I am writing this on my two-week old Macbook Pro, a 15" that is currently the cheapest 15" MB Pro sold at apple.com. I don't know the exact model name. I am telling you about this new machine because Apple just 'gave' it to me after I dealt with a lemon piece of crap MB Pro that was made in 2008, that I bought in Oct 2009.
The point of my story is Apple does, at least sometimes, actually back up their warranties. I am still in shock that they gave me this new machine. I did not ask for it. I will tell you what I did, it might help you. It might make a difference that I live in San Fran Bay Area, which is true Apple Computer country, right? It might be different in Austrailia.
My bought-in-oct-2009 machine needed three new logic boards in 1.5 years, a new battery, the screen died so a new screen, then a new half-case, and a new dvd/cd drive. And when the last repair came back with the 'new' screen, 'new' logic board and new case, the 'new' screen was defective, having a weird flicker. I never had the nvdivia (whatever) graphic stuff. I still don't know what was wrong with my lemon computer.
Over the span of 1.5 years, the machine was in for repairs, with shipping time, for a total of about a month.
Plus I had spent a ton of hours on the phone with many poorly trained technicians. They are so poorly trained that they don't even do basic things like ask for my repair case number. Virtually every 'new' tech support person would ignore the fact that I began by telling them I had a repair number. They would go straight to asking about the machine, what was it doing, walking me through their litany of diagnostics. Finally I got wise to that and would say 'why don't you take the case number and review the file so I don't have to tell you all this, what the heck is the point of giving me a case number if no one ever looks at the notes?'
Once, when my machine was at an apple repair facility in Tennessee, I called from my home in CA and a customer service idiot asked for the serial number. I said "I can't tell you the number, I don't have the machine with me and it would take a lot of time to dig out my paperwork" he said 'then I can't help you' and I said 'Apple Computer knows my serial number. If you use my apple ID, which you haven't even bothered to ask for, doesn't my customer history come up? if you use your database, my machine's serial number is attached to my name and apple id, isn't that the whole point of having an apple id, case number?"
What a nightmare. Many many hours. Many days with no computer. And then the indignity of arrogant badly trained young, mostly male dopes who treated me like it was a given that I was an idiot, even tho they were skipping very basic steps.
I got satisfaction but I'll never get back the many days of my life I lost. An apple store manager told me that when the iPad exploded, Apple had to hire tons of new hires and was not able to train them. He said apple is aware of the problem.
One dumb customer support person or tech support person after another, doing things that were blatantly wrong. If I knew they were wrong, it had to be quite blatant, cause I am not a tech person.
But I am a lawyer and I can write clearly.
So when my machine came back about two weeks ago with a 'brand new' screen, case and new logic board and the new screen flickered all day, I called, apple sent me a shipping carton. But they also assigned me a special case manager who said he would give me the white glove treatment. Maybe you could ask for one. I don't use the stores, don't go to genius bars.It is better to have apple send boxes to ship the machines to them. It goes much faster, at least in the states.
I wrote out the long list of my repairs. I don't think any of the tech repair folks ever looked at the long history. Then I taped the letter to my lemon computer before I shipped it to the repair facility. But I decided to email the letter to my special case manager who had promised me the white glove treatment. I said "I thought I would share my letter with you."
I guess having a short list laying out all my repairs briefly was a good case. He called the apple store nearest to my home and arranged for me to pick up a computer that day. Then I got very bad service from a pig at the genius bar, then I threw a tantrum in the store, and said I am not leaving until I get my new machine. I see, on hindsight, that the theatrics were not necessary, but apple people had worn me down with, no kidding, the real life equivalent of about two weeks of my life, 24/7, on the phone with apple. I broke down.
When the manager said he would call the cops if I wouldn't stop using the f-bomb and I said "Have you ever heard of our constitutional right to free speech? If I want to say f''' I will." and he said "If you do I'll call the police" and I said "That would be great. Then I would have a wrongful detainer and arrest lawsuit against apple computer. I bet it would settle out of court quickly. So call the cops. Or give me the f'ffing computer the white glove case manager promised me."
The manager actually went in the back and read my file. He came back and apologizied profusely and said the genius bar guy had simply failed to actually read my file. The genius bar guy was so used to treating customers distainfully that he didn't listen to me or bother to read the case notes. The genius bar guy told me no apple employee would have told me to come to the genius bar to pick up a new replacement computer, that wasn't how it was done. I politely explained to him that an apple employee -- the white glove specialist -- had made my genius bar appointment. The guy at the genius bar called me a liar and said he did not believe me.
I gave the genius bar guy the case number the special white glove manager had given me. White glove said "Go to the genius bar at 4:30, give them this case number, and when they read my notes, it will say you get a new computer and I have talked to the store manager, it is all set" but when I gave the case number to the genius bar guy, he refused to input the file number. He said the numbers were not a valid case number. How could he know that without checking? He said all case files had letters and numbers and my case file number was only numbers so he refused to read it. He said "all I can do is take your machine and send it for another repair"
It was all well that ended well. But it was sickening.
And get this. When it was all over, I called apple headquarters and asked to talk to customer relations to compliment the store manager and my special case manager who had actually given me exceptional service and I wanted to compliment them. I asked if there was a way for me to send an email with my compliments and the CUSTOMER RELATIONS DEPARTMENT AT APPLE COMPUTER CORPORATION said they did not have an online complaint process. If i wanted to write a letter, I had to send it snail mail.
I said "I can't believe that one of the largest computer companies in the world has no online way for customers to give feedback".
Then I said "Can you give me your email address so I can write a letter to you?"
Obviously, apple doesn't care about customer feedback, just customer money. Why wouldn't a computer company have online complaint/compliment website?!!! I kow they have this discussion forum. . .
The customer relations guy agreed to email me his email address so I could satisfy my urge to send a letter complimenting the good guys who, after much ****, helped me.
Also, I am entitled to a partial refund of my extended warranty on the lemon, which I will use to buy a new warranty on the new one, right? But when I talked to that department, the gal said 'let me give you the case number' and I said 'can you email it to me?" and she said we don't do that. And I said what do you mean you don't email case numbers? I have about 20 case numbers going with apple this year, it is a whole file just for apple numbers. I put the email into the file. It is too much work to write down your number. what do you mean you won't send me an email with the number? I always ask for the case numbers emailed."
she did it.
but the resistance to using email to communicate with me seems very weird for a COMPUTER corporation.
And, I was suppose to have received the refund about a week ago. I'l get it. My good guy managers have promised me I can call them if there is problem. but criminy. customer service ****.
but take heart: apple did give me a new machine but I have to be very very very persistent.
and after this, I realize that TWICE I have accepted the customer service crap on prior computers. Once I had a apple laptop die about three weeks before the warranty expired. They fixed it and it died again a week or two later. Now I know that I could have legally requested a replacement because obviously the repair did not work. But at the time, ten years ago, I was more passive as a consumer.
If you are very strongly assertive but polite, and tell everyone who is doing things you find unacceptable that you want to talk to their manager, you get what you want but you have to go through **** first. I think they design their system to discourage folks from asserting their rights and it works. Twice I have just gone out and bought new machines that died right after a repair but a week or two after the warranty. I used to be so naive that I expected a reputable company to just do the right thing. Now I know you have to fight.
And it is hard to fight. I am a lawyer and I fell for their delaying bad service. They wear you down with delays and poor service. Don't let them. Hang in there. Demand, without profanity -- that always ****** folks off --- and persevere.
