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Craigslist, MBP and AppleCare woes

M

modest serving

macrumors member
Original poster
Feb 16, 2010
34
0
I recently purchased a MacBook Pro 13" 2010 model on craigslist.
It was less than 2 months old, came with receipt and still under AppleCare warranty of course.

I re-registered the device during a clean install of snow leopard and also using the apple.com registration page. I received an email confirming my registration.

I noticed a problem with the display, so I scheduled a genius bar appointment at the nearest Apple Store (Knoxville, about 90 miles from my home). On my way out of town for a trip I went to my appointment in Knoxville on 04/08/2011. The genius was friendly and acknowledged a display defect. He made a work order under warranty. Since I live 90 miles away we decided to ship it to a repair center and have it shipped to my home address. He asked for my shipping and billing addresses and I signed the work authorization.

Here's where it gets really really bad. Saturday 04/09/2011 I decided to check the status of the the repair. I pulled out the copy of the "Genius Bar Work Authorization" and to my horror under "customer information" there was the name and address of the previous owner. The phone number was mine but everything else was his. I called the Knoxville Apple Store and they said I'd have to come in to discuss this face to face. I'm in North Carolina unfortunately. Will be back tomorrow. So I called AppleCare. I spoke with Stephanie who discussed this with me and proceeded to look up the repair order. Sure enough the wrong shipping address was listed. My address was listed under billing address, however. She proceeded to re-register the device's serial # under my info and change the shipping address.

I was still uneasy.

So Sunday, I called the Apple Store in Knoxville and got someone who was more helpful than when I tried yesterday. He looked up the repair number and checked the info. He confirmed that it was incorrect and asked me for my name, address, and email address. He assured me that it was corrected and my MBP wouldn't end up in Texas and lost forever. I'm still a bit nervous, though.

I want to believe that my MacBook Pro will return to me but I still have that worry that my MBP will end up in Texas. When I log in under my Apple ID it showed no pending repairs and no MacBook Pro under my registered devices on the Express Lane site. I can look it up by entering the repair # and the serial # but it's not tied to my Apple ID. It says it's currently being repaired at the repair center. Once it is shipped I can't do anything. I just hope it's shipped the right place.
 
Why did you sign the work order without reading it and looking at all of the addresses, etc? You can't blame Apple for YOUR failure to read, it's not like he knew what your address was when you went in for the repair. Try calling again and see what address they have... why not just tell them to ship it back to the apple store you dropped it off at, and you will pick it up? Ask for tracking info so you will know where it's being shipped to...
 
Yes, I definitely should have read the work order thoroughly before signing it. It was partly my mistake. I don't think I've blamed Apple for anything. I'm just asking for advice and to see if anyone else has had a similar experience.

He did ask for and enter my shipping and billing address, though and for some reason only the billing address was correct when I called AppleCare. I'm going to call AppleCare one more time this evening to see what is entered as the shipping info on the repair.
 
modest serving said:
Yes, I definitely should have read the work order thoroughly before signing it. It was partly my mistake. I don't think I've blamed Apple for anything. I'm just asking for advice and to see if anyone else has had a similar experience.

He did ask for and enter my shipping and billing address, though and for some reason only the billing address was correct when I called AppleCare. I'm going to call AppleCare one more time this evening to see what is entered as the shipping info on the repair.
Click to expand...

I know you haven't blamed them yet, just saying you can't blame someone when you signed a work order with the wrong address. :D

Just keep calling and making sure they have the right address, nothing else you can do at this point, except ask them to just ship it back to the apple store, sure that would solve all of your problems.
 
Mistakes happen. All you can do at this point is sit back, wait and hope for the best.
 
Confirm again that they have the correct shipping address for the repair to be shipped back to -- but this time have the rep make a note on your account that you've made this request and take that person's name or ID number.

That way, if the computer does end up getting shipped back to the original owner then Apple will need to make it good. They usually are very easy to work with so I wouldn't worry. Unfortunately, when someone buys a computer new from Apple their contact info gets distributed through many channels. After I sold my Powerbook on craigslist years ago I started getting confirmations about a repair the new owner initiated.
 
