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Apple Still Facing Criticism Over Warranty Issues in Europe as Lawsuits Spread to More Countries
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Why is this not one of them? If I spend £1500 on a Apple laptop/computer which in green back is $2250 I expect it to work flawlessly for more than a year at the very least. That is what the EU Law is designed to protect the consumer from. It is not complicated bureaucracy. Its common sense. We are not asking Apple to stop Apple Care indeed most would purchase (as I have done in the past) it for the third and indeed even the fourth year. What common sense says is that if you have paid good money for something that should have a reasonable life span, the company making it should provide warranty for it for a reasonable life span. What do consider a reasonable life span for MacBook/Pro, iMac, iPhone etc - 1 year? Your argument suggests that 1 year life span for these products is more than adequate, EU law disagrees - simple.
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I know it is a typo, there is a better chance of getting a warrant than warranty.
If you look at the link the other gentlemen sent, Samsung offers one year on laptops.
True; but, as this discussion shows, people tend to muddle the difference. And if a manufacturer can't differentiate themselves with a better level of service, why would they continue to offer it?
You don't know me, you don't know where I live or work or buy stuff regardless of the fact that's don't change my profile every time I am somewhere else.
And who are you to say I don't have a right to point out when folks are making baseless assumptions or simply uneducated.
If you don't like me or my right to speak there's a thing called an ignore list. Use it.
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A lot of civil cases are filed with a lack of proof. Proves nothing other than someone thinks someone did wrong. Assumption of guilt by the filing party shows up in a good half of the patent suits that get filed,for example. And then the second thing the filing party does is file motions for the items they believe will prove guilt. Things they couldn't get without a court order.
And as said, settling isn't an admission of guilt but just a lack of desire to deal with the crap and a belief that following through on the suit will be more costly than just paying the damn fine etc.
i still don't see why apple doesn't just roll apple care into the cost of its systems next time it refreshes a line and advertise everything as having a 3 year warrenty
That is the part folks are ignoring. You have to take it to court. Not this go scream at them and they have to give in nonsense. Apple knows this which s why when some asshat comes in 14 months out screaming 'Sale of Goods Act' they say contact their lawyers
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No it isn't. If it was then it would state from the manufacturer for any flaw at any time that isn't due to mishandling etc for a period of X months/years.
The EU law is about the seller and protecting you from being sold something the seller knows or as reason to suspect it total crap. It would be like, to use another thread, if Apple knew point blank that every LG retina display was a total failure straight off the line and put them in the machines anyway knowing that they were full of dead pixels, etc because they paid a lot of money for the screens and don't want to trash them so they hope no one notices. THAT is what the EU law is about.
As always with stupid people, I see the same 90% on here attempting to construct an argument while remaining ignorant (or choosing to ignore) half the facts.
The Apple extended warranty goes above and beyond the EU 2 year requirement for consumer protection. Unless somebody in the Apple store is saying "If you don't buy Apple Care, you are ****** out of luck if your product fails after only 1 year." In that case, it would be fraudulent. That's not even close to what is really happening.
The reality - the EU is saying "please go out of your way to over-explain consumer law to our coddled little babies who don't know better. Oh and, give us some of that money from your fat pile of cash because we're all broke from working about 5 hours a day (on a good day)."
The Apple extended warranty goes above and beyond the EU 2 year requirement for consumer protection. Unless somebody in the Apple store is saying "If you don't buy Apple Care, you are ****** out of luck if your product fails after only 1 year." In that case, it would be fraudulent. That's not even close to what is really happening.
The reality - the EU is saying "please go out of your way to over-explain consumer law to our coddled little babies who don't know better. Oh and, give us some of that money from your fat pile of cash because we're all broke from working about 5 hours a day (on a good day)."
Mrs. Reading apparently hasn't looked at Apple's website.
First, it isn't Apple's job to teach people about statutory rights. Educating people is the job of schools, governments, consumer protection agencies, and so on. The only thing that a seller has to do legally is to not make any statements that could make a customer believe they have fewer rights than they have; in the UK this is done by writing "your statutory rights are not affected" in the right places.
Second, on Apple's website, they do a pretty good job of actually telling people about their statutory rights, even though they don't have a legal obligation to do so.
1. Apple has no duty to fix problems after your warranty runs out if you didn't buy the product from Apple. So if someone says "Apple refused to fix my iPad after 15 months", we have not the slightest idea whether Apple should have fixed it or not.
2. The rule is to make people want to help you. That applies almost everywhere. Screaming "Sale of Goods Act" makes people not want to help you, and then things go downhill. Give the sales person a chance to be the hero who helps a customer in need of help, and your chances are a lot better.
3. The interesting time is 12 to 24 months, where according to UK law it is up to the buyer to prove that the fault was present when the product was sold. Apple's rule is not saying "contact your lawyers", Apple's rule is that a genius looks at the damage; if the Genius decides Apple should fix it then it is fixed, otherwise contact your lawyer. Since the Genius is a human being, how the customer behaves might very well influence the decision (see above).
First, it isn't Apple's job to teach people about statutory rights. Educating people is the job of schools, governments, consumer protection agencies, and so on. The only thing that a seller has to do legally is to not make any statements that could make a customer believe they have fewer rights than they have; in the UK this is done by writing "your statutory rights are not affected" in the right places.
Second, on Apple's website, they do a pretty good job of actually telling people about their statutory rights, even though they don't have a legal obligation to do so.
