I was going to say this. It would have saved you all those multiple trips back to the mall if the first time you went in, you had this video of it happening. One time, my brother's BMW was having serious electrical problems and I video'd it. We took it into the dealership and they could not reproduce the issue, so we showed them the video, and we got service right away.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Applecare Horror story
- Thread starter robbie12345
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I was going to say this. It would have saved you all those multiple trips back to the mall if the first time you went in, you had this video of it happening. One time, my brother's BMW was having serious electrical problems and I video'd it. We took it into the dealership and they could not reproduce the issue, so we showed them the video, and we got service right away.
If you don't like my opinion, put me on ignore instead of attempting to play the "holier than thou" card. You can't have it both ways and insult me at the same time - that just makes you a hypocrite.
If me calling people out for what they are pisses them off? Well that's just a shame. I'm sure I'll lose sleep over it tonight.
Haha, yeh I just meant with tax included and all, but its close to 200 nonetheless.
Actually... And this is nitpicky, I know... AppleCare is a service, so it's not taxed. Only physical goods are taxed. But I get what you're saying.
Just recalling days when I had to scold employees (not at Apple) for trying to sell AppleCare with tax added.
One more thing to add, and not an excuse but... Sometimes GSX is wonky and difficult to navigate. If you don't read the service news religiously it's easy to miss a notice. Sometimes searching on a serial number doesn't bring up related REP information either. Like when you search a serial it's supposed to give you a list of key articles for that system, not always the case. It's gotten a lot better in recent years. This doesn't excuse the service you got but having used apple's service tools I could see how information about a machine specific service program could come in under a tech's radar.
One time Apple lost my MacBook on the way back from the service depot for a 3 weeks span and the best they could offer was a 10% off coupon. That did rub me the wrong way. The manager at that store seemed genuinely distraught but claimed it was the best he could offer for my trouble.
I think you are asking a bit too much... It's Ok to get some sort of compensation, but getting an Ipad Air 32GB Wifi+4G... that's way too much and complete unrealistic.
Also, when I read such posts, I'd really like how people are expressing and communicating with the geniuses. I've always thought that being kind and clear about the problem is the first and most important step to solve the problem.
I've worked as a computer technician and I've seen too many rude and/or unclear people, with whom it was usually difficult to deal with and/or help. Also working as a Software engineer, I have met some project managers that they were impossible to deal with... every sentence they let out was unnecessarily confusing and then they asked why people didn't do what they asked for. Go figures.
Also, when I read such posts, I'd really like how people are expressing and communicating with the geniuses. I've always thought that being kind and clear about the problem is the first and most important step to solve the problem.
I've worked as a computer technician and I've seen too many rude and/or unclear people, with whom it was usually difficult to deal with and/or help. Also working as a Software engineer, I have met some project managers that they were impossible to deal with... every sentence they let out was unnecessarily confusing and then they asked why people didn't do what they asked for. Go figures.
The OP has been in this thread railing against Apple, the Genius Bar, and saying he's going to tell them he'll sue them if he doesn't get a 32GB wifi+4G Air. You and I both know exactly how he treated the people at the Genius Bar.
Even though yours is an extremely rare horror story from Applecare, I'd just like to post how much better Applecare is, both in general and even compared to this instance, than almost ANY other computer brand out there. For example, last week I needed a Windows laptop for work/school unfortunately. So I got a brand new one (i7, windows 8, nice overall). As soon as I got this, I ran through the seemingly endless updates. Finally, after having updated everything, I decided to update to windows 8.1 as it's free. Towards the end of an extremely long install procedure, it finally threw an exception and gave me some esoteric error code to investigate on my own... Long story short, I have spent many hours researching this online, turns out that many others have this problem and in no way can update to windows 8.1 (even with my brand new/nice laptop!). It turns out, in fact, that Microsoft doesn't even know the exact cause of this error (despite having been released for months now).
