iPhone 4S with ???? Water damage!

After purchasing my iPhone 4S on contract from 02 in June, all was fine until a few weeks ago when the speakers stopped working. No sound from keypad, slider tone or when watching a video clip. It rings occasionally! After contacting 02 - as my phone is under warranty (although not insured) they sent my phone to Apple to repair.

The day after the repair centre received it, they sent me a text message to say the phone has water damage and cannot be repaired under warranty. They would like £110 to fix it!!

I now have my non-repaired phone back. My questions are though, how can my phone be water damaged when its never been near water?? I'm very careful with my phone and its always had a cover on and stays inside a sleeve when not in use. Apparently the charger doc is corroded from this too. I've had the phone since June....why on earth is it corroded already? I don't have problems with this part of the phone.

I've heard/read so many stories now of people being to their phones are water damaged and not coveted under warranty.

Can anyone advise if they have had similar problems? And if so, what I can do as I feel my phone shouldn't have any sort of damage like this after only a few months.

Thank you :-)
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Comments

  • Do you play music in the bath? Condensation and all that?
  • thatsean
    thatsean Posts: 992 Forumite
    edited 29 November 2012 at 4:47PM
    #it's quite common, using the phone in the rain, after a heavy workout, on a humid day can all get moisture into the phone. As Albion says - using the phone to play music, or text in the bath is one I'm terrible for - and on day I know I'll get an out of warranty phone for it.

    Unless you live somewhere where the humidity is zero - your options are to get an Apple approved repair centre to check it out as a second opinion.

    Repair centres are paid by the mfr for fixes, not to reject jobs - whilst im sure some blagging does on, broadly, there's not much of an incentive for them to reject the job with a 110 invoice, rather than replace the phone and invoice Apple 350 for it. They do it because they know the warranty wont cover it.
  • LG30
    LG30 Posts: 5 Forumite
    I've never used my phone to listen to music in the bath (although my husband does use his to listen to music all the time whilst in the bath and has never had any trouble)

    Ironic that you could buy a cheaper handset and not have any like problems.

    It's seems that so many people are told there phones are water damaged that this is a bad thing for apple. Phones are made to be used!!!! My friend was told that condensation from her talking can cause problems with her phone. It's ridiculous.
  • gjchester
    gjchester Posts: 5,741 Forumite
    LG30 wrote: »
    It's seems that so many people are told there phones are water damaged that this is a bad thing for apple. Phones are made to be used!!!! My friend was told that condensation from her talking can cause problems with her phone. It's ridiculous.

    Due to people in the past water damaging phones and claiming it was a warranty fault most manufactureres put in moisture sensative indicators. Simply put they are stickers that go red when they get wet. The problem is that moisture can so all sorts of damaged from shorting circuits when its still liquid, to drying out and leaving salts that cause corrosion or shorting. It's often not cost effective to fix a phone as there may be more damage later on and water damage is almost exclusivly user damage, it's hard to see it happening in the factory as a manufacturing defect (although the sensers can fail sometimes and give false posatives)

    Once the sensors are tripped that it, they are tripped regardless if it's a false posative or not, and all smartphones have them. It's not really just Apple. Apple is reported more as there are more iPhone out there than anything else.

    Apple is actually better than most, if they see the sensors on the headphone jack going red they will check the others so it take more than one to be classed as water damage.

    None of this helps you but is the reason why they have them and water damage is reported more..
  • Emy1501
    Emy1501 Posts: 1,798 Forumite
    I would go back to Apple and advise that the phone has not been dropped in water and therefore on what basis they believe the phone has suffered water damage.

    if they come back with the condensation argument then I would go back to the retailer pointing out the phone is not fit for purpose. No way that a phone should fail due to condensation.

    It seems to me that manufacturers are using this argument to get out of repairing faulty phones.
  • gjchester
    gjchester Posts: 5,741 Forumite
    Emy1501 wrote: »
    I would go back to Apple and advise that the phone has not been dropped in water and therefore on what basis they believe the phone has suffered water damage.

    if they come back with the condensation argument then I would go back to the retailer pointing out the phone is not fit for purpose. No way that a phone should fail due to condensation.

    It seems to me that manufacturers are using this argument to get out of repairing faulty phones.


