As I wrote a few weeks ago, I recently bought myself a beautiful new MacBook Pro. I love the thing: it is the most beautiful computer I have ever owned. Nevertheless, Apple didn’t make it easy for me to give them two thousand dollars. Between that and the smug jackasses working the Genius Bars whom you practically have to beg to just try to fix your computers, I love my Apple just as much as I want to insert a catheter up one of those Geniuses’ urethras and then force him to jump up and down on a trampoline.

Rob A’s got a similar problem with Apple, only he doesn’t like his new MacBook. Frankly, he’s crazy, but we’ll leave that out of it. Rob’s story of Apple’s incompetence and lies after the jump:

A few days ago, I purchased a brand new MacBook from an Apple retail store, but found it fairly unsatisfactory, and returned it (no easy task), eating the 10% restocking fee in the process. Or so I had hoped. When I bought it, I had put most of the cost onto an Apple Credit account (with Juniper Bank) and the remainder onto my debit card. When I returned it, the lovely-yet-disinterested clerk assured me the whole balance could be refunded onto the credit account, an amount that exceeded my actual credit line by about $400. Despite my objections, she forced the system to accept the refund, gave me a reciept, and sent me on my way.

Fast forward to today, Friday: big surprise, a call to Juniper Bank tells me that only the amount up to my credit line was refunded. Nothing further is forthcoming, and the service rep told me that “Apple Retail should know that.” I call up the store after that, and talk to yet another lovely-yet-disinterested clerk, who puts me on hold repeatedly before trying to put me off entirely. First she says that the $400 descrepancy is the restocking fee, then she dictates my reciept back to me, the one I’d been reading to her, and says that since the receipt shows a full refund, she can’t do anything, finally she declares that my problem is with Apple Credit, not Apple Retail.

After I assure her that the restocking fee was only $100, as per the receipt, and that Apple Credit told me the exact opposite, she relented with a sigh and said she could have Apple Corporate get back to me, maybe “around Tuesday.”

So as it stands, I’m out $400 (which as a poor college student, I’d like back) because nobody at Apple Retail sees fit to actually listen to customers when they’re making returns or complaints. Rest assured, I won’t be making any further Apple purchases, up to now, I’ve had no beef with them, but this is easily the worst retail runaround I’ve ever had.

And I’ve returned things at Best Buy.

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