Users struggle to buy, repair key tech items

NEW DELHI/MUMBAI: The Sampats, an ailing elderly couple from Thane, are facing the lockdown heat, quite literally, after their air conditioning unit suddenly conked off. The Ratnam family from Malad is in a similar predicament after their TV and microwave stopped working last week.
Thousands of families across the nation are facing a hard time due to their gadgets malfunctioning at the ‘wrong time’. With lockdowns in place, neither can anyone take a damaged good to a repair shop nor can a technician come home.
It’s not only household goods that are causing distress. With work from home becoming the norm in the era of social distancing, many services that were broadly seen as “non-essential” till some time back, are now defining the new-age work culture.Repairs of laptops, printers, refrigerators, ACs, smartphones and even TV sets are an absolute necessity when you are confined to your house under emergency conditions.