Reader Joshua wants to warn everyone that exchanging your defective-out-of-the-box iPhone 3G is a huge pain the butt. His girlfriend got her iPhone on launch day but quickly discovered that the speaker was broken. She brought it into the Apple store to have it checked out and an employee accidentally dropped it. At that point, Apple told them they’d just replace to the phone. That’s where things got complicated.
Joshua writes:
My girlfriend was set on getting an 8GB iPhone 3G on launch day, and to make sure, we headed out to the closest mall location in San Jose, CA at 5am. We were the 20th person or so in line, and had no problems getting in.
She was transferring her service from T-Mobile, and surprisingly, it all went smoothly. We probably walked into the physical Apple Store at around 8:15am and were back out to our car by 9:15.When we got home, we noticed a problem with our iPhone — the speaker wouldn’t work. No external sounds whatsoever, unless it was docked. We called the Apple Store and I have to say, Apple offers some awesome support. They took her name down and told her to come right back in past the line and they’d take care of us (sorry to everyone who was still waiting).
We rolled back in around 10:30am, and if the next five hours had been up to Apple, we’d have been gone by 10:45am. Funny thing, they were going to try to troubleshoot it, but then one of the Apple specialists accidentally dropped the phone, and said casually, “We’ll just go grab you a new one.”
Unfortunately, AT&T has a different take on iPhone exchanges. AT&T could not give her a phone exchange because she was no longer qualified for first-time purchase and activation, so they tried to charge her full price ($399 instead of $199, if I recall) for the iPhone because she’d already purchased and activated an iPhone. Then, since they already returned that previous iPhone, AT&T locked her phone number and said she couldn’t get it back for 48 hours because of that return. After that, it became a worry on both ours and Apple’s part if they were going to charge an early termination fee, and then a new activation fee for the second phone.
Our Apple concierge, Rosemarie, was wonderful in arguing with AT&T on our behalf. Four and a half hours later, Rosemarie was able to widdle it down so that they could get her new iPhone activated with her original number, but they refused to let her walk out of the store with an iPhone for $199. In the end, Rosemarie and the store manager (whose name I didn’t get, but she was also extremely helpful) decided that what they were going to do was charge us for the full price of an iPhone and issue themselves a gift card for the difference of what we would have had to pay. So we paid our part ($231 and some change) and they used their self-issued gift card to cover the rest. In other words, Apple chose to eat the cost on our behalf because of what AT&T was doing.
In the end, we couldn’t have asked for more exceptional service than what this Apple Store gave us. While we waited, specialists noticed us and offered us snacks and sodas and were generally really friendly and empathetic. We were also pretty chill about the whole thing, which I’m sure helped, and by the time we left, they made sure we weren’t screwed with by AT&T.
So, just a warning to anyone else that has to exchange their iPhone. I’m not even generally an Apple/Mac person, but this gives me great faith in the Apple Store’s customer service, and I would definitely say to have faith in them, but be wary of AT&T.
Kudos to the Apple Store for for spending so much time working this out for you. We hope that AT&T works out this glitch — there’s really no reason why a simple exchange of a defective phone should take 4.5 hours and require the Apple store to issue gift cards.
Is this happening to anyone else?
(Photo: qshio )
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That just goes to show how greedy telecommunication companies are. They obviously don’t care for their customers behalfs….
Also the relationship between AT&T and Apple seem somewhat sour for this release… Only if telecommunication companies did business in the way Apple does they would be able to cut their call centers by 50% I bet.
Yes, I agree. AT&T are mostly douchebags.
The fact that a CS rep couldn’t understand the concept of ‘defective product return’ is really beyond words.
That’s a level of incopetence that borders on malicious.
The iphone is a beautifull piece of equipment. I would love to buy one. I just can’t because AT&T isthe worst. So Apple you can’t have my business until you offer to make your equipment available to other service providers.
I’ll patiently wait for as long as it takes Apple to wise up. Remember you can’t sell apples off an empty pushcart.