1. Apple has no duty to fix problems after your warranty runs out if you didn't buy the product from Apple. So if someone says "Apple refused to fix my iPad after 15 months", we have not the slightest idea whether Apple should have fixed it or not.
2. The rule is to make people want to help you. That applies almost everywhere. Screaming "Sale of Goods Act" makes people not want to help you, and then things go downhill. Give the sales person a chance to be the hero who helps a customer in need of help, and your chances are a lot better.
3. The interesting time is 12 to 24 months, where according to UK law it is up to the buyer to prove that the fault was present when the product was sold. Apple's rule is not saying "contact your lawyers", Apple's rule is that a genius looks at the damage; if the Genius decides Apple should fix it then it is fixed, otherwise contact your lawyer. Since the Genius is a human being, how the customer behaves might very well influence the decision (see above).
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I consider a reasonable warranty whatever is offered by the vendor, and that I agree to purchase. Responsible consumers don't need to the government to 'protect' them. If I don't like the warranty, I won't buy the product. Period.
That being said, Apple needs to comply with the law there (or pull out entirely). They should also raise the prices on products in the EU and Australia to cover the cost of complying with that law. Consumers have no right to get something for free - and shouldn't complain when local prices are higher than the US.
VAT tax falls in the same category.
No, it isn't.
Totally not.
If the seller knowingly sells "total crap" (broken products), that's called deceit - which has got nothing to do with statutory consumer warranties.
Consumer warranty laws also apply to non-conformity arising without any intention or negligence from the seller - which is the vast majority of warranty cases.
Gee what a great idea. Apple should raise prices on you. Haha
BTW, its not "THEY better be ready to pay for it." its "WE better be ready to pay for it".
Never fails. Every single thread on Macrumors has at least one person like this.
Apple tells you that you get 1 year _manufacturer's warranty_. Your government or whoever wants to help consumers should tell you about _statutory rights_, which is an entirely different thing.
After one year, the product isn't covered by Apple's manufacturer's warranty. You can return the product _to the seller_ who is responsible for giving you your statutory rights. That seller may be Apple, or may be someone else. In most places, you will have to show that the fault existed when you received the product.
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Sure they do. There is a link on the "Apple Care" page that leads to all the information you could want.
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In the UK, there is "warranty" and there are "statutory rights". "Warranty" is what the manufacturer gives you voluntarily. "Statutory rights" are the rights that the law gives you as a consumer against the seller.
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And we don't care if other companies behave worse than Apple, especially Samsung. It's only when other companies make bigger phones, that's when they are shining examples.
(Haven't actually looked at Samsung's warranty, but Dell doesn't mention your statutory rights at all, not even on the page where they sell you two years extended warranty, and since Dell doesn't sell through other stores, Dell is _always_ the one responsible for statutory rights).
IMHO Apple Care is way overpriced. I always had IBM/Lenovo Thinkpads and you can purchase 4 years of extended warranty for any of their notebooks for just EUR 100-200,- This includes global (!) on-site repair (next business day).
When I had a dead pixel I called Lenovo and they sent some technician to my hotel in Germany who swapped the panel for me. Just one phone call, no bring-in, no time without my business notebook. All for EUR 149,- by then.
When I had a dead pixel I called Lenovo and they sent some technician to my hotel in Germany who swapped the panel for me. Just one phone call, no bring-in, no time without my business notebook. All for EUR 149,- by then.
especially when paying premium price for the products and paying premium price to extend warranty.
Let's say you open a store that sells iPads. If you buy your iPads at Costco and sell them with some markup, then that's a bad business idea, and payments for statutory rights will eat you alive. What you will be doing is to sign a contract with Apple; and that contract will tell you exactly what Apple will pay you if you have to fix a problem with an Apple product.
If you buy from a manufacturer who you think will not reimburse you for that kind of cost (because they just won't, or they will avoid paying out, or they might go bankrupt), you must make sure that your markup is higher accordingly.
And just saying: _All_ products are subject to this law.
yeah.. maybe..
dunno, i haven't read much about this other than the front page blurb and the comments up to pg3 so maybe i shouldn't have replied in the first place
so yeah, i could be wrong but i took this as the governments seeking to get apple to comply to their rules of commerce (or whatever)..
not some money grubbing lawyers trying to sue apple simply because they have lots of cash..
(though i do understand the lawyers seek to gain a cut of any fines which may be imposed upon apple in these actions)
Just a clarification: "Faulty" doesn't mean "not working". If a fan in your laptop is designed to work for three years, then a faulty fan could stop working after 18 months. That fan would have been faulty from day one; the fault isn't that it's not spinning and cooling your laptop, the fault is that it breaks too early.
Yes, I understand what you're saying....
However, part of the law says that you have to 'PROVE' that the fan only lasting 18 months was because of a faulty fan, and not you dropping the laptop a bazillion times or using your laptop in a non-normal place like inside a machine shop or in a snowstorm.
I would think that part of the law would require a lawyer if the merchant in question either does not believe you or is unscrupulous.
Of course not, the issue is however when, in the face of inquiries and demands, Apple refused to fix or replace a faulty item for free in the second year and instead told everyone that they need to pay for fixes, repairs or replaced (refurbished) units in that second year if they didn't have AppleCare when Apple was legally obligated to provide that fix for free.
Until now, Apple refused to acknowledge or comply with their legal responsibilities in this country, probably because they recognised that most people aren't prepared to go to court for the cost of a $250 refurb iPhone or $500 repair job.
I'd say this change has come about because of their upcoming appearance at a parliamentary enquiry.