Colin Piggott appears to be one of the lucky ones.
The retired Victoria resident just got his scroll saw returned from the now-closed ABC Electric after wondering if he would ever see his beloved $700 hobby tool again.
But there doesn't appear to have been happy endings for a number of others whose appliances were caught behind closed doors and papered windows when ABC Electric went out of business earlier this month.
Piggott got his saw back after contacting ABC Electric's owner Sterling Corbin's legal representative, Mark Hundleby.
"He made a promise he would contact the owner, Mr. Corbin and [Friday] I had a phone call from a man called Sterling. He told me where my saw was and how I could get it," he said. "So I went and got the saw and fixed it myself and it's working fine."
The saw was left with one of the technicians who worked as a subcontractor for ABC Electric.
According to Piggott, that technician had a number of other items from ABC Electric. Piggott also said during his conversation with Corbin, the store owner did not explain why no one had contacted customers to tell them where they could find their tools.
Bruce Sandy of Bruce Sandy Electronics, one of the subcontractors, is the technician who had Piggott's saw.
Sandy said he has absolutely nothing to do with ABC or its books, and in fact was owed thousands of dollars by the company. "But there's no use suing because they have no money," Sandy said, alleging that over the years he has been given a number of cheques by the Corbins that did not clear.
When the store looked like it was closing, Sandy "rescued" a number of high-end microwaves and coffee makers, noting that if the bailiffs moved in it could be months before people got their machines back.
Sandy said he has repaired about 25 of them and as he finishes he contacts the owners. He says he has 15 more to fix.
He said ABC customers who are wondering about high-end microwaves or coffee makers could contact him at 250-479-9558, but added he did not have all of the items that were left with ABC. He also said he does not know how to get in touch with Corbin.
"At one point Sterling had a home number and then he had it disconnected," he said. "I don't know very much about where all this gear has gone."
The 70-year-old store, which recently moved to a small location near the McDonald's on Hillside Avenue, shut down in June with no notice to customers.
Phones were cut off, and while the website remained online, e-mail links for owners Sterling and Eileen (Clare) Corbin were either disabled or the e-mails themselves were simply ignored as both customers and the Times Colonist repeatedly tried to contact them.
Hundleby, who was listed as representing the Corbins and ABC Electric in another matter, told the Times Colonist he had not been authorized to speak on behalf of the parties but said he would try to contact them. The Corbins did not return calls by press time.
Piggott said the situation was infuriating and wondered why the Corbins didn't bother to give customers a heads-up.
"I felt absolutely powerless and I was getting angrier by the minute because I felt they had stolen it from me," he said. "I wish they had gotten in touch with me when clearing the store and explained the situation and given me a chance to recover [the] saw and take it somewhere else. But no one was in touch with and that's what made me angry."
He wasn't the only one. A number of former customers contacted the Times Colonist to ask what they could do to recover appliances they had left with ABC Electric to be repaired.
Each complainant told the Times Colonist no one told them the store was closing and they were not advised where their tools and appliances had been taken.
According to court documents obtained by the Times Colonist, ABC and the Corbins are being sued by Royal Bank of Canada seeking payment for an $18,631 line of credit and a Visa card with a balance of $23,145.87. The Bank of Montreal also initiated court action to recover $12,460.40 charged to a MasterCard.