Sounds like some sort of mix up/idiots CSR she was dealing with. I can’t believe that any company would actually have this as their policy.
I’m a little confused about this. Did Apple cover the entire $231? Or did they have to pay again for another iPhone even though the one sold to them was broken?
Most cell phone companies have a 30-day return period after you buy a phone where you can return it or exchange at no extra charge to you and no ETF if you decide not to keep the line.
I thought AT&T was the same but I could be wrong…
Where it me, I would have just canceled the contract and left.
Like I always say – with every positive & negative story about any store – it is not the store, it is the employee’s at the store.
They are the ones who give the stores a good & bad name.
“It took me the better part of an entire day to buy and activate my phone, and at one point it looked like I was going to have to pay twice as much, and the first one I bought was defective, but I couldn’t be happier!!”
Kudos to the Apple concierge (really, concierge?) for making things right. But seriously, Apple really has some folks by the short-hairs.
If this exact same experience had happened at say, Wal-Mart, I have a feeling we’d be reading a complaint instead of a kudos.
I don’t understand why anyone would pay 3G’s for an iphone.
If Apple hadn’t stepped up and swallowed the cost of the replacement phone I would have filed a small claims suit against AT&T. If AT&T required an additional $199 for the new phone then it basically means they’re the one selling you the phone. If they’re unwilling to give you a free replacement for defective equipment then you’d be well within your rights to sue them.
Oh no! What will I do without the most cutting edge technology at the very moment it comes out?! How will my social status recover?!?
Apart from stores not having enough stock around here, the launch apparently went successfully.
Rogers in Canada was apparently shit-stormed on because of their proposed rates, and apparently they responded with a new package…
I’m confused.
Your girlfriend bought a defective phone and wanted to take it back. Apple CSR drops it and damages it further. Why does the OP have to pay for a new one? Shouldn’t Apple or AT&T or both replace the phone free of charge, since it was defective straight out of the box?
Or maybe I just missed that part in the letter?
What I’m wondering is why there was any exchange of money in the first place. If I buy a product, it is defective, and I go to the store to exchange said product, I don’t expect to be repaying for anything. At this point it becomes a product for product purchase.
Especially since the purchase of the iPhone has to be on a credit card, I’m not sure I would be comfortable with being charged 2x the amount only to wait another week for the credit to appear.
I also have experience with this at Verizon, I had a new phone sent to activate, which I did, only to find the mic was defective. After about an hour in a nearby Verizon store I walked out with new phone that was functional, all without ever showing my credit card.
To return an iPhone within 30 days they’ll charge you a 10% restocking fee.
@dragonfire1481: i have at&t and i believe, but am not postitive, that they too have the 30 day policy. i’m also pretty sure, given my experience every step of the way when my [normal old, non-apple] phone died, that they are incompetent and sneaky. if it is like my case, they advertise one thing and have some little thing written somewhere else that makes it invalid for 99% of cases, meaning mine! cingular/at&t loses my business next January 13th (because I don’t want to deal with a cancellation fee!).
anyone really love their cellphone company they’d suggest switching to?
My friend and I went on launch day to pick the 3g. I got the white 16gb, he got the 8gb. Well, a couple of hours pass and my friend decides he wants the white 16gb also.
Off we go to the AT&T store and he tells them he wants to change the 8gb for the white 16gb. It was not an issue and all they did was charge the difference and remove the 8gb info from the account and entered the 16gb info. There was no restocking fee or anything like that.
And for what it’s worth I have done this with AT&T a couple of times with different phones. I would get one and decided a couple days even weeks later that I did not like it, then I would go and exchange the phone for another one. I would pay the difference or even swap if the price was the same.
I think the Apple store employees not being accustomed to selling phones and plans and the fact that they might have been talking to a misinformed (dumb) AT&T CSR did not help Joshua’s girlfriends problem.
this new version is a terrible deal. What do you get? GPS running on poorly written mapping software and 3G at dialup speeds ONLY if you’re in a major market.
