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ETHICAL CRISIS - i got sent a free 17" MP...
- Thread starter miccc83
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I agree with you on the stealing part however, as far as the company losing money goes it really does make a difference between them and a smaller company... you wouldn't believe the things a large company can write off. I work in an ER - our hospital writes of 10 MILLION in bad debt a MONTH. Furthermore, our business office can zero out unpaid balances with out ANY approval up to $25 and can even write off hundreds after going through the next step (whatever that may be). So as far as them losing money, this mistake means nothing.
But this is not like he was in the Apple store buying a 13" inch MacBook and "just happened to accidentally pick up" a 17". It was sent to him by mail. His participation was passive.
Now, time was, IIRC, the law said that anything you receive through the mail -- even if you did not order it -- was legally yours to keep. Mind you, this was years ago; the law may have changed.
That said, call Apple anyway. They may want to send you a prepaid box along with the MacBook you paid and ask you send the MBP in the prepaid box, so you're not out any money. They may also say "Why don't you just keep the MBP?"
It's their screw-up, yes, but give them the opportunity to fix it.
Personally, I probably wouldn't return it. I'm not going to elaborate on that, and even though I love Apple I still wouldn't return it.
I work in retail, and whenever an item is marked incorrectly, we have to let the customer get the item for the listed price; regardless of if it is at a loss or not. You know what you wanted, were charged the correct amount, and Apple sent you the wrong item. There is no reason for them to be rewarded for their mistakes. You're the one with room to benefit, they alone benefitted from this purchase because this will most likely be one of many future purchases you have through them.
Also, I think pictures are necessary to validate this thread, as this is your first post ever on MacRumors.
I work in retail, and whenever an item is marked incorrectly, we have to let the customer get the item for the listed price; regardless of if it is at a loss or not. You know what you wanted, were charged the correct amount, and Apple sent you the wrong item. There is no reason for them to be rewarded for their mistakes. You're the one with room to benefit, they alone benefitted from this purchase because this will most likely be one of many future purchases you have through them.
Also, I think pictures are necessary to validate this thread, as this is your first post ever on MacRumors.
Sell it to Gizmodo for $5000.
Or ring Apple up. Tell them about it. Maybe the Apple rep will think you're stupid and don't know what you're talking about.
Or ring Apple up. Tell them about it. Maybe the Apple rep will think you're stupid and don't know what you're talking about.
Wait, wait...you're making the argument that the size of Apple doesn't matter, but the size of the 'upgrade' does? That doesn't make like a very linear thought process
For me, I'd call Apple up, explain to them what happened. Practically speaking, I wouldn't like the idea of Apple being able to call me up at any point and say "hey, what happened, here? Pay us for that machine!" That most likely wouldn't happen, but I wouldn't want that risk hanging around.
so, what are you going to do?
you've got all sorts of advice - what's your final decision?
Do you understand how many computers Apple ships each month? Shipping mistakes are inevitable, no matter how smart or dumb Apple's employees are.
I was more arguing along the lines of the fact that I believe Apple has been known to ship computers with slight speed bumps or a slightly larger hard drives than what customers have ordered.
Call them and tell them. If they'd sent you an inferior product, would you still have had to come here and ask?
You basically sound like you know keeping it without asking would be dishonest.
You basically sound like you know keeping it without asking would be dishonest.
That's because you were misled by the OP's misleading original post. There is no "ethical crisis" because he's already decided to steal the computer by selling it. He's asking how he can get away with it.
Of course it is, would derivatives exist otherwise? By your logic, there would be no investment and the economy would collapse.
0dev: That derivatives analogy is one of the worst I've ever heard. Seriously, learn something. That is just ignorant about both derivatives and ethics.
OP: there is no dilemma here. Anyone with class would call Apple immediately and leave the situation up to them. Then again, someone with class wouldn't have started this thread.
OP: there is no dilemma here. Anyone with class would call Apple immediately and leave the situation up to them. Then again, someone with class wouldn't have started this thread.
Incidentally, what if individuals make mistakes to big companies?
Recently a relative of mine was booking a flight for another relative, Anthony. Now another relative is called Anthony and given the combination of tiredness and stress entered the wrong Anthony's details in. It was only a couple of days later that the mistake was realised. We called up the flight company explaining how it was an honest mistake.
Now if they were morally correct and had all their ethics in order they should have said "we all make mistakes" and switched the surname and home address details (the only differential details).
They said no and we'd have to pay a fee (around 50% of the original flights cost) to have details swapped, profiting off our mistake.
The council originally classed our house in the wrong tax band. For 6 years we were paying too much, we told them yet nothing was done. Eventually they did another evaluation and found our house should have been 2 bands below. They said it was their mistake and they were sorry but that they wouldn't pay us back for their mistake. Their original evaluation had been mixed up with our neighbours house.
Recently a relative of mine was booking a flight for another relative, Anthony. Now another relative is called Anthony and given the combination of tiredness and stress entered the wrong Anthony's details in. It was only a couple of days later that the mistake was realised. We called up the flight company explaining how it was an honest mistake.
Now if they were morally correct and had all their ethics in order they should have said "we all make mistakes" and switched the surname and home address details (the only differential details).
They said no and we'd have to pay a fee (around 50% of the original flights cost) to have details swapped, profiting off our mistake.
The council originally classed our house in the wrong tax band. For 6 years we were paying too much, we told them yet nothing was done. Eventually they did another evaluation and found our house should have been 2 bands below. They said it was their mistake and they were sorry but that they wouldn't pay us back for their mistake. Their original evaluation had been mixed up with our neighbours house.
It wasn't an analogy, I was simply responding to the comment about how profiting off of mistakes is apparently wrong. To be more specific, I should have said swaps really.
Many people usually don't understand mistakes happen and most *good* companies may not stiff the customer for their mistake. Under most consumer protection laws, if a product is incorrectly priced or sold at the wrong price a store *can't* go back and charge the remaining difference after the fact.
Many companies are known to do the same as Apple with refurbs shipping with faster CPUs, extra memory or larger HDs. I'm always waiting for somebody to fear the ethics of that too
On a non-Apple related experience, several years back a store sold me a quad-core retail CPU for the same price of an equal speed dual-core CPU. I didn't notice until I stuck the CPU into the socket and by then I wasn't going to eat a 10% restocking fee for their mistake
(price difference between a dual & quad was $100 USD)