended warranties to.
The company has said if customers purchased an extended warranty within the past 30 days, they can get their money back. But Nault doesn't think that's enough.
"If you bought five or six months ago, you don't get that money back," she said.
Across Canada, the closure of Sears will affect more than 12,000 workers. The company says 360 of those are or were employed in northeastern Ontario, including Sudbury, North Bay, Timmins and Sault Ste. Marie.
With files from Martha Dillman