Another St. Maarten Scam!

I've gotta say that S.M. Caraibes, a motorcycle and scooter repair shop in Marigot, is unequivocally one of the biggest scams going in St. Maarten! To get to the point, it seems that when you go to get something repaired there, they break something else (namely, the carburetor), so you need to go back again in a couple of days for another repair! Here are the experiences I know of with the place:

1. My roommate had a scooter that we just figured was a piece of crap American Scooter (which is still actually probably pretty accurate). But, after the first time it broke down, he took it to S M Caraibes to have it fixed. It worked great when he picked it up, but a day or two later, it would just randomly shut down. He took it back to be fixed again, only to have it break down again! This cycle repeated about 4 or 5 times before he finally gave up on it and rented a car

2. My neighbor bought a scooter that was also having some problems. He also took it to S M Caraibes to be fixed. Again, it worked great for a day, but stopped working the next day! Unfortunately, it stopped working for him in the middle of driving somewhere on the island, and it was stolen as he called someone to pick him up!

3. After having his scooter stolen, after a poor repair job, Ray eventually bought my scooter. I have not had a single problem with this thing in the more than a year that I owned it; it was nearly perfect. However, it soon had some battery issues, and he took it to S M Caraibes to be repaired. They told him it was a problem with the ground wire, and he drove it home. A day later, it would start fine, but would just stop after you put on the gas...the same problem that had happened with multiple scooters that they had fixed before.

Finally, we got smart and took it to Moto Caraibes, also in Marigot. They fixed it in a day and now it is working better than ever. Apparently, it was the carburetor. But, interestingly, they asked Ray if he had already tried to take the carburetor apart and fix it himself. When he told the guy that he hadn't, he was told that someone definitely did, and put something in it! When Ray told him where he had it fixed in the past, the guy just shook his head.

So...lesson learned...DON'T GO TO S M CARAIBES!