DTI set to investigate sale of substandard angle bars

An angle bar used in building houses.
Taken from powersteel.com.ph

The regional Department of Trade and Industry (DTI-7) office will look into reports of the proliferation of uncertified and substantard angle bars in Central Visayas.

Zaide Bation, chief of the DTI-7’s consumer welfare and business regulation, said they will verify reports from the Steel Angles, Shapes and Sections Manufacturers Association of the Philippines Inc. on the sale of “uncertified and substandard” angle bars used in constructing houses.

“We have not received the formal complaint, but we will do something about it,” she told the Inquirer over the phone yesterday.

Bation said it’s possible they will conduct random test buys at selected hardwares in the region.

“We will try to determine whether there are hardware stores that sell these kind of angle bars. For now, all we have are allegations. That is why we need to investigate,” Bation said.

Ramon Tan, vice president for external affairs of the Steel Angles, Shapes and Sections Manufacturers Association of the Philippines Inc., earlier wrote the DTI in Western Visayas regarding the sale of uncertified and substandard angle bars.

An angle bar is a metal bracket in the form of a right angle.

It is made of galvanized steel and is often used in masonry or applied to different surfaces through welding or drilling.

Tan said they conducted test buys in various hardware stores in Iloilo and bought 35 angle bar samples of various sizes from 10 hardware stores.
At least 31 out of the 35 samples purchased were found to be “uncertified and substandard.”

Tan said the samples either bore the logo or marking that is registered to New Fruit Life Inc., the CRWEI from Cebu R Which Ent. Inc or have no markings at all. He said 13 out of the 15 samples bearing the CRWEI logo were also found to be substandard.

The angle bar samples were bought in Negros Occidental on July 17 to 18, 2017.

“The proliferation of uncertified angle bars in addition to those found to be substandard is very alarming,” Tan said in an Aug. 16, 2017 letter to DTI-6.