Back to the point of this post: I called Acer (the manufacturer) to see if they would help me wipe everything clean and install a fresh new copy of windows 8 to start over again. In essence, the barely comprehendible non-native English tech guy told me "no". The best he could do was bring it back to the Acer factory condition (which is not the same and a clean install after all the special drivers/bloatware they put into their hidden partition). He was perfectly fine leaving me with this problem as unsolved. Furthermore, he couldn't talk to me about other solutions to this problem because it would lead me to install/do something that Acer didn't want me to.
I'm still resolving this issue (hopefully I've found a lucky workaround since I'm a graduate student that can get free software), but the moral is that I've never had this bad of an experience with anything to do with Apple-whether is was dealing with my laptop, phone, iPad, etc...They have always stayed with me until the problem was solved (regardless of what the solution was) AND I was content.
True it is that sometimes you'll deal with incompetent Geniuses that don't help you the best way, but at least if you stick with them and keep pressing, you'll be happy in the end. In fact, from my lengthy experience with Apple, I know that I'm usually more happy after my problem is fixed than before it happened because I usually walk away from the Apple store with a new device In any case, since you're issue was eventually resolved, I think you had a better experience with Apple than I have had with my brand new P(iece of) C(rap) that I can't even run the latest software on.
PS: I swear every other laptop manufacturer is still trying to copy the MBPro and MBAir designs. At least that means my new buggy laptop isn't as ugly as they used to be.
----------
One more thing: I would gladly pay $200 (or whatever you think Applecare used to cost) for anyone/company to address my any issue with my computer for 2 years. The sad thing is, no company does this in the PC world since there is so much fragmentation between hardware & software design/implementation.
Back to the point of this post: I called Acer (the manufacturer) to see if they would help me wipe everything clean and install a fresh new copy of windows 8 to start over again. In essence, the barely comprehendible non-native English tech guy told me "no". The best he could do was bring it back to the Acer factory condition (which is not the same and a clean install after all the special drivers/bloatware they put into their hidden partition). He was perfectly fine leaving me with this problem as unsolved. Furthermore, he couldn't talk to me about other solutions to this problem because it would lead me to install/do something that Acer didn't want me to.
I'm still resolving this issue (hopefully I've found a lucky workaround since I'm a graduate student that can get free software), but the moral is that I've never had this bad of an experience with anything to do with Apple-whether is was dealing with my laptop, phone, iPad, etc...They have always stayed with me until the problem was solved (regardless of what the solution was) AND I was content.
True it is that sometimes you'll deal with incompetent Geniuses that don't help you the best way, but at least if you stick with them and keep pressing, you'll be happy in the end. In fact, from my lengthy experience with Apple, I know that I'm usually more happy after my problem is fixed than before it happened because I usually walk away from the Apple store with a new device
In any case, since you're issue was eventually resolved, I think you had a better experience with Apple than I have had with my brand new P(iece of) C(rap) that I can't even run the latest software on.PS: I swear every other laptop manufacturer is still trying to copy the MBPro and MBAir designs. At least that means my new buggy laptop isn't as ugly as they used to be.
----------
One more thing: I would gladly pay $200 (or whatever you think Applecare used to cost) for anyone/company to address my any issue with my computer for 2 years. The sad thing is, no company does this in the PC world since there is so much fragmentation between hardware & software design/implementation.
This.
If you treat people with respect, they will give you the same respect back. If you've been abusive/shouting at geniuses - this *will* be in the notes, which corporate can see. They can see every stage of every repair, including appointment notes, progress, etc. If you've been rude to a genius, they will know and won't help you further.
They didn't *make* you buy a hard drive. They advised you that they aren't responsible for data loss. You chose to buy a hard drive to backup (I assume you didn't have a backup in place).
Ultimately - you got your machine repaired, so move on with life. I know you want a free iPad, but ultimately Apple have no responsibility to give you one. They made an (overly) generous offer of what - $270? Take it, take your partner out for a nice meal, and get on with your life. If you want an iPad, buy one. Just because they make "huge profits", doesn't mean you're entitled to a freebie.
Also, if you push it too hard, they'll just clam up and tell you that if you feel you're owed more, to take it to legal. And if it goes there - you won't have a leg to stand on.