I still don't know how it works. Am I missing something?

At first I thought this was pretty sweet. But after sitting back and looking at this...

At what level do they deem a battery "not certifiable"? Certainly the average Joe will run his battery further into the ground than they will.

Something tells me this is just going to land more batteries in the landfills...

@invisiblenemies: Yes. Yes you are. Read the first paragraph again. Then again.

Explaining the joke makes it significantly less funny, even if I do agree with the sentiment.

Question 1 seems to be blank... I think it should read "Are the batteries new?"

I hate the fact that batteries are non-swappable in so many Apple products. I've had my black and white ipod forever, and it was ridiculous to swap the battery. I don't need anything big and flashy and theft prone. The Macbook Air? What good is a laptop if the battery is dead and you can't replace it? You're tethered to an a/c adapter.

Are Apple fanboys so vain that they need that few millimeters shaved off, and they puke at the thought of a few extra lines for a replaceable battery? Or is there some air of superiority for a super aerodynamic MP3 player?

Man now I'm all worked up.

@bornonbord: No, they will take any battery as long the phone was bought in the last 18 months.

----

They only PASS out certified batteries.

@wcnghj: So you forget to charge your phone and you receive a battery from them that's 'certified' with a 25% charge (Battery A).
You use Battery A until you forget to charge it one day and swap it again, for Battery B. What happens to Battery A?

Maybe it only just doesn't get certified because it's only 20%. It gets tossed in the landfill and they buy a new one to give to the next guy.

Where as if you weren't such a lazy dolt, then you would have charged it, made it through the day, and one less battery would be in the landfill.

@bornonbord: You mean a battery with a 25% capacity?

I am pretty sure they will recycle the battery..

@wcnghj: ::headondesk::

re-read the above and pretend it's ALL hypothetical. And the numbers were pulled out of thin air.

MY POINT is that more batteries will get thrown out.

@downwithmonstercable: Your blasphemous talk will anger the all mighty Prophet Jobs and his fanboi disciples.

@bornonbord: If it's chargeable, they charge it. If it's not, this could actually be a way to keep your phone longer when the battery can't hold a charge, and thus keep it out of the landfill. Not to mention, neither the phone or the battery should go to the landfill ( at least not whole ) as much as possible should be recycled.

@bornonbord:

I'm sure they're recycled, not thrown in a landfill.

This is genius. I'm not in a position to use U.S. Cellular in the near future, but they certainly earned a place for consideration when my contract is up.

@downwithmonstercable: You have it wrong. The batteries are not integrated because the customers were begging for it. They're integrated because the Mothership said it shall be so.

That said, I don't really care as long as the battery life is "long enough". Given the number of times in my life that I have needed to swap a battery in my phone or laptop (zero), it's not that big a deal to me.

I do know that I dropped my T68i and the battery fell out infinitely more often than I intentionally removed it (for any reason apart from changing the SIM card).

Is this a problem for enough people to make the program worth it?

My phone lasts about four days between charges. Charge it every other night, and there's never the possibility of a low-battery problem.

Are there really phones out there that don't even last a day between charges?

@jimconsumer: Yeah, I deleted the explanation.

@Stephen Schenck: The biggest users would probably be those using a full-blown smartphone on a regular basis. I know when I use my Treo's Internet connection extensively I can kill the battery in 3-ish hours ...

If this is just a swap to get a charge, then wouldn't I have to be near a place where the swap can be done? Is there going to be one around every other corner?

Sounds like a program more suited for electric cars.

@ZekeSulastin:
Ha, I guess that does explain it. I keep my phone voice-only. No camera crap, no MP3 player, no texting. Certainly no internet - that's what laptops are for.

@bornonbord: MY POINT is that more batteries will get recycled. - fixed that for you

Wait, have these people ever heard of chargers?

@jonnypage:

Except that recycling most materials causes more environmental damage than replacement.

Reclamation is a different story, but these types of batteries don't lend themselves to it.

@Michael Belisle:

"I broke it and then it stopped working properly" doesn't really enter into a discussion of reliability, though.

@ZekeSulastin:

And you're always near a US Cellular store when this happens? And why are you using internet-on-a-phone extensively? Buy a laptop, or at least a netbook. A cheap linux-based netbook has a battery life of six hours, and is light-years beyond any cellphone's interface. :/

@zekebullseye:

Obviously not. Or perhaps plugging it in while they're at work/the hotel/any occupied building in the free world (or any vehicle!) is just too labor-intensive?

@jonnypage: I completely disagree. This is going to put more batteries in the world.

Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.

The first one there? Yeah, that's because it's the most important.

@K-Bo: I do see your point about phones in landfills, but I don't think it works. I think most average consumers realize they can purchase new batteries for their phones once their battery stops holding a charge. I also truly believe that most consumers would run their battery down further than US Cellular will.

However, I could absolutely be wrong, and it might just be that sad of a state of affairs that people are dumb enough to think "well, my battery won't hold a charge, guess I need a new phone". This is entirely possible, in which case I'm going to go cry myself to sleep.

Wouldn't you know it...somebody here will find something wrong with this plan. Jeeze.

