When a Favorite Company Breaks Your Heart
My family owns five iPhones, two iPads, an Apple TV device, and at least 10 Apple computers. We buy AppleCare service, just in case. So when my wife's iPhone stopped working on Saturday, we thought we could count on Apple to fix it before she left for a week of business travel across the U.S.
We were wrong.
In the spirit of complete disclosure, my wife dropped her phone last November and the screen cracked, but it has worked well ever since, at least until this weekend when it wouldn't power on or charge.
On Sunday, we drove an hour to visit the Apple Store in Providence, Rhode Island. Our Apple "Genius" quickly decided to replace the phone, rather than fix it.
Unfortunately, the store didn't have any white iPhone 4s. We offered to take a black one. The Genius said, "We can only replace your phone with the exact same phone."
My wife offered to interrupt her business day to pick up a replacement phone at an Apple store on Monday afternoon in Chicago, the first stop on her week of travel, but apparently they don't have any white iPhone 4s there either. She offered to do the same on Tuesday in San Francisco, and stop in the store there. Guess what? No white iPhone 4s in San Francisco.
Too top secret to explain to a customer?
Sunday night, I called AppleCare, pointed out that Apple appears to be out of stock on this phone across the country, and again asked them to replace the phone with an equal or better model. "We can't," said two different service representatives, and refused to explain further.
Note to fellow customers: if the best explanation a company can offer is "we can't," it means that if they told you the real reason, they would sound heartless, greedy, or stupid.
Apple offered to Fedex a phone to my wife's hotel to arrive "within one to three business days." Unfortunately, she is staying in Chicago for a night, then in San Francisco for two nights, so a vague arrival date didn't work.
You or I could walk into any Fedex office and arrange to get a package delivered the next day, but apparently Apple does not know how to do this.
Is it illegal to upgrade a customer?
Far too many companies operate in a heartless manner. They rely on bureaucratic policies and nonexistent laws to put profits over people. For example, the first AppleCare rep I spoke to Sunday night said that it was illegal for Apple to replace a phone with a better phone. I'm not an attorney, but I've never heard of a law that protects customers against being treated with respect and consideration.
In the hour we spent in the Providence Apple Store, countless people walked out with brand new iPhones. They represented new purchases. We did not walk out with a new iPhone, because we were just loyal customers with a prematurely broken phone.
Here's the sad reality: once you buy from some companies, your value goes down... way down.... even if you used to be a raving fan.
Update Monday 6:01 p.m. EST (26 hours after initial visit to Apple)
My wife, now in Chicago, went to another Apple Store. The Genius there was very nice and actually looked at the phone rather than assuming it was unfixable. In ten minutes, he got it working again. Once again I am reminded that people who care really can make a difference.
As for the rest of the folks at Apple, this video is for you:
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Bruce Kasanoff is co-author with Michael Hinshaw of Smart Customers, Stupid Companies. Bruce also has free ebook guides available at Kasanoff.com.
To see more of Bruce's articles on LinkedIn, click the "follow" button below, or follow@NowPossible on Twitter.
Image credit: Jmcdermottillo/Shutterstock
Video by Andy A./PeoplePerHour
Dad at Owunwanne Inc | Product Manager everywhere else
11 年Sprint has the same policy. They won't upgrade your phone to the latest and greatest if you break your subpar phone.
Vice Presidente at Abaco Services & Consulting
11 年it is simple; Switch to NOKIA
Account Manager Client Services
11 年Bruce, You are spot on with this story. Customer Service, honesty, transparency and follow through are the best opportunities to keep your customers. Six degrees of separation or in your case, I feel that when a company gets TOO large, they loose their "warm fuzzies" and the ability of consistency. Bravo Bruce!
Ping Identity the most comprehensive Identity Company on the planet.
11 年Bruce Kasanoff, I am a customer service fanatic (to my children's embarrassment), but it's a little off-putting that you are promoting your own book and consultation. If I had encountered your video in a different context, I'd be applauding, but it seems you've put your very own promotion at the top of this post. Apple will certainly have it's challenges and I've had my own with Apple. In full disclosure, I'm an ex-Apple employee on both the Retail and Corporate Sales teams. I was management in charge of the Genius bar and had one mission: delight customers. And I've seen Apple compromise sales for customer service many times; often when the customer was a fault. Certainly there are exceptions, but that video should more likely be aimed at individual employees than the company. My apologies if you have used this forum to promote excellent Apple experiences equal to this raving and destructive post, but either way, your personal promotion dilutes the point.