I called AppleCare again. I feel a lot better now. The lady I spoke with said it was still due to be shipped to Texas as far as she could see but that there were notes on my account from where I had called before. She called the repair center and put me on hold. She came back on and assured me that it was being shipped to Cleveland, TN where I live and that it should be shipped out today. She said if I didn't receive a tracking # today that I should call tomorrow and get one. :)

In the meantime I finally figured out how to properly register the device. I went to My Support Profile and did it. It actually worked when I did it there. No it shows up under my Apple ID, though it doesn't show any pending repairs or cases. I'm pretty confident it will turn out ok now.
 
modest serving said:
I called AppleCare again. I feel a lot better now. The lady I spoke with said it was still due to be shipped to Texas as far as she could see but that there were notes on my account from where I had called before. She called the repair center and put me on hold. She came back on and assured me that it was being shipped to Cleveland, TN where I live and that it should be shipped out today. She said if I didn't receive a tracking # today that I should call tomorrow and get one. :)

In the meantime I finally figured out how to properly register the device. I went to My Support Profile and did it. It actually worked when I did it there. No it shows up under my Apple ID, though it doesn't show any pending repairs or cases. I'm pretty confident it will turn out ok now.
Click to expand...


If they do ship it to the wrong address after this whole mess, then ask them for a new machine because they messed up. And if they say no, tell them you are contacting an attorney.
 
modest serving said:
I called AppleCare again. I feel a lot better now. The lady I spoke with said it was still due to be shipped to Texas as far as she could see but that there were notes on my account from where I had called before. She called the repair center and put me on hold. She came back on and assured me that it was being shipped to Cleveland, TN where I live and that it should be shipped out today. She said if I didn't receive a tracking # today that I should call tomorrow and get one. :)

In the meantime I finally figured out how to properly register the device. I went to My Support Profile and did it. It actually worked when I did it there. No it shows up under my Apple ID, though it doesn't show any pending repairs or cases. I'm pretty confident it will turn out ok now.
Click to expand...

:) Best of luck. It would suck major basketballs if it ended up going to the previous owner.
 
sdneidich said:
If they do ship it to the wrong address after this whole mess, then ask them for a new machine because they messed up. And if they say no, tell them you are contacting an attorney.
Click to expand...

That is not a good way to start anything, at least give them a chance to fix it before being a jerk. Apple has built a rep for serving the customer.

They are well aware of the fact that they have ivy league legal council on their staff and you are armed with a tiny budget and a phonebook to find a random lawyer.

Pretty sure apple has their bases covered and your threat just may be met with with them accepting your challenge.
 
Well I should either have it or be very upset by Wednesday. I'll let you know. Thanks for all of the replies :)
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8G4 Safari/6533.18.5)

Sounds like a simple mixup that's been fixed.

I was expecting a horror story from the title!
 
Mr. Chewbacca said:
That is not a good way to start anything, at least give them a chance to fix it before being a jerk. Apple has built a rep for serving the customer.

They are well aware of the fact that they have ivy league legal council on their staff and you are armed with a tiny budget and a phonebook to find a random lawyer.

Pretty sure apple has their bases covered and your threat just may be met with with them accepting your challenge.
Click to expand...

I find it amusing when people post these absurd comments. Contact a lawyer? Really? It's not like Apple is going to take your money and run of with it. They'll almost always fix the problem so there is no need to call a lawyer or bring certain laws/acts and act like you're going to scare Apple. :rolleyes:
 
modest serving said:
I recently purchased a MacBook Pro 13" 2010 model on craigslist.
It was less than 2 months old, came with receipt and still under AppleCare warranty of course.

I re-registered the device during a clean install of snow leopard and also using the apple.com registration page. I received an email confirming my registration.

I noticed a problem with the display, so I scheduled a genius bar appointment at the nearest Apple Store (Knoxville, about 90 miles from my home). On my way out of town for a trip I went to my appointment in Knoxville on 04/08/2011. The genius was friendly and acknowledged a display defect. He made a work order under warranty. Since I live 90 miles away we decided to ship it to a repair center and have it shipped to my home address. He asked for my shipping and billing addresses and I signed the work authorization.

Here's where it gets really really bad. Saturday 04/09/2011 I decided to check the status of the the repair. I pulled out the copy of the "Genius Bar Work Authorization" and to my horror under "customer information" there was the name and address of the previous owner. The phone number was mine but everything else was his. I called the Knoxville Apple Store and they said I'd have to come in to discuss this face to face. I'm in North Carolina unfortunately. Will be back tomorrow. So I called AppleCare. I spoke with Stephanie who discussed this with me and proceeded to look up the repair order. Sure enough the wrong shipping address was listed. My address was listed under billing address, however. She proceeded to re-register the device's serial # under my info and change the shipping address.

I was still uneasy.