@bornonbord: I've known people to replace a phone because the battery wouldn't hold a charge. If your contract is up and it's $30 for a new battery or free with contract for new phone, many people don't think about the environment, just their wallet.

For a high end phone, I would get a new battery. For a phone I got for free (or even free after rebate)I get a new phone when the battery doesn't hold a charge anymore.
Usually every 2-3 years. By then it's pretty beat up anyway and the camera lens is full of dust and lint from carrying it in my pocket.

Can I swap a damaged battery? Mine works, but has been water damaged.

@downwithmonstercable: Yeah, it could be a pain to a certain degree, I've never had a problem in any Apple product regarding battery life, so switching the battery has been a moot point. And I don't have the money to buy the newest product as soon as it's out, so I've kept all my Apples for a pretty long time. But, why so harsh on Apple users? If they want to pay more for a laptop or MP3 player that they think works better or just looks cooler, isn't that their right? Sounds like jealous talk to me. Hehe.

But I will grant that all the overly-vocal, Windows-bashing Apple users tend to give the rest of us a bad name.

For the people who don't understand this, I'll give you a perfect example of when I should use this:

About a month ago, I borrowed a buddies car to drive about 25 miles to buy some Braves tickets from a guy. On the way, my phone died and since I didn't have a car in Atlanta, I never brought a car charger to school with me.

Long story short, I got stuck in traffic and could call the guy to tell him I would be running 20 minutes late. When I got there, he was gone, and I didn't have his phone number because it was in my phone.

Maybe I should have been a little bit more prepared, but life does happen and in cases like this, it would have been nice to walk into a store, give them my old battery and grab a new one. Then I could have called the guy, got my Braves tickets and spent my night paying way too much for beer and junk food while watching baseball in person rather then paying way too much for beer and junk food and watching baseball on TV.

@ZekeSulastin: On a day-to-day basis, wouldn't it be far simpler to carry an extra charged battery yourself than go hunt for a US cellular kiosk/store?

The only use I can see for this is if you've [ab]used your battery to the point that it no longer holds a good charge, you can roll the swap-my-battery-for-free dice.

@oblivious87: "Maybe I should have been a little bit more prepared"

Please, I still don't understand. I need a more perfect example.

@K-Bo: On that note - You have 5 months til your contract is up. Why not get a fresh battery for free? You get one from US Cell, 5 months later, sign a new contract, get a new phone with a new battery, and toss the old one. That's 3 batteries and 2 phones.

I see holes in my own argument, and I'm not saying there's any sure-fire way to handle this, but I don't like US Cell's approach to "When you just happen to have forgotten to charge your phone". More batteries will be used. It's lazy and wasteful

What I want to know is if you have an older phone and your battery has lost it's ability to hold a charge, can you use this program to get a better battery? If it is a program they plan on promoting heavly they must know that there will people who use it for this purpose. So what happens to my old shitty battery? Does it go into the program and get given to some poor sap, or an I going to be flagged as "That girl who gives unusable batteries" because my old one doesn't pass "certification"? hummmm....

@bornonbord: You really don't know much about US Cellular.

#1. You only have one battery at a time, they won't let you keep the old one.

#2. You can renew a 12 month contract at 10 months and a 24 month contract at 18 months.

#3. Wased? they would get thrown away anyway by the owner once they don't hold a charge.

@wcnghj:
1. You give them one. They give you one. That's TWO batteries. What will they do with your old one if it doesn't meet their criteria for being 'certified'? Just because you were lazy and didn't charge your battery, they might throw it out.

2. Good for US Cell customers

3. I'm saying that US Cellular will be disposing of batteries that the average person wouldn't yet dispose of. US Cellular won't give you a battery that only lasts a day, but that is perfectly acceptable for many people who have older batteries.

@starzshine: Old battery will get tossed in the garbage. This is exactly the point of my comment.

@bornonbord: Batteries take a while to die. By the time they won't reliably hold a charge, generally speaking, it'll have been two or three years and the customer will be up for a steep discount on a new phone to lock them into a contract anyway.

In short, it's not so much "My battery won't charge, new phone time!" as "My battery won't charge, new batteries are $50, shiny new phones are $40, and the shiny new phones have more/better features than mine".

@RandomZero: Ok, as shitty as that is (and it is), it's still better for the phones to go through that and get tossed than to add even more batteries to the mix. In your scenario, there's a one-battery to one-phone ratio. If you consider this battery swap program, that will add even more batteries to the mix.

@starzshine:

To answer your initial question: Yes, you can get a fully charged battery at no cost as long as your account is not suspended and your phone model is included in the program.

Your second question: When your old battery is taken in, it is shipped off-site to be handled externally. Your retail store will not be using their judgement to test and send batteries back into the program. Once a large enough quantity is taken in and/or inventory levels of the fully charged batteries are low, the old batteries are shipped out and replacements are shipped to fulfill location requirements.

Your ability to participate in the program will not be hindered in any way if you submit only unusable batteries. That's the point of the program. To let you rest assured that when and if you ever need a battery and qualify for this program you can simply stop in and receive a replacement. Although, after the 4 initial swaps per month, you should be looking at either the phone or your charger as the potential issue...

@Hannah Munn Luce:
Yes.