Air-conditioners and service men in ‘hot’ demand

GEORGE TOWN: The intense heat, coupled with continuous dry days, has not only brought increased sales in air-conditioners but also calls to service them.

One such company that experienced this is electrical appliance store SenQ.

Jimmy Khor, who manages its outlet at Queensbay Mall in Bayan Lepas, said the hot dry spell, which started since Chinese New Year last month, has helped it to push more air-conditioners as well as kept its service teams very busy.

“We received 30% more calls from our regular customers this period to service their heavily used air-conditioners,” he said.

He noted that the energy-saving units were particularly popular as sales had soared by 20% since the company last had its sale during the Chinese New Year season.

Their technicians, Khor added, had been kept busy changing or cleaning filters and reloading the units with gas.

“Since last month, we have had to outsource the service to deal with the increase in service calls from our customers.

“We have four teams stationed on the island but sometimes have to source technicians from other companies due to the high demand,” he said.

It’s the same situation over at TAC Cooling Engineering in Gelugor.

Its human resources manager Kelly Tan said they received more requests than usual from customers for maintenance services.

“Usage must have gotten more intense because of the hot weather,” she said.

Tan said there should be no problem leaving the air-conditioner on for the entire day but when it was turned on and off often, it would lead to a need for frequent maintenance.

“We noticed that calls for services have gone up by 10% since last month,” she said.