I was at a foam party in a club in Europe and my second-hand, out of AppleCare, iPhone 4 got damaged in the water. So I googled around to see what to do. There seemed to be a consensus that you'd be out of luck with Apple, and would need to go to a third party repair place. NO, that is not correct. I went to get my phone fixed, and the guy half fixed it, enough to get my data off, but not really usable. So I went into the Apple store to talk to someone about what else I could do, and they told me that I could simply bring it in, pay 150 pounds, and get a new refurbished one! So I picked up the phone from the repair guy and brought it in to the genius bar. Unfortunately, the repair guy hadn't even put the rear camera back in! So they said that repairing it counted as abuse of the device or some such thing, and I no longer qualified for the trade-in 
I asked them if they needed the camera so the could refurbish the device and he said no they don't do that they just recycle it. Oh, and the guy's business card said he was a "Certified Macintosh Technician", but it turns out he had let that "lapse", so that counted against them honouring the exchange as well.
So, word to the wise, no matter what all the websites say, bring your iPhone to Apple first. Only if you're out of luck, then try to get it repaired. At least that's how it works in Europe.
I asked them if they needed the camera so the could refurbish the device and he said no they don't do that they just recycle it. Oh, and the guy's business card said he was a "Certified Macintosh Technician", but it turns out he had let that "lapse", so that counted against them honouring the exchange as well.So, word to the wise, no matter what all the websites say, bring your iPhone to Apple first. Only if you're out of luck, then try to get it repaired. At least that's how it works in Europe.