All of Best Buy's Nearly 1,000 Stores Now Offer Apple-Certified Repairs in the United States

[iShater]

My recent cracked screen and depleted battery replacements have all been at Best Buy. Easy to sign up, get in on time, and typically it is done faster than estimated time.

 

[Guscat]

They don't repair or replace on the spot.

For an iPhone that goes tango uniform, you are stuck waiting for the repair to come back. Never mind you no longer have a phone for a week and cannot call or be called.

As iPhone hardware is very buggy (every iPhone I have ever had has had a factory defect), this is a very lame service.

All Best Buy does is check out the hardware with an Apple diagnostic tool and apologize for leaving you without a phone line for a week while they send it in to Apple. Pure Applesauce

How many iPhones have you owned? 1? 0? I've owned iPhones ever since Sept 2007 and my wife has had them since early 2008, and other than needing to get my X replaced and problems with lint buildup in my charging ports, we've never had any hardware problems with our phones.

 

[brgjoe]

Love it. Assuming they are competent.

The nearest Apple Stores are 3-4 hours away. The nearest Best Buy is a little over an hour. So this really does help.

 

[dilbert99]

Not true. All stores starting at June 1 has full repair options. Screens, microphones, etc. all could be done in house and store even with a walk in appointment. Only iPhones are done in house.

Tell Louis Rossman, I bet he will tell you Apple repairs nothing and doesn't allow anyone else to repair things either.
Apple just replace your device most of the time.
Apple don't do repairs that require soldering so I am guessing that mic/jack replacements would be a no.
[doublepost=1561021045][/doublepost]

How many iPhones have you owned? 1? 0? I've owned iPhones ever since Sept 2007 and my wife has had them since early 2008, and other than needing to get my X replaced and problems with lint buildup in my charging ports, we've never had any hardware problems with our phones.

All my iPhones except for the iPhone 3gs have been replaced, some of them replaced twice.

 

[alexandr]

"But I was going into Tosche Station to pick up some power converters and get my iPhone fixed!" - Luke Skywalker, provincial

yea, but that was a long long time ago...

 

[aneftp]

Honestly. Not worth your time at Best Buy if u have apple store within driving distance.

I had the dreaded white spot iPad Pro 10.5 screen. Under Apple care. I figure I would drive 8 minutes to Best Buy Store. Rather than 20 min to Apple store.

Even with known defective white spot.
1. Best Buy tried to charge me $49 fee (cause they said it’s mandatory even though there is zero damage to device)
2. They would need to ship it out anyways.

Wtf? Why am I even at Best Buy

I immediately called Apple care while in store. They immediately shipped me replacement iPad Pro over night.

Charge me $0

And when I got new replacement iPad Pro. I sent old one back to Apple.

So do yourself a favor. It’s easier to ship the device out to Apple under Apple care than visit Best Buy who will ship it out anyways.

 

[truthertech]

They don't repair or replace on the spot.

For an iPhone that goes tango uniform, you are stuck waiting for the repair to come back. Never mind you no longer have a phone for a week and cannot call or be called.

As iPhone hardware is very buggy (every iPhone I have ever had has had a factory defect), this is a very lame service.

All Best Buy does is check out the hardware with an Apple diagnostic tool and apologize for leaving you without a phone line for a week while they send it in to Apple. Pure Applesauce

Completely, utterly false. So much so, it sounds like fake news by a Best Buy or Apple competitor. Best Buy has certified Apple repair staff who perform same day repairs, many while you wait. They also offer exchanges for warranty repairs that are so extensive they need to be sent back to Apple.

"*Same-day repair for iPhone 6s and newer is available at a Best Buy store near you. Appointment required. Device must be dropped off before 6 p.m. local time. Most repairs will be completed same-day if all necessary parts are in stock and device is not extensively damaged."

 

[macduke]

More of a generalization, really. Most Apple Stores ARE in metropolitan or suburban (read: high population) areas, which is generally the opposite of rural areas (lower population).

The generalization is my problem. There are a lot of cities with hundreds of thousands of people that don't have Apple Stores and aren't rural. There aren't cows wandering around downtown on a Friday night. In many areas there is a certain stigma of using the word "rural" to describe somebody, typically made by people who live on the coast who like to think that all of the middle of American "flyover" country can all my lumped together as one cultural or political ideology. I live in the Midwest and it has been frustrating to overcome that stereotype.
[doublepost=1561045408][/doublepost]

Tallahassee is the capitol of Florida and probably the closest Apple Store would be in Jacksonville (about 2 1/2 hour drive). This is great for a lot of my relatives who have easy access to a Best Buy.

Yeah, not sure why people don't get that. I live in a college town that is also one of the biggest cities in the state and is nearby the capitol which is also one of the biggest cities in the state and combined there is a population of around 400,000 and the closest Apple Store is about 2 hours away.

I usually get a new iPhone every year. I started with 3GS and I've never had a hardware problem. I help my family with their tech issues and they've never had a hardware problem either.

I do too, starting with the original, and I've had the following issues:

• Original 2007 iPhone had bubbles develop under the display, replaced (this was my first Apple device)
• It was either my 3G or 3gs that had dead pixels on arrival and they replaced it
• iPhone 4 had antenna issues that would cause it to get hot and drain the battery really quickly in certain areas. It also had a horrible large green spot in the middle of the camera. Both of those were design flaws, so nothing could be done.
• My wife had the battery issue on her iPhone 5 and had it replaced as a part of that program.
• iPhone 6 Plus had all kinds of issues crashing frequently and general laggy behavior, likely due to being spec'd with only 1GB of RAM and a 1080p display it could barely run
• iPhone 6s had an overheating home button issue where it would get hot to the touch while charging and cause the phone to shut off/reboot. They replaced it, and that is when I made some higher up contacts in Apple, lol.

