Michael was having a pretty minor problem with playing television programs in iTunes. Sure, it doesn’t even rank as the a serious first world problem, but he contacted Apple to get it resolved, because that’s what Apple is supposed to do. A senior representative tried to resolve the problem by resetting his iTunes password. Nice idea if it had worked. It didn’t. Now this cord-cutter, who uses his Apple TV to catch up with favorite shows, can’t watch those shows at all. Being locked out of his iTunes account and all.

The ever-present cloud can do amazing things, but just a few keystrokes can lock content you’ve paid for away forever.

Last month, I had what I thought was a minor problem with iTunes (some TV shows would play in iTunes but not Quicktime Player). I opened an issue with Customer Support, and after a few simple fix attempts (log out and back in, delete and redownload the content) it was escalated to a “senior” Representative, who asked if she could reset my iTunes password and send me a new one. I said sure.

That was over two weeks ago.

I thought they were going to reset my password and immediately send me a new one. What actually happened was, they reset the account, but never sent me a new password. So I can’t log in, and can’t access any of my iTunes or iCloud content. My iTunes account is now in some limbo state where it won’t let me reset my password; only Customer Service can do that.

So for two weeks, I haven’t been able to update any of the apps on my iPad or download new ones. My Apple TV is a useless plastic brick. And every day I can only sigh in frustration as I get email notifying me of the new tv shows available for download from all my previously purchased Season Passes, that I can no longer access.

Several months ago I “cut the cord” and cancelled my satellite TV service, so I get all my tv through iTunes. And now I have nothing.

My Customer Service representative has been polite but unhelpful (“Thank you for your patience, we are still working on the issue”). DirecTV had their own problems, but at least with them I never had a service outage for more than a couple hours, let alone a couple weeks.

I tried emailing Tim Cook but didn’t get a response. I don’t know if I’ll ever get my iTunes account back. Will I have to repurchase all my apps and Season Passes?

My advice to anyone working with iTunes Customer Support: if they ask to reset your password, Just Say No.

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