Apple keeping my iPhone for a month just to give it back

About a month ago my iphone 11 suddenly turned off while i was using it. I charged it, fully reset, nothing. The same day i went to the store to get it checked and they told me that they were able to fix it.

This phone was purchased in hong kong but i now reside in canada. I made that clear with the apple store employee and the manager. They took the phone and gave me a replacement iphone 7.

At first everything seemed to be fine. Then 2 weeks struck and no reply. After that i have been going to apple for countless times asking for an update but every single time was basically “we’re working on it”. Finally, over a month later i get an email and it states that the product is ready for pickup.

Super excited, ready to finally replace the crappy iphone 7. But noooo that did not happen. They told me that my original phone came back. In my head i was thinking ... that’s weird i thought they were giving me a new phone. Until he said that the phone that i waited longer than a month for is the same phone and does not work.

Now that i understand the overseas stuff (which is still such a stupid problem putting customers in a area where they can’t do anything about), that apple cannot service phones purchased from overseas. My problem with this situation is that it took longer than a month for apple to come back and tell me they essentially did nothing.

Sure. The phone is from China. But to wait a whole month thinking that my new working phone will arrive just to be told that i’m back to square one is insanely frustrating. I am very unsatisfied with how apple treated me... essentially waiting a whole month of my time for nothing. Now i need to buy a new phone with my own money, which in the first place, the phone broke not because of my own fault but because of apples software or internal issues.

Hopefully my story can help some people on their broken phones overseas. If they say they can fix it, In reality they can’t. I used my 11 everyday for business, education, and everyday uses. Now i’m stuck with the loaner phone ... because of who knows what was wrong with my original 11.

There goes all the time spent worrying about my phone and travelling to inquire about any updates on my phone.

[Re-Titled by Moderator]