Since then all my iPhones have been great.

I've also had issues with:

• 2008 MacBook Pro Nvidia GPU issues, replaced entire logic board
• 2012 MacBook Pro image retention issue, they replaced the display
• 2012 iMac image retention issues at work, not as severe, was too much of a hassle to replace
• 2017 iPad Pro wouldn't charge after one month, had the Lightning port short out and left a black scorch mark on my Lightning cable, they replaced it
• 2017 iPad Pro Keyboard Case came apart at the seams, they replaced it
• I got an iMac Pro at work a couple months ago and have been having issues with BT locking up all the time for both mouse and keyboard. Wondering if it's a T2 chip issue, but it could be a software issue for all I know yet. Makes me glad I got the 2019 iMac 5K maxed out for home use, which seems just as speedy, just a little louder and way cheaper.

So yeah, issues happen.
[doublepost=1561045476][/doublepost]

Howso? Apple puts stores in urban and growing suburban areas. Outside of that they are, by definition, exurban or rural and exurban people can go to the suburbs, whereas the rural users like cannot without a great deal of effort. Very logical.?

Because there are cities that don't have Apple Stores.

 

[thettareddast]

.

Electronics are complex. The more complex that something is, the more potential failures. And ekectronics are delicate. Why do you think race cars and rockets require so many handlers and constant observation?

Is it because race cars and rockets are essentially one-off products, stressed to their absolute thermal and mechanical limits, and carry high-critical missions/rewards with disastrous consequences in case of failure....where telephones are manufactured in the millions with less stringent design constraints and lower operating demands?

Any other great analogies to share?
[doublepost=1561046966][/doublepost]

The closest Best Buy to my rural area is the same distance as the closest Apple store.

With all due respect, do you really think rural areas have Best Buy stores? lol.

You don't think the largest consumer electronics retailer in America has a broader geographic footprint than an upscale brand with narrower product range?

 

[nouveau_redneck]

You don't think the largest consumer electronics retailer in America has a broader geographic footprint than an upscale brand with narrower product range?

Of course Best Buy has a larger footprint than Apple. What made you think I suggested it doesn't? Perhaps you need to reread my posts, or take a reading comprehension class.

 

[DoctorTech]

No thanks. I don't want paid FBI informants snooping around my devices. I don't have anything to hide but I really dislike the FBI paying Best Buy employees to go on fishing expeditions to see what they can find on someone's electronic devices. The 4th Amendment to the Constitution prohibits the FBI from doing warrantless searches of someone's electronic devices and "probable cause" is required for a judge to issue a search warrant. The FBI decided to bypass our Constitutional protections by paying Best Buy employees to search people's computers for them.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech...-informants-flag-child-pornography/406822002/

 

[Defthand]

Is it because race cars and rockets are essentially one-off products, stressed to their absolute thermal and mechanical limits, and carry high-critical missions/rewards with disastrous consequences in case of failure....where telephones are manufactured in the millions with less stringent design constraints and lower operating demands?

Any other great analogies to share?

I admit, it was a poorly phrased analogy, but it's accurate nonetheless. I wasn't comparing race cars and rockets to phones. I was comparing race cars and rockets to their simpler relatives. You don't agree that a mobile phone with its complex circuitry and delicate casing is more vulnerable than an analog phone from yesteryear?

 

[thettareddast]

Of course Best Buy has a larger footprint than Apple. What made you think I suggested it doesn't? Perhaps you need to reread my posts, or take a reading comprehension class.

It is an implausibility that apple will neighbor every farmer in America.

Apple is adding more certified servicing locations. Multiple times what they have now. Each new service point added, it follows, will reduce average distance for all consumers to a servicing location.

Within the boundary formed by the servicing network, each new node will gain net reach for all people, be they urban dwellers, suburbanites, rural folk.

Is that math too difficult or do you need it further explained?
[doublepost=1561061801][/doublepost]

I admit, it was a poorly phrased analogy, but it's accurate nonetheless. I wasn't comparing race cars and rockets to phones. I was comparing race cars and rockets to their simpler relatives. You don't agree that a mobile phone with its complex circuitry and delicate casing is more vulnerable than an analog phone from yesteryear?

Modern electronics are immensely capable and complex. (Arguably, phones are more complex than rockets). Higher complexity can have more points of failure, yes. But the analogy to maintenance requirements of rockets is wrong for reasons stated, and moreso the conclusion that these electronics (=iPhones) are inherently fragile and error prone due simply to being modern is very wrong.

Modern means advanced engineering and advanced manufacturing, and the requirements of producing to maintain brand reputation for a product serving literally millions of people.

iPhones and other leading smartphones are actually resilient and reliable. There's empirical evidence from hundreds of millions of them having been made and used. And if you think about a single handheld device that records, produces, and plays music, and captures photos, and transmits photos, and enables video chats, and plays games, and God knows what else -- and it's being used 6+ hours a day, every day of the year, over the useful life of 3 to 4 years.....imagine telling someone with a 1998 Walkman and Kodak digital camera about that sort of longevity.

I mean a rock pebble will lasts for hundreds of millions of years, but it don't do sh*t

 

[lordofthereef]

Does this mean if I have device with active AppleCare and the device must be replaced Best Buy will replace it?

I can tell you first hand (well technically second hand, and you will read why) that unfortunately it doesn't if they don't have the phone in stock. To complicate matters worse, they don't have a good way to replace a phone that gets damaged during repair if they don't already have it in stock.

Obviously this all may change down the road. But my wife has been having to deal with a 6s that was damaged in repair for a customer, the official Apple chat channels they (Best Buy) have haven't been of much help, and it's just been a bit of a s$&@show.