    Apple will simply show you the red activated sensors and say there has been moisture present. You can see where the obvious ones are here http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3302 but there are two more internally see http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?hl=en&sa=X&tbo=d&biw=1280&bih=859&tbm=isch&tbnid=7OmQi-0iq-U7pM:&imgrefurl=http://jailbreak.phoneshowto.com/latest-iphone-jailbreak-news/how-to-verify-for-water-harm-before-buying-a-utilized-iphone-four/&docid=HBvxJehullGSAM&imgurl=http://jailbreak.phoneshowto.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/3da8d__IMG_1497-620x465.jpg&w=620&h=465&ei=dKS4UKyhHYjLhAf61oCwBw&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=205&vpy=308&dur=1638&hovh=194&hovw=259&tx=188&ty=96&sig=108203611665596683537&page=1&tbnh=156&tbnw=209&start=0&ndsp=24&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0,i:108.


    They may suggest the cause is condensation, but it's only a suggestion the sensors can't tell you what cause them to trip, all they say is the phone has been exposed to moisture not how. Apple have been are reported to allow warranty repairs if the internal ones are not tripped even if the two external ones are.


    They sensors can be over sensative but it most likely come down to the OP having to proving lack of water contact, which would be almost impossible.

    If in the past people hadn't water damaged phones andthen tried to claim on warranties so much we may not be in the situation we are, but not a lot we can do about it now..
  • Emy1501
    Emy1501 Posts: 1,798 Forumite
    gjchester wrote: »
    Apple will simply show you the red activated sensors and say there has been moisture present. You can see where the obvious ones are here http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3302 but there are two more internally see http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?hl=en&sa=X&tbo=d&biw=1280&bih=859&tbm=isch&tbnid=7OmQi-0iq-U7pM:&imgrefurl=http://jailbreak.phoneshowto.com/latest-iphone-jailbreak-news/how-to-verify-for-water-harm-before-buying-a-utilized-iphone-four/&docid=HBvxJehullGSAM&imgurl=http://jailbreak.phoneshowto.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/3da8d__IMG_1497-620x465.jpg&w=620&h=465&ei=dKS4UKyhHYjLhAf61oCwBw&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=205&vpy=308&dur=1638&hovh=194&hovw=259&tx=188&ty=96&sig=108203611665596683537&page=1&tbnh=156&tbnw=209&start=0&ndsp=24&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0,i:108.


    They may suggest the cause is condensation, but it's only a suggestion the sensors can't tell you what cause them to trip, all they say is the phone has been exposed to moisture not how. Apple have been are reported to allow warranty repairs if the internal ones are not tripped even if the two external ones are.


    They sensors can be over sensative but it most likely come down to the OP having to proving lack of water contact, which would be almost impossible.

    If in the past people hadn't water damaged phones andthen tried to claim on warranties so much we may not be in the situation we are, but not a lot we can do about it now..

    The small claims court is very claimant friendly. If a claimant says the phone was not dropped in water then it will be down to Apple or the retailer to prove it was. Apple will have to admit that the sensor could be triggered by condensation and there is a reasonable chance that this could be caused by any sort of consendation.

    I suspect there is little chance a court would accept this arguement.

    A phone has to be fit for purpose and manufactuers suggesting phones should be used in a moisture free environment is a nonsense.
  • LG30
    LG30 Posts: 5 Forumite
    Emy1501 wrote: »
    The small claims court is very claimant friendly. If a claimant says the phone was not dropped in water then it will be down to Apple or the retailer to prove it was. Apple will have to admit that the sensor could be triggered by condensation and there is a reasonable chance that this could be caused by any sort of consendation.

    I suspect there is little chance a court would accept this arguement.

    A phone has to be fit for purpose and manufactuers suggesting phones should be used in a moisture free environment is a nonsense.

    Thank you! My point exactly. A phone should be fit for purpose. Think I will be fighting my corner on this one. My phone is 4 months old and should be working perfectly well as it is looked after.


    Will take it to our nearest apple store to put my questions to them.

    Thanks for replying :-)
  • sniggings
    sniggings Posts: 5,281
    First Post First Anniversary Combo Breaker
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    one of the sensors is in the headphone jack, I wonder why Apple have now moved this to the bottom of the phone! a drop of rain would easily get in the iphone 4/4s phone jack when it was on the top of the phone.
  • gjchester
    gjchester Posts: 5,741 Forumite
    sniggings wrote: »
    one of the sensors is in the headphone jack, I wonder why Apple have now moved this to the bottom of the phone! a drop of rain would easily get in the iphone 4/4s phone jack when it was on the top of the phone.

    Which is why Apple usually check both external and internal sensor stickers.

    The headphone jack on the 4 is on the top, the other external sensor is on the dock connector. rain on the heaphone jack alone would not be rejected.
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