Interesting fact: When Rob sends watches back to the US after repair he sends a group of watches in a single shipment to his US agent. His agent then breaks down the shipment and sends the individual watches to their final destination.
I know Jarrett is knowledgeable in Hamilton Electric. Your statement makes me wonder when Jarett "services" an Accutron, it's actually sent to Rob.
I can add a positive review for Rob as well. He has done 3 watches for me.
What about a basic Bulova with a quartz Miyota CM02 movement? I've sent it to Bulova years ago, but it just continues to chew through cells. It's a Marine Star 200m 98C67. I think the movement has been superseded. Thought about getting a new one and swapping it myself.
Not sure what he services or doesn’t, but your best bet is to reach out to him. His page is below.
https://accutronwatchpage.com/
Page doesn't work for me. Tried several browsers, tablet, phone, laptop.
Just an update, I decided to send my watch across the world to Rob and to my surprise USPS actually got it to his door in about 5 days. He’s confirmed receipt and will touch base when he’s ready to work on it and has gone through it.
So far so good!
I don’t mean to be a scold but I would never trust a watch I cared enough about to send overseas for service to USPS. They couldn’t even manage a recent mail hold without intervention and I’ve had watch parts vanish for months in that system.
Rob Berkavicius in Thailand. I sent him my watch from Boston, USA*.
https://www.accutronwatchpage.com/
* before Trump 2.0
Rob doesn’t have an 8 week backlog because he is incapable.
His backlog speaks of his ability and reputation.
This is the 4th tuning fork that I have sent him and would not hesitate to send him another if and when. Highly recommended if you can stand the backlog.
I use the Croydon Service Centre in the UK. If you send them the watch they give a quote for what needs doing.
http://www.watchrepairs.co.uk/
I’ve been happy with their work but the cost was around £300 each time.
I sent a watch to Rob yesterday, so we'll see. He provides explicit instructions for shipping to him and details the process of returning the watch. FWIW, First Class International to Thailand cost me $22.25 USD. According to Rob, the return shipping will be about $26.00 plus about $8.00 for tariffs.
As a follow-up, my Seamaster arrived home today. I'm very happy with the service, but, honestly, I'm not completely sure I'd do the same again. The logistics turned out to be a little stressful. I certainly defer to Rob's expertise in avoiding issues with Thai customs, and I appreciate his efforts to minimize the shipping costs for his customers, but the somewhat complicated process—with intermediaries in both directions—seems to introduce plenty of opportunities for things to go wrong.
I followed Rob's detailed shipping instructions exactly, though my local post office wouldn't accept his forms. They asked me to transfer all the information to paper forms they provided for ease of automatic scanning. In any case, I handed the watch over to USPS on 21 January. Rob received the watch on 18 February. For the return trip, DHL picked up the watch on 2 June, and USPS delivered it to my mailbox today (18 June). Possibly I'm spoiled by purchasing watches from Japan, Singapore, etc. and having them in my hands two or three days later, but 46 calendar days in transit seems like quite a lot. Also possibly I'm overly paranoid. I don't worry about watches when they're in the possession of a watchmaker, but my imagination does tend to get a bit overactive when thinking about what a mail carrier or commercial shipper might do.
Ultimately, though, all's well that ends well. The watch is in fabulous shape, the costs were more than reasonable, and a 5-month wait isn't too bad overall. I've had watches in service with Omega for more than twice that long.
As a follow-up, my Seamaster arrived home today. I'm very happy with the service, but, honestly, I'm not completely sure I'd do the same again. The logistics turned out to be a little stressful. I certainly defer to Rob's expertise in avoiding issues with Thai customs, and I appreciate his efforts to minimize the shipping costs for his customers, but the somewhat complicated process—with intermediaries in both directions—seems to introduce plenty of opportunities for things to go wrong.
I followed Rob's detailed shipping instructions exactly, though my local post office wouldn't accept his forms. They asked me to transfer all the information to paper forms they provided for ease of automatic scanning. In any case, I handed the watch over to USPS on 21 January. Rob received the watch on 18 February. For the return trip, DHL picked up the watch on 2 June, and USPS delivered it to my mailbox today (18 June). Possibly I'm spoiled by purchasing watches from Japan, Singapore, etc. and having them in my hands two or three days later, but 46 calendar days in transit seems like quite a lot. Also possibly I'm overly paranoid. I don't worry about watches when they're in the possession of a watchmaker, but my imagination does tend to get a bit overactive when thinking about what a mail carrier or commercial shipper might do.
Ultimately, though, all's well that ends well. The watch is in fabulous shape, the costs were more than reasonable, and a 5-month wait isn't too bad overall. I've had watches in service with Omega for more than twice that long.