So Sunday, I called the Apple Store in Knoxville and got someone who was more helpful than when I tried yesterday. He looked up the repair number and checked the info. He confirmed that it was incorrect and asked me for my name, address, and email address. He assured me that it was corrected and my MBP wouldn't end up in Texas and lost forever. I'm still a bit nervous, though.

I want to believe that my MacBook Pro will return to me but I still have that worry that my MBP will end up in Texas. When I log in under my Apple ID it showed no pending repairs and no MacBook Pro under my registered devices on the Express Lane site. I can look it up by entering the repair # and the serial # but it's not tied to my Apple ID. It says it's currently being repaired at the repair center. Once it is shipped I can't do anything. I just hope it's shipped the right place.
Click to expand...

Glad it turned out OK for you. Whenever I sell a computer, it usually still has some months of AppleCare left. It's a very simple process via email to transfer ownership. I usually forward my transfer request to the new owner and then when Apple confirms it, I usually forward that onto the new owner, too. Apple always states that the new owner will receive a "proof of coverage document" in 2 weeks. I've never had any problems transferring ownership of my AppleCare. The seller should have given you proper documentation, too.
 
So the horror story is code for you made a mistake and you weren't feeling all warm and fuzzy about it? Got it. Glad it's being shipped to you, as for a suit ... You'd lack grounds. I hope the guy suggesting that wasn't serious.
 
What people do when they have a problem with Apple

1. Freak out
2. Register and post freak out/rant on MacRumors
3. Tell people at work/in class/waiting in the hall at parole office about situation
4. Post on MacRumors about people at work/class/parole office said to call Apple customer service
5. Call parents/girfriend's parents/surviving next of kin
6. Post on MacRumors that your parents/girfriend's parents/surviving next of kin told you to call Apple customer service
7. Ask what you should do on Ask.com
8. Post on MacRumors about how Ask.com respondents said you should call Apple customer service
9. Search Google looking for similar instances where same thing happened to other people using myriad combinations of keywords until you are bored to tears.
10. Call Apple customer service


Seriously though, glad it must have worked out.
 
iLog.Genius said:
I find it amusing when people post these absurd comments. Contact a lawyer? Really? It's not like Apple is going to take your money and run of with it. They'll almost always fix the problem so there is no need to call a lawyer or bring certain laws/acts and act like you're going to scare Apple. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

That is the point I was making. It is absurd when people threaten legal action especially during the first attempt to fix a problem... I think we agree
 
Mr. Chewbacca said:
That is the point I was making. It is absurd when people threaten legal action especially during the first attempt to fix a problem... I think we agree
Click to expand...

Oh, I was agreeing with you :D (perhaps I should've said I agree or +1 haha) but yeah, when people mention lawsuits or anything to do with the law, I usually don't take those posters seriously.
 
jessica. said:
So the horror story is code for you made a mistake and you weren't feeling all warm and fuzzy about it? Got it. Glad it's being shipped to you, as for a suit ... You'd lack grounds. I hope the guy suggesting that wasn't serious.
Click to expand...

I did make a mistake, but so did the genius. He asked for my info (including my shipping address) and didn't enter it properly.

Cheerwino said:
What people do when they have a problem with Apple

1. Freak out
2. Register and post freak out/rant on MacRumors
3. Tell people at work/in class/waiting in the hall at parole office about situation
4. Post on MacRumors about people at work/class/parole office said to call Apple customer service
5. Call parents/girfriend's parents/surviving next of kin
6. Post on MacRumors that your parents/girfriend's parents/surviving next of kin told you to call Apple customer service
7. Ask what you should do on Ask.com
8. Post on MacRumors about how Ask.com respondents said you should call Apple customer service
9. Search Google looking for similar instances where same thing happened to other people using myriad combinations of keywords until you are bored to tears.
10. Call Apple customer service


Seriously though, glad it must have worked out.
Click to expand...

I find that amusing :) I think my case started with 1. called Apple 2. Googled for similar cases. 3. Posted on Apple Discussions. 4. posted on MacRumors.

I didn't have to register. I've been registered at MacRumors over a year.

Posted from my 13" MacBook Pro :)
 
iLog.Genius said:
Oh, I was agreeing with you :D (perhaps I should've said I agree or +1 haha) but yeah, when people mention lawsuits or anything to do with the law, I usually don't take those posters seriously.
Click to expand...

If I was a manager and a customer came in on the first or even second complaint threatening legal action I would take my business card and on the back write down the phone number to corporate legal department and tell the customer .... " Have your lawyer contact my lawyer, we are done here! " :D
 
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