I have an iPhone running ver. 1.4 jailbroken on TMobile. I can’t imagine being locked into ATT for it though.
@Jubilance22: I think the letter was indicating at that point that the phone had been returned (as defective, refunding the $199+tax) but that they were refusing to let her buy another one (non-defective) at the $199 price because she was already a customer.
At least that was my read.
Trying to avoid flamebait–but from a customer service standpoint I have been really happy with Verizon Wireless.
Now, I hate that they lock their phones down, the data charges are plain crazy and if you aren’t careful you can end up with an expensive monthly charge . . . but
CSRs are pretty friendly, when you escalate you tend to get a reasonable person on the phone, coverage is excellent, you can upgrade and downgrade your phones easily.
I don’t like the phone tree, and every now and then I get some spam. So life isn’t perfect, but I feel like I get my money’s worth and with the state of customer service in this country, I feel like that is a good deal.
@Jubilance22: @enm4r: I had to reread it about 4 times, too. They keep saying exchanged, but at one point, it says that the iPhone linked to the account had been returned, which is why they wouldn’t allow the $200 first-time activation or the original number.
Unless iPhones are different than other phones, swapping one phone for another is no big deal, even with AT&T. It makes me wonder if Apple was the one who screwed up by returning the phone instead of just transferring the phone, causing all this problem. I’ve never had a problem with AT&T swapping one phone for another, and I’ve done it with both Blackberries and regular phones. AT&T just asks you to swap the SIM card, give them the ID off the new phone, and you’re set. I’ve never worked with iPhones, though, so maybe it’s a different story with them.
As it stands, I’m glad it worked out for the OP, but I’m a little suspicious about this due to my past experiences in swapping phones.
@coan_net: There’s an old expression that “sh*t runs downhill.” Bad employees at the bottom are only tolerated by bad management at the top.
@fjordtjie: Been with Alltel for 11 years now. They’re not perfect, but they do seem to genuinely try to get it right. Have had AT&T & Sprint for work phones; absolutely hated AT&T, Sprint just never had signal where I needed to be.
@backbroken: I don’t know. Sounds like Apple went completely out of their way to find a problem to the solution. They even let them bypass everyone else standing in line! The broken phone was their fault, yes, but the difficulty in getting them a new one wasn’t.
I’m just as confused as everyone else. Did you pay for the phone again because you had a faulty phone? That’s what it sounds like in the post. If so, why?
This is actually all AT&T’s fault because I had a similar issue. When I got my iphone on Friday, the Genius that was doing the activations connected my phone to itunes but it wasn’t recognized. Turns out it was due to low battery (<5%), but it took 10-15 minutes of charging for it to work. I wanted to exchange the phone being worried about the battery and when we tried got an error message from AT&T. It said they put a hold on all iphone purchases for 24 hours and any returns done in those 24 hours would lead to having to pay full price for the phone, not the subsidized price. The manager at the Apple store then guaranteed me a 30 day return (since apple has a 14 day policy) and gave me his card and number in case I had any issues.
@acknight: @godlyfrog: Thanks for the explanations, I was really confused. Sounds like it should have been a swap instead of a return and purchase.
Having had to get my iphone replaced the day I bought it because I dropped it all of 5 minutes after leaving the store (apple was great – because it was launch day, they were VERY kind and replaced it for free), I can tell you that the Apple people in NY were very aware that for me to (a) keep the same phone number and (b) get the discounted price so that my ‘return’ would cover the cost, both the return and the new ‘purchase’ needed to be part of the same transaction. There’s a way to do this on the little handheld jobbies, but the salesperson needs to be aware of how it works. I needed approximately 4 apple employees (including a manager) to get through the process correctly on the first try.
