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HomePod Mini Repair Fee is Only $20 Cheaper Than Buying a New One Without AppleCare+

It's funny so many people are surprised. The faux indignation is rich.

Take another consumer product that is similarly priced. For just a random example, a Sangean radio that sells for $75 - $100. If it fails *after* the warranty period, get a quote on having it repaired. Or how about a Hamilton Beach Stand Mixer for $100? I could go on and on with other consumer products.

Seems many here are not living in the real world.
 
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gnasher729 said:
Lots of people have speakers that last forever. Mine are a bit over thirty years old and working just fine. Unless you are stupid and throw your HomePods around there's no reason they shouldn't last for many years. And in the EU, UK, and Australia, Apple will have to fix problems for at least two years. If it lasts for two years, then it doesn't have any faults and will last forever.

So I wouldn't buy AppleCare, and don't worry about it. If it breaks after five years, chances are you will replace your HomePod with a new model that is better and cheaper.
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but my thirty year old speakers can attach to my stereo equipment just fine... and yeah I have some thirty year old CVs
 
citysnaps said:
It's funny so many people are surprised. The faux indignation is rich.

Take another consumer product that is similarly priced. For just a random example, a Sangean radio that sells for $75 - $100. If it fails *after* the warranty period, get a quote on having it repaired. Or how about a Hamilton Beach Stand Mixer for $100? I could go on and on with other consumer products.

Seems many here are not living in the real world.
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Your examples don’t pound consumers with being environmental friendly in their company mantra.

I wonder if your world is “tinted” 🙂
 
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miniyou64 said:
Apple is making some very stupid decisions lately. They used to be premium products because they worked flawlessly. Now they’re just over priced. This device’s value proposition is Siri. Siri gets worse every iteration and I hear it’s even more terrible on HomePod. No buy
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Apple has no shame these days for sure, but it's partially our fault. We have blindly followed the Apple logo pricing down the primrose-path of anything goes'. Until we stop spending ridiculous amounts on their products, Apple won't stop. Amazon and Google make a hundred-dollar speaker, so Apple 'followed' suit. Pure consumerism at its finest. 🤷‍♂️
 
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ipponrg said:
Your examples don’t pound consumers with being environmental friendly in their company mantra.

I wonder if your world is “tinted” 🙂
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No. I live in the real world where you will never find perfection 100% of the time.

Don't like Apple's environmental policies? Then vote with your wallet and currency purchasing tech products from another company that has a better total environmental record. Easy.
 
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The thing is, the cheaper the product gets the closer any repair is going to be due to the inherent overheads. It's a heavy item that needs posting out and back, and that's before you've factored in human time spent taking it out of the box, putting it back and then any repairs as well. Plus parts.

It's a shame that, for comparison, the costs of having an Alexa or Nest Audio aren't included as a comparator.
 
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Apple have gone hardware > software > services > Accessories and insurance.
 
ouimetnick said:
That’s because they don’t repair them. They replace them and recycle the old one.
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Yeah seems likely. There comes a point where it just doesn’t make much financial sense, and at $99 it’s a cheap item and any repair costs are likely to well and truly be close to the cost to replace.

Unsure about the US, but if you had someone repair your TV or whatever locally you’re probably looking at a few hundred minimum. Labour costs time and money, never mind the training etc to support the services as well as any parts. I think the fact you can get it serviced (/replaced) for $79USD is pretty reasonable in the end of the day. It might be close to the price of a new one, but knowing Apple it’ll come back as new for that price so it’s still worthwhile.
 
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Brian Y said:
But Apple is claiming to be environmentally friendly. If your power cord gets damaged, it's a whole new unit. If the fabric rips, it's a whole new unit. Cable inside becomes loose... guess what? Whole new unit!

But don't worry, the ice caps are doing good because we didn't get a charger with our new iPhones.
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Exactly... This whole environmental argument was bull$h!t. Courage my ar$e. They’ve got balls though I’ll give them that. If they’d kept lighting to USB-A then fair enough, I could see that was an attempt to help the environment whilst not taking the pi$$ out of people.

But essentially forcing potential customers (admittedly not everyone) to buy new USB C plugs is a feckin joke.
 
ckater said:
Du you really think they will work in the ecosystem more than 5-7 years?
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by the same token, the odds they fail in that time are VERY low... the cost of applecare+ AND the $30 per repair under the program gets close to just buying a new one too... its a very, very, very poor decision to buy applecare+ on this product.
 
citysnaps said:
No. I live in the real world where you will never find perfection 100% of the time.

