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The Nightmare of Replacing a Battery on a Mac Laptop

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Re: The Nightmare of Replacing a Battery on a Mac Laptop

#241

Post by blowski »

hackaflocka wrote: post #206
blowski wrote: post #10

Just as a side-note (IANAL), in the EU, retailers can't refuse to fix something just because it's past their warranty period. If you can establish that the product has broke under reasonable use then you can argue that the product wasn't fit for purpose when you bought it, and therefore it is still the retailer's responsibility to repair it, replace it or give you a partial refund. I did this with Apple when my logic…

The arguing, was it face-to-face or via email. I can do email, but I hate arguing with people face-to-face. Also, if it was face-to-face, was it with just one person, or did it take escalating (and if it did, how many levels did you need to escalate, and who made the final decision?). Sorry for all these questions, I just want to become a more informed and effective consumer.

It was face-to-face - I went to the Apple Store (in Covent Garden, London) having booked an appointment with the Genius Bar. I explained the problem, and they ran a program from a USB stick and then said it was because the logic board had issues.

They offered to fix it for roughly £400, and I:

* quoted the specific law, and had a print out from the relevant website - it was either Which or Gov.uk or something reputable (i.e. not one of my Hacker News comments)

* demonstrated that others had the same problem - I found posts on StackOverflow and the Apple forums

* that I had used the laptop reasonably - it wasn't damaged in any way, and I had a list of the things for which I used the laptop

* I also pointed out that I was a great Apple customer - I had an iPad, an iPhone, and spent a fair bit in the App Store.

The rep went to his manager, and came out a few minutes later saying they agreed to fix the issue for free.

I'm quite introverted and hate confrontation as well, so my advice would be to pre-plan but without making specific scenarios of what might happen. If you have things in writing, it makes you more confident and it makes the reps a bit more nervous as you have a record of the conversation. Also, definitely keep things impersonal. Make it clear that you're not attacking the rep, or even the company, but just the specific policy which you disagree with. Finally, don't make threats like "I'll post this on social media" or "I'll tell all my friends not to buy from you" as the rep's response will typically be "Go on then". Keep calm, professional and friendly, and a majority of the time the reps will be reasonable and try to help you.

Hope that helps!

Re: The Nightmare of Replacing a Battery on a Mac Laptop

#242

Post by blowski »

creshal wrote: post #43
blowski wrote: post #10

Just as a side-note (IANAL), in the EU, retailers can't refuse to fix something just because it's past their warranty period. If you can establish that the product has broke under reasonable use then you can argue that the product wasn't fit for purpose when you bought it, and therefore it is still the retailer's responsibility to repair it, replace it or give you a partial refund. I did this with Apple when my logic…

Usually you have a warranty exception on batteries, though, because they naturally degrade with use.

If you complained after 2 years that your battery was less effective than when you bought it, you wouldn't have a case. But if it failed completely, then you probably would.

Re: The Nightmare of Replacing a Battery on a Mac Laptop

#243

Post by dkonofalski »

vetinari wrote: post #56
jakejake wrote: post #18

There's a trade off to having a laptop that seemingly defies the capabilities of the day - they have to glue parts and remove coverings. Apple has been shedding ports & user-serviceable parts in laptops for years to get them thinner and lighter. Almost every complaint in the article has a counterpoint. Bought AppleCare but didn't register it. Complains about the Genius Bar repair time - try finding somebody to even s…

Disclaimer: I currently own both Apple laptop (MBP13) and Lenovo laptop (T430s). When my previous Thinkpad T400 needed servicing - a line of bad pixels developed on the display - the display was replaced by the next business day, for free (under warranty). The kicker is, that I didn't buy the NBD service and I didn't need to prove anything about the date of purchase or something - I forgot to bring my proof of purcha…

That would have been completely possible had he still been under the manufacturer's warranty, as yours seems to have been. The issue here was the he was outside the standard warranty but still within the extended warranty that he hadn't registered. There's no way for Apple (or any company) to know that you bought an extended warranty from a third-party unless you notify them/register it with them. That's the crux of the issue here. If you have an Apple warranty, you can even take it to a third-party authorized Apple center and they can fix it. Their current systems allow them to have parts on order within 12 hours and they don't have to hang on to your machine, if it works (which it would for a battery issue), in order to get something that takes longer to order.

Re: The Nightmare of Replacing a Battery on a Mac Laptop

#244

Post by eevilspock »

rayiner wrote: post #205
eevilspock wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be nice if they added a per app power usage tracking feature like they have on iOS to isolate such culprits. But yes, Chrome is the worst in battery and CPU usage.

I'm pretty sure Activity Monitor had per-app power usage tracking before iOS.

thanks for reminding me.

Re: The Nightmare of Replacing a Battery on a Mac Laptop

#245

Post by vetinari »

dkonofalski wrote: post #243
vetinari wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disclaimer: I currently own both Apple laptop (MBP13) and Lenovo laptop (T430s). When my previous Thinkpad T400 needed servicing - a line of bad pixels developed on the display - the display was replaced by the next business day, for free (under warranty). The kicker is, that I didn't buy the NBD service and I didn't need to prove anything about the date of purchase or something - I forgot to bring my proof of purcha…

That would have been completely possible had he still been under the manufacturer's warranty, as yours seems to have been. The issue here was the he was outside the standard warranty but still within the extended warranty that he hadn't registered. There's no way for Apple (or any company) to know that you bought an extended warranty from a third-party unless you notify them/register it with them. That's the crux of…

> That would have been completely possible had he still been under the manufacturer's warranty, as yours seems to have been.

Yes, mine has been under warranty. It is important to note however, that this Thinkpad came with 3 years warranty as a standard. (Looks like they scaled that down to 2 years since then).

> Their current systems allow them to have parts on order within 12 hours and they don't have to hang on to your machine,

I assume this is US-specific thing. As I wrote, I was always waiting for weeks for the spares to arrive (once for HDD and twice for power supply). There is only third party service center - only 8 out of 28 EU countries have Apple Stores - and they are not allowed to stock spares. They also have to send the swapped parts back to mothership.

Re: The Nightmare of Replacing a Battery on a Mac Laptop

#246

Post by kristopolous »

DavidAdams wrote: post #103
kristopolous wrote: post #55

Out of curiosity, am I alone in not wanting to use apple products because I find such practices as this to be unethical engineered extortion to extract more money from the consumer? I find such things exploitive and the product's success giving a green light for other manufacturers to re-engineer their products based on less honorable principles. For instance, on flip phones, batteries would eject if you dropped it i…

Apple isn't making any attempt to hide the fact that its batteries are non-user-replaceable. And I think it's clear to any reasonable person that the engineering of these devices isn't intended to generate revenue for the service department, but to create an extremely slim but solid laptop. Now, I think it's very reasonable for a consumer to decide that the'd rather have a replaceable battery than a slimmer laptop, a…

Are you honestly saying that latches, screws, and glue each have human-noticeably different form factor consequences?

I'm claiming that replaceability, durability, composability, these things no longer made the cut in the design.

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