@Jubilance22: You’re not confused. AT&T is confused. Apple had to bend over backward to do right by the customer and get around AT&T red tape. Apple: 1 AT&T: 0
Last year I had a pretty good experience with Apple fighting for me with AT&T. I bought the iPhone the day after it came out. After I finally got it activated in the afternoon, I saw that the camera didn’t work. I brought the phone back to the Apple Store that day, they replaced it and called AT&T on my behalf to push through the new activation. I sat at the Genius bar for about 2 hours while they worked on it with AT&T. They were intent on me walking out with a working iPhone, which I did.
My silent switch on my 3G was defective and all they did was “sell” me a new one but zero out the cost so I did not pay anything. It helped that I made an appointment for the next day for an Apple Genius.
Another reason to be smug that I didn’t get the IPhone.
@Tightlines: I guess what I am trying to say is that one man’s unnecessary 12 hour ordeal is another man’s wonderful customer experience. It all depends on your preconceived notions about the retailer.
Instead of Apple/iPhone/Verizon, imagine the original post was about the author’s Black Friday experience buying a brand new Dell laptop at Best Buy. Author waits in line, purchases laptop, then goes home and discovers the speaker doesn’t work. Author takes it back to store where Best Buy employee drops it, provides misinformation regarding the return, then has to wait 5 hours while Best Buy hashes out the return with some faceless off-site Dell representative who wants to charge the customer the retail price to return the laptop. Best Buy eventually replaces the laptop by issuing a gift card for the difference. How do you think that experience would be portrayed? Would we be reading baout the author’s ‘great faith’ in Best Buy’s customer service? I doubt it. We’d be reading about how it took 5 hours to resolve a simple request because the Best Buy/Dell return policies are broken and anti-consumer (followed by 48 commenting clones saying “That’s what you get for shopping at Best Buy. I always use New Egg.”)
FWIW, I’m neither a Dell/Best Buy advocate as I don’t patronize either, nor do I own an iPhone… and I’d probably be one of the clones in the comments.
@SacraBos: I think Apple was confused as well. godlyfrog answered what I suspected, in that Apple actually opened themselves up to this nonsense by handing the transaction incorrectly.
I’m all for them bending over backwards, and my experience with Apple has been similarly great. What matters most is that the customer was happy. But, I do think that had this been handled correctly, they could have avoided the gift card nonsense. Should there be such ridiculous tape regarding exchange vs return/buy? Probably not, but I think in this case most of the work Apple completed was because of the way it was initially handled.
backbroken is absolutely right. Apple is getting a pass on this for no reason other than they are Apple and can do no wrong. It is Apple who chose to partner exclusively with AT&T. Apple set up the activation system with AT&T. They are still at fault here, no matter how nice the CSR is.
@quagmire0: Congratulations threadcrapper. You’re a genius and your post is completely necessary. I agree with your comment that people’s spending habits and desire for new things should fall in line with your habits and expecations, and they certainly should not do what they want.
No problems here with an exchange, although it was noticed before we walked out of the store. Didn’t even have any problems with the fact that the number had been ported over from a different provider.
@AirIntake: I take it you forgot to read all those reports around iPhone 2g that centered around verizon wireless telling apple to basically go f*ck themselves because vzw and apple both wanted more moneys? And vzw and at&t are basically the only two carriers worth going with in the US (tmo? sprint? ya right). Source: [www.usatoday.com] and many others, if you just look around. The terms vzw wanted almost scare me, while some of Apple’s were fairly unreasonable but some were to be expected (like, a cut of the monthly bill..someone/something’s got to pay for ongoing software updates).
AT&T is the worst part of owning an iPhone for sure. When my iPhone 2G came damaged, Apple quickly gave me a replacement no questions asked. I’m sure I’ve read more than one account of people receiving the same treatment from Apple even if the damage was their fault, for the first few weeks of the launch. After that I’ve loved my phone, and I love my new phone, but AT&T keeps fucking up billing.
@backbroken: If they’d gone to Wal-Mart people would be screaming about how this person had to pay TWICE for the same phone. Apple broke the phone, they should eat the entire cost. I can’t believe the cult mentality that allows people to leave being suckered twice and happy for it.
