Da Forde

Houston we have a problem!  I’ve never been a Mac person, but when the MacBook Pro came out and I kept hearing how amazing it was and Apple products in general.  A few months ago I joined the converted and picked up a Mac Book Pro and it has been a pretty impressive machine so far. Unfortunately about 2 months ago a problem started to grow, literally. Take a look at these shots of the original battery that came with my Mac Book Pro (see below), it has now started to expand.

                      

With Apple trying to get ahead of the problem and introduce the battery exchange program I should be taken care of right?  What tipped me off  that there was a problem was the fact that when using just the laptop’s on battery it kept shutting down.  After calling into the Apple support I was told that I am in fact was eligible for batter exchange.

Sidebar - imagine what happens when you are driving your car at forward and suddenly put it in park - do you think it will eventually effect the engine?  The same thing happened to my hard drive and after spending 30 minutes on the phone with technical support I had to re-install the operating system because my data became corrupted.

My saga continues….

Everything seemed normal when they said I qualified for the battery exchange program. With some 1 million batteries to be exchanged I was told it would be 6 - 8 weeks until my new one arrived. I called in on Thursday of last week to get a status update and after being bounced around to call centers in Peterborough, some where in the US, Niagara Falls and then finally Markham I was told "we see when the order was taken but it wasn’t placed". Some 45 minutes later I’m still on the phone and the customers service guy  informs me that he’s going to ensure it is ordered this time. I asked if he could expedite the order. After all, "it isn’t the customers fault that a mistake was made so I should have to suffer and wait another 6 - 8 weeks", that is fair isn’t it?  He informed me there is nothing he could do. I had to ask him "is it nothing you can do or nothing you are willing to do?   I’m sure you COULD talk to a manager to see if they could do something. "So here’s what I was offered. "I will personally extend a $125 gift certificate to you for any purchase over $350."

Sidebar  - if a customer is NOT happy with your company will asking them to spend more money with you solve the problem or will it just piss them off more?

So here’s the email that I get from them today….

Dear Tim Clark,

Thank you for contacting Apple.

We are pleased to offer you a coupon for the Apple Store. This coupon is valid through 12/30/06 for $125 off the minimum purchase of $375. Your coupon’s Promotion Code is LGL2U4KQNT

To redeem the coupon, please visit http://www.apple.ca/store <http://www.apple.ca/store>   or call 800-MY-APPLE (800-692-7753), where representatives are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Regards,

 Apple Canada

Apple  - who the heck is Tim Clark?  Do you care about your customers that little that you just cut and paste emails and get their name wrong?  Have you had that many problems that this is now a standard form email that your customer service reps use? 

Will my battery explode before I have to wait THREE MONTHS to send it back to you?

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Tags: apple, macbook pro, customer service

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