Don't like Apple's environmental policies? Then vote with your wallet and currency purchasing tech products from another company that has a better total environmental record. Easy.
Click to expand...

Thanks for sharing your “real world” advice where people aren’t allowed to point out contradictions in a company’s mission statement on a message board. 👏
 
When a product gets near or below the $100 price point repairs honestly aren’t worth it to the company IMO. Shipping, labor, shipping back, etc.... Replacement cheaper and faster.
 
citysnaps said:
It's funny so many people are surprised. The faux indignation is rich.

Take another consumer product that is similarly priced. For just a random example, a Sangean radio that sells for $75 - $100. If it fails *after* the warranty period, get a quote on having it repaired. Or how about a Hamilton Beach Stand Mixer for $100? I could go on and on with other consumer products.

Seems many here are not living in the real world.
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True, very true. Being true very strongly. So many people are saying it’s true
 
I own Alexa, Cortina, and Google. None of them have ever broken. If the Homepod Mini is that easily damaged, that's on Apple for making a fragile product, not me for not buying insurance.
 
gnasher729 said:
Lots of people have speakers that last forever. Mine are a bit over thirty years old and working just fine. Unless you are stupid and throw your HomePods around there's no reason they shouldn't last for many years. And in the EU, UK, and Australia, Apple will have to fix problems for at least two years. If it lasts for two years, then it doesn't have any faults and will last forever.

So I wouldn't buy AppleCare, and don't worry about it. If it breaks after five years, chances are you will replace your HomePod with a new model that is better and cheaper.
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I have two HomePods and a few nice pairs of B&Ws. I know the HomePods won’t outlast the B&Ws because of their eventual technology limitations, but I bought them because 1) they sound great for the price (on sale), and 2) they are convenient as part of my Apple ecosystem. Siri, however, is still a mess.

But if I don’t get at least 5 years out of the HomePods before they start to become crippled with software updates, then I will return to only using dedicated stereo speakers like my B&Ws.
 
AppleWes said:
When a product gets near or below the $100 price point repairs honestly aren’t worth it to the company IMO. Shipping, labor, shipping back, etc.... Replacement cheaper and faster.
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But this isn't any company. This is Apple, who is willing to sell a phone without a charger to save the environment. I wouldn't expect them to just replace the broken one, that causes waste.
 
MauiPa said:
Sounds like most of the unit gets replaced if bad. Almost impossible to fix cheaper things after labor costs anyway. I guess if you only paid minimum wage, but really? A shop would want at least $80 an hour, so it could be fixed in 30 minutes?
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...that's not even including the parts cost, training for employees, liability for the repair,...
In western countries things costing less than 150€ usueally don't get fixed locally. They are replaced and the defective products e.g. shipped to Asia, where the costs are much lower for repair. The grade A and B+ repaired products get shipped back to EU, US,... and sold as refurbed. The rest is sold in other markets or as spares...
 
Never had Apple care+ and don’t think I ever will, by the time you factor in the costs of it, you would be much better getting accidental damage on your home insurance policy in and out of the home.

Most will give you this with a low excess and the cost per month is relatively small, I am covered for accidental damage up to £2000 on a single item with a £100 excess, plus all the usual home contents insurance for fire theft flood etc and pay less than £13 a month for it.

Any insurance from any company is a complete waste of money IMHO, and earns companies mega £££ year on year, so much so retail staff are pushed to sell the insurance.

In my situation just covering my iPhone and iPad would cost me £328 then you have got the excess etc on top of that.

Whereas my home insurance costs me £156 per year covers all my devices as all are worth less than £2000 plus additional to that covers my home against theft fire and flood, a far better deal IMO.
 
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KrisLord said:
How much time and effort would it cost to fix a HomePod mini?
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Less, if it's designed to be repairable. More, if it's designed to be assembled once only and as cheaply as possible.

KrisLord said:
The fact that there’s an upfront price for any repair is pretty good. The fact that it costs 80% of the cost of the product simply shows that replacing key parts of the product isn’t as simple as some people would like.
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Should read as: hasn't been designed to be as repairable as some people would like.

KrisLord said:
I doubt we’d have these same complaints if the repair was $79 but new ones were $149
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Well yes, that was kind of the whole point of the article.
 
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