OK, I don’t haven a iPhone but shouldn’t this have been what happened:
- couple return with BAD iPhone
- Apple people agree it’s broken
- Apple people pull a phone from inventory
- Apple people pull her SIM and put it in the new phone
- couple walks away happy and Apple people report the broken phone
I thought you buy the phone from apple but the plan from AT&T – as long as their sim is sitting in a phone, should they even care? Or even know this has happened?
Had a similar problem with AT&T refusing to approve a move to the new phone while in the Apple Store. An Apple employee spent over an hour on the phone with AT&T. The first AT&T support person said I’d have to go to an AT&T store. No way after standing in line at the Apple Store for hours. Finally an AT&T supervisor spent a half hour setting up a new account to go around the AT&T glitch. From what I have learned AT&T has so many restrictions or categories on accounts that those with anything out of the ordinary (like a business account, a discount plan, etc) were denied. Apple was terrific and at one point the manager said we will not let me leave without an activated iPhone.
Clearly AT&T’s greed insisting activation be done in the store complicated this situation.
And now many of us are finding that AT&T’s 3G service has many dead zones and can’t compare to that from Sprint and Verizon. Too bad Apple had to partner with such a scummy company.
@rochec: It is AT&T we’re talking about here.
Yes, I had a similar experience. I posted about it here:
[whatsnextintech.blogspot.com]
Basically, seems like a very brittle system integration between AT&T and Apple.
Only a fanboy will put up with this. I know it was AT&T’s fault, but however I drool over a product, will never sell my soul for it. Lame.
@crazylady: Actually it went like this:
Apple says “Hey Verizon, we’re looking at making a phone, and we want you to be the provider”
Verizon says “Ok, sounds good”
AT&T says “Hey Apple, if you go with us, we’ll give you 10% of our subscription income”
Apple says “Verizon, can you match AT&T’s offer?”
Verizon says “You’re nuts, no phone manufacturer in the world gets a cut of the contracts”
Apple says “I give my rose to you, AT&T!”
AT&T says “Sweet, sign this 4 year exclusivity agreement”
6 months later..
AT&T says “Dear Apple, suck it. We decided to raise the minimum plan rates for the next iphone and we’re no longer going to give you a cut of the contracts.. and there’s nothing you can do about it!”
Apple says “Shit, we should’ve just stayed with verizon and not gotten greedy”
Congratulations to Apple! Good job!
Seems to me that the telcos have way too much power over what phones (and features) they offer – case in point, Verizon Wireless cripples many of their phones, so that certain features, such as Bluetooth and MP3 ringtones, are disabled; and that customers can only use applications that VZW provides. Want to install a mail reader on your phone? That’ll cost ya extra!
Wait, they STILL had to pay $199+tax to replace their defective iPhone? How is that good Guest service? I don’t get it.
So AT&T wouldn’t just exchange the phone, but charged her again? So she had to pay an EXTRA $199 on top of what she originally paid to get her iPhone replaced?
I think this story should be more of a shame on AT&T and on a lesser degree, Apple, for not just replacing the defective phone outright.
There’s more to things that is let on here, I can tell you from experience.
I agree Apple’s getting a pass because it’s Apple. Admittedly, they’re good with iphones; they took and replaced a friend’s iphone that’d had a mysterious dunking in beer because his power wouldn’t come on.
However, exchanging the phones is as easy as swapping the sim numbers. However, iTunes has to be used. Apple set up iTunes to do all the activations in AT&T stores to cut down on iPhones being sold in America and exported overseas, cutting both AT&T and Apple out of our money. It was a huge problem with the first-gen iphones, since Apple gets $18 out of the base $20 data feature.
The fact is the phone just had a busted speaker UNTIL the Apple rep handled it and dropped it. Again, swapping out sim and IMEI numbers is easy enough.
And actually, the reason Apple skipped Verizon was because Verizon wouldn’t sign a deal that didn’t let them put Vcast on the iPhone. Notice that the iPhone doesn’t have AT&T MEdia Net on it.