Son's 12" MB...battery puffing up

[mrdctaylor]

Hey guys,

I bought my son a 12" MacBook in April 2017. Fast forward to this week and the battery is beginning to puff up and make the case separate. I had him take it to the closest Apple store and the info he got was inconsistent.

First, they told him there would definitely be a charge. They also said they don't do that there and it would be sent off (5-7 day turnaround). He said that maybe he'd just bring it in later, but asked if it was a safety issue in the mean time. They then said that if it WAS the battery (and it almost certainly is) that it might be free. Long story short, he left the laptop with them and we'll see how it goes.

Questions:
1) Even though this is a few months out of warranty, is it common to get a free battery replacement?
2) On a possibly related note, is it bad for a Macbook to just be closed/put to sleep without powering it down? What about when putting it in a backpack? I know on old school laptops, I'd always power down.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Webster's Mac]

Hey guys,

I bought my son a 12" MacBook in April 2017. Fast forward to this week and the battery is beginning to puff up and make the case separate. I had him take it to the closest Apple store and the info he got was inconsistent.

First, they told him there would definitely be a charge. They also said they don't do that there and it would be sent off (5-7 day turnaround). He said that maybe he'd just bring it in later, but asked if it was a safety issue in the mean time. They then said that if it WAS the battery (and it almost certainly is) that it might be free. Long story short, he left the laptop with them and we'll see how it goes.

Questions:
1) Even though this is a few months out of warranty, is it common to get a free battery replacement?
2) On a possibly related note, is it bad for a Macbook to just be closed/put to sleep without powering it down? What about when putting it in a backpack? I know on old school laptops, I'd always power down.

Thanks in advance!

I can't say for sure whether or not there will be a charge. They might replace the entire machine for the battery replacement cost, which for your computer, would be $199 USD. They might fix it/replace it for free, too, but I would count on them charging. Whether or not they do it for free depends on the store.

In regard to your other questions, the 12" MacBook is fanless and uses an SSD for storage, meaning there are no moving parts, and heat generally won't be an issue. You can safely leave it in sleep mode whether it is at home, in a backpack, or somewhere else.

If this were a MacBook Pro, it *might* be a different story. It should still be perfectly safe to put it in sleep mode and put it in a backpack, but if it wakes up, it could overheat due to having much more powerful processors and fans that need good airflow to cool it down properly.

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

Ouch that's a true disgrace. This is exactly what happened to me with my old 2015 along with the GPU fault. The whole thing got replaced.
It's 1 year and 4 months old - Apple SHOULD definitely sort this horrible fault out and there's no way that you should pay. It's a very very expensive machine not a £300 laptop.
I'm the biggest fan of the MacBook but my God, Apple really need to get their act together on this range of laptops. For me, battery problems and now my 2nd gen keyboard is needing replacing even though, I never eat or drink around it etc. It's heavily over priced for what it offers.
Apple's quality control is very very very bad or non-existent on their Mac range and it's very sad for such a rich company.

 

[MBAir2010]

hope for best, maybe that macbook had a default or malfunction, but you will never know.
if they charge of if you feel cheated, LET THEM KNOW!
they are all on cloud 9 thinking apple is the bestest eveh, even during the recent macbook scandal '18!

let us know what happens

 

[burpootus]

Hey guys,

I bought my son a 12" MacBook in April 2017. Fast forward to this week and the battery is beginning to puff up and make the case separate. I had him take it to the closest Apple store and the info he got was inconsistent.

First, they told him there would definitely be a charge. They also said they don't do that there and it would be sent off (5-7 day turnaround). He said that maybe he'd just bring it in later, but asked if it was a safety issue in the mean time. They then said that if it WAS the battery (and it almost certainly is) that it might be free. Long story short, he left the laptop with them and we'll see how it goes.

Questions:
1) Even though this is a few months out of warranty, is it common to get a free battery replacement?
2) On a possibly related note, is it bad for a Macbook to just be closed/put to sleep without powering it down? What about when putting it in a backpack? I know on old school laptops, I'd always power down.

Thanks in advance!

My early 2016 12" Macbook threw a "Service Battery" warning at 17 months age. It was below 80% original capacity after only 161 cycle counts. Apple cut me no slack and wanted full price to do a repair. Now, at 26 months, it is 55% original capacity. When it dies I will go back to Windows. I haven't spent a dime with Apple since.

 

[Webster's Mac]

My early 2016 12" Macbook threw a "Service Battery" warning at 17 months age. It was below 80% original capacity after only 161 cycle counts. Apple cut me no slack and wanted full price to do a repair. Now, at 26 months, it is 55% original capacity. When it dies I will go back to Windows. I haven't spent a dime with Apple since.

Try a different Apple Store. That's unacceptable.

 

[giffut]

The significant quality degradation with exorbitant pricing starting with the Macbook 2015 series is Apples way of planned obsolecence, there is no more to it, really - that´s how they earn all their profits. They on purpose are using worse battery quality and capacity, like with the iPhones. That makes any Macbook/Pro a warranted "toss out and buy new" for many users. Those machines – and all the Macbook Pros 2016 etc. - are only worth it second hand at less than half their initial price and an extended warranty in place. Starting with the introduction of the T2 processor, they began the route to permanently close/seal any loopholes for cloning and installing third party system software. It´s a shame, really.

 

[pl1984]

I had an iPad Air do something similar, the display was separating from the chassis as a result of an expanding battery. The Apple Store charged me a replacement battery fee ($99) instead of a normal repair fee ($250) because the damage was battery related. It also didn't hurt that, at the time this happened, Samsung was having issues with their Galaxy Note 7 catching on fire. I felt that was fair treatment...especially since, for iPads, they swap them for a refurbished one instead of changing the batter on site so I received a replacement which was in better condition than the one I brought in.

I would highly recommend getting it fixed no matter the cost (within reason of course) because that can be a fire hazard.