31–40 of 113 posts
This was from 2021 and in the end he was at least able to talk to some humans and solve the issue. As bad as it was, it was still miles ahead of what you could expect in a similar situation with google.
This was from 2021 and in the end he was at least able to talk to some humans and solve the issue. As bad as it was, it was still miles ahead of what you could expect in a similar situation with google.
The fact that you can’t talk to a human about being locked out of Gmail which is used for millions of people’s entire lives is absolutely mind blowing
This was from 2021 and in the end he was at least able to talk to some humans and solve the issue. As bad as it was, it was still miles ahead of what you could expect in a similar situation with google.
The only other large company that I have similar experiences with is our ISP (KPN in NL) who are also really easy to get hold off and very helpful (down to helping you hook up your own fiber equipment).
This was from 2021 and in the end he was at least able to talk to some humans and solve the issue. As bad as it was, it was still miles ahead of what you could expect in a similar situation with google.
Apple support is amazingly good. It’s stark when most other companies have “optimized” customer service to discourage users from using or achieving anything through it. It’s also often an interesting glimpse into Apple’s behind the scenes tech support tools which are quite extensive.
On one hand, I want to reply "duh, you didn't pay your CC" but at the same time Apple is _horrible_ about messaging things like this. I had some random Apple charge not go through (IIRC it was my monthly iPhone Citizen One bill that was paid on my Apple Card but the Apple Card rejected the payment???). And it fouled up things in odd ways that were not clear at all from any UI I could access. In the end I had to keep…
Why was this 4 year old article posted with no additional context? Lots of red flags here on the author's part. This seems like a case of someone not following through on their tradein, missing a payment due to a changed bank account, and then ignoring Apple’s emails about the issue. The author makes it sound like Apple acted out of nowhere, but the reality is they gave notice and took action only after the author fa…
They never recieved the trade-in kit. When asked, Apple never replied. And no, it doesn’t make sense for Apple to disable most of the services in case a credit card is past due for a few days.
I'm also not sure why the author didn't follow up: not following up has the direct consequence of being charged a substantial amount of money.
On one hand, I want to reply "duh, you didn't pay your CC" but at the same time Apple is _horrible_ about messaging things like this. I had some random Apple charge not go through (IIRC it was my monthly iPhone Citizen One bill that was paid on my Apple Card but the Apple Card rejected the payment???). And it fouled up things in odd ways that were not clear at all from any UI I could access. In the end I had to keep…
Side moral there: if you have access to a functional regulatory system, don’t be afraid to ask it for help when a large company is messing with you. In general, such agencies love nothing more than to get to be the one to swat the corp on the nose with a rolled up federal register.
True. I've used the FCC and CFPB in the past and while the UI to interface with them is somewhat clunky, it's functional and in all 3 cases I was satisfied (vindicated). In at least 1 of the cases the monetary value was low enough that it was absolutely in my best interests just to pay it and make it go away but it felt so good to have the CFPB slap down Spectrum and get them to drop the fee. It makes me sick to my stomach to think of what's going to happen to those agencies over the next few years.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
However, if I miss a bill at my credit card because of some missed email, I can call them and get it fixed up. If I miss a bill at my bank, I can call my bank and we will get it fixed up. And those are a bit too big for my comfort compared to a credit union. The problem is if something goes wrong with amazon, google or apple, you can get locked into a giant hole.
the author says the phone / imessage kept working fine, just unpaid cloud services froze. sounds like the apple support person never thought to ask or check if they had unpaid bills for those frozen services. (facepalm)
Yeah, that was a little surprising to me too. One would imagine that ones iCloud or Apple account would have everything in one place on Apple's side. The support person should have been able to pull up the account and see some reference number related to the incomplete trade-in, the bounced payment, and some status message about the account being auto-locked due to missing payment.
If the support person saw a normal, unaffected account - that makes me think visibility into the account is restricted into support tiers and the person should had the ability to escalate or request (logged) access to more details. It's a shame it took the author multiple days and calls into different departments to find resolution for what should have been a very obvious payment problem.
That's why an all inclusive account like the X envisioned by EM is a pretty stupid choice, if you're a customer. Never go all-in, if you cannot win.