When Can AppleCare Replace a MacBook's Battery?

[kingtj]

Why is this "not right"?

I agree with you that in a situation like the one mentioned, escalating it to a higher level person in the store would have been a good decision. But just like when I call in for customer service or support to my cable company, cellular provider, or anyone else -- sometimes it's just more efficient and a better outcome to hang up and call back.

The fact is, Apple Geniuses get "beat up" on all day long by customers with issues. They're only human, and I'm sure that especially after one of them gets stuck with several difficult customers in a row, they're not in the state of mind to be cheery and helpful if I happen to be the next one they talk to.

I'm pretty sure Apple never trained any of those people about certain charge cycle numbers they should tell customers is "excessive use" for their laptops. That sounds like something one of them made up because he/she didn't feel like giving you a free battery replacement. If so, that would mean the person had some personal reason to dislike you or he/she just recently dealt with a situation or two where they felt like they gave away free stuff to people who didn't deserve it and they were in a mindset to put a halt to any more of it that day.

Well..to be fair, I don't think it's right for a customer to drive to another place or talk to another genius person. It would be better to talk higher level staff. If they don't respect the policy...there goes the violation..and can be sued for false advertisement/ false-leading type.

 

[austintg]

I just don't understand the MAC appeal. I just replaced the battery on my 3 year-old Dell laptop that is still serving me well. It cost me just under $35.00 including shipping and I snapped it in myself in about 30 seconds.

Well mine was $0 and they have top notch customer service plus an ecosystem that I'm not ready to give up. I've been using Mac since 97 and haven't ever seen the need to use Windows regularly. I have Windows 10 pro on my Mac so if I happened to need it I have quick access through BootCamp. Can't say that about a Dell, you're stuck with one system all the time that gives you a headache because it doesn't run efficiently nor makes sense. I say use whatever you want, and I choose Mac for myself because it works hassle free and I make a ton of money editing video in final cut, which is some of the least hard work for the most money I've ever done.

 

[kingtj]

Dell replacement batteries, from Dell themselves, tend to cost more like $89 and up. The $20-40 batteries you can buy for them online from Amazon vendors, eBay, and so forth are almost all generic, Asian-made copies of questionable quality.

I wouldn't say they're likely to catch on fire (could happen, but it's not something you hear about all THAT often, despite so many PC laptops using the things daily) -- but I've bought a number of them to refurbish used Dell laptops to resell them inexpensively to people on tight budgets. Truthfully, they usually wind up about a 50/50 chance of still working after about 6 months' time.

On some of them, you can compare them to an OEM Dell battery and tell they weigh only about half as much. I'm positive if you pried one of those open, you'd find they short-changed you on the number of cells in the battery pack.

I just don't understand the MAC appeal. I just replaced the battery on my 3 year-old Dell laptop that is still serving me well. It cost me just under $35.00 including shipping and I snapped it in myself in about 30 seconds.

 

[icehockey77]

Why is this "not right"?

I agree with you that in a situation like the one mentioned, escalating it to a higher level person in the store would have been a good decision. But just like when I call in for customer service or support to my cable company, cellular provider, or anyone else -- sometimes it's just more efficient and a better outcome to hang up and call back.

The fact is, Apple Geniuses get "beat up" on all day long by customers with issues. They're only human, and I'm sure that especially after one of them gets stuck with several difficult customers in a row, they're not in the state of mind to be cheery and helpful if I happen to be the next one they talk to.

I'm pretty sure Apple never trained any of those people about certain charge cycle numbers they should tell customers is "excessive use" for their laptops. That sounds like something one of them made up because he/she didn't feel like giving you a free battery replacement. If so, that would mean the person had some personal reason to dislike you or he/she just recently dealt with a situation or two where they felt like they gave away free stuff to people who didn't deserve it and they were in a mindset to put a halt to any more of it that day.

Not to mention, at least from my experiences working at the Genius Bar, most battery issues were software related, where various 3rd party menu bar plugins, user created scripts, and other, power intensive apps, were running at 100+% CPU for long periods of time. FQ the process, remove the parent application, boom everything is fine. People are very quick to assume its hardware, they are almost hoping that's what it is so they can say "Oh well apple just ain't what it used to be!" But the reality is their own stupid app is causing it.

 

[pat500000]

Why is this "not right"?

I agree with you that in a situation like the one mentioned, escalating it to a higher level person in the store would have been a good decision. But just like when I call in for customer service or support to my cable company, cellular provider, or anyone else -- sometimes it's just more efficient and a better outcome to hang up and call back.

The fact is, Apple Geniuses get "beat up" on all day long by customers with issues. They're only human, and I'm sure that especially after one of them gets stuck with several difficult customers in a row, they're not in the state of mind to be cheery and helpful if I happen to be the next one they talk to.

I'm pretty sure Apple never trained any of those people about certain charge cycle numbers they should tell customers is "excessive use" for their laptops. That sounds like something one of them made up because he/she didn't feel like giving you a free battery replacement. If so, that would mean the person had some personal reason to dislike you or he/she just recently dealt with a situation or two where they felt like they gave away free stuff to people who didn't deserve it and they were in a mindset to put a halt to any more of it that day.

Employees who weren't trained to find out about battery cycle is bad on apple side. Apple implemented the policy and its their job to know this by training their employees. All they had to do was check power cycle from system profile under power and it tells them. The apple website indicates the max cycle of battery. When Apple does not follow their own policy... They violated the policy that they made. So, it would make sense if the employees were educated about it.

But that's just my opinion.

 

[nutmac]

Out of curiosity, how many charging cycles does your Mac show it has been through?

FruitJuice reports 172 cycles out of 1000, which corresponds to total number of times the battery has been fully drained and recharged. The number is frankly higher than what I expected as I rarely let it go below 20%.

 

[tbone7467]

So my MacBook Pro late 2011 just stated service required for my battery. There is only 386 cycles on it. Im wondering if apple replaces the battery with a better battery or the same one that was in before. The reason I ask is battery technology has changed a lot over the last 5-6 years, will I benefit from any of that? I plan on changing my battery and getting a Samsung 1tb SSD also.

 

[manatee4mation]

I recently brought my MacBook 12", about a year old (have AppleCare) in with 86% battery life. They ran a test and talked to a service manager. They replaced the battery with the notation "will fail within the warranty period." No fuss. Great apple service.

 

[dukebound85]

My mid 2015 MBP has 342 cycles and 84% left. Would apple replace mine as its well below 1000 cycles and near 80%?

 

[zzLZHzz]

My mid 2015 MBP has 342 cycles and 84% left. Would apple replace mine as its well below 1000 cycles and near 80%?

does it say "Service Battery"? if it does and you are still have AppleCare, Apple will most likely replace the battery for you.

 

[LV426]

Got a duff keyboard? They will swap out the battery when the keyboard is replaced.