UK carriers response to Apples iphone 4 refund announcement

Oscar_The_Grouch

Mark, you are well within your rights to return the phone as "faulty" if there is an issue with the signal. Under the terms of the Sale of Goods Act, the shop must either repair or replace it. If they cannot, they have to offer you a full refund.

Take the phone in and say "it's faulty". When they had you the box with the new phone, go to the back of the queue (you don't want to upset the other customers that are waiting) then had the unopened box over and say "it's faulty". If they try to give you another phone, do the same thing again. They are not going to have much stock, so they should get the picture fairly quickly. If they tell you they will post a phone to you, say "that's not good enough. Please can I have a full refund or a new, working iPhone 4 now".

Make a right, royal pain of yourself. You should get the refund, but don't expect to be able to get a Tesco contract again.

southernguy_2

MarkCox wrote: »

I'm currently trying to return an iPhone 4 to Tesco and having no joy. They are saying their return policy is 14 days regardless of any announcement from Apple.

I'm outside of the 14 days but within 30 days (for now). Anyone who has managed to return their phone in the UK, especially with Tesco, I would be very interested to hear how you did it.

If I return it as faulty Tesco said they would simply replace it, I would then return that also. Tesco also said their policy for returns is 28 days from the initial purchase, so they would essentially run down the clock replacing it until 28 days was over. Not great service!

I'd be interested too I'm 17 days into a Tesco contract.

MissKeith

This is a weird one for me. I obviously would like to do the right thing by my customers but I know when we send a phone back as faulty, we lose 30% of the value of the handset and ultimately, it affects our bonus. Also, if we do a return out of standard policy, our branch gets hit with the cessation fee, which agains affects our pay. I hope that the networks change their standard policies so it won't negatively affect either the customer or the little people working in stores.

I've lost an awful lot of respect for Apple with this fiasco. I honestly don't think the iPhone 4 was ready for release, we are doing more faulty exchanges than sales and we get sent literally 4 a week of the phone as it is. The demand is too high for the stock Apple is sending us and this is just poor for both prospective customers and those waiting on exchanges. I feel bad when I have to put my hands up and say I have no stock so I can't exchange your phone. That should not be happening.

When Sony Ericsson realised the Satio had issues, they were all recalled, the problems were fixed and they offered every customer who had bought one an exchange to the new one. You'd think how expensive iPhones are to run and buy, Apple would have the same respect for their customers. Clearly not.

Intasun32

MissKeith wrote: »

This is a weird one for me. I obviously would like to do the right thing by my customers but I know when we send a phone back as faulty, we lose 30% of the value of the handset and ultimately, it affects our bonus. Also, if we do a return out of standard policy, our branch gets hit with the cessation fee, which agains affects our pay. I hope that the networks change their standard policies so it won't negatively affect either the customer or the little people working in stores.

I've lost an awful lot of respect for Apple with this fiasco. I honestly don't think the iPhone 4 was ready for release, we are doing more faulty exchanges than sales and we get sent literally 4 a week of the phone as it is. The demand is too high for the stock Apple is sending us and this is just poor for both prospective customers and those waiting on exchanges. I feel bad when I have to put my hands up and say I have no stock so I can't exchange your phone. That should not be happening.

When Sony Ericsson realised the Satio had issues, they were all recalled, the problems were fixed and they offered every customer who had bought one an exchange to the new one. You'd think how expensive iPhones are to run and buy, Apple would have the same respect for their customers. Clearly not.

@MissKeith,

You come across as an honest person but the fact is that you are selling & have sold goods that the public have been told by the maker, Apple, have a design fault that affects the signal. They (Apple) have also promised (ho ho ho) to refund any customer that wishes it a full refund. I can understand how all this finacially affects the retailer and employees, but at the end of the day the item that you have sold your customer has been proved to be faulty. End of story.

I am sure that any Iphone 4 owner that lodges a complaint with their local trading standards office or take their network to Otelo or Cisas must be favorite to come out the winner. Even Otelo & Cisas could not find in favour of the network no matter how hard they will have tried!

:beer:

burnsguitarman

I have an iphone4 with Tesco, and was told yesterday, that I am out of time for returning and cancelling the contract. I was told I had up to 28 days to return a faulty phone for an exchange, but even though he admitted they are all faulty by design, he could not exchange it because he had been told he coudn't! Besides which they had no stock!
Not much help really.

MissKeith

Intasun32 wrote: »

@MissKeith,

You come across as an honest person but the fact is that you are selling & have sold goods that the public have been told by the maker, Apple, have a design fault that affects the signal. They (Apple) have also promised (ho ho ho) to refund any customer that wishes it a full refund. I can understand how all this finacially affects the retailer and employees, but at the end of the day the item that you have sold your customer has been proved to be faulty. End of story.

I am sure that any Iphone 4 owner that lodges a complaint with their local trading standards office or take their network to Otelo or Cisas must be favorite to come out the winner. Even Otelo & Cisas could not find in favour of the network no matter how hard they will have tried!

:beer:

I understand that entirely and I would like to be able to prioritise my customers but as a "little man" working for a big company, I cannot override either my companies rules or the rules of the networks for fear of dismissal. People like me are stuck in between a rock and a hard place, the only thing that has been communicated to us is that Apple are offering a free case for those users who experience the signal fault.

As it is, I am waiting on some definite response from the networks and the company I work for before I start promising returns to customers. I still have so many customers clamouring for an iPhone 4 and as much as I try to convert to an android handset, all they want is an iPhone 4. If there is such a huge issue with this phone, why aren't Apple recalling it from sale? I just can't understand this mentality of offering refunds to unhappy customers whilst still continuing to sell the product.

I would not be happy at all having to wait many weeks for a much awaited phone, realising there is a fault, waiting two-three weeks for an exchange only to realise that they are all the same and having to settle for another phone which isn't an iPhone 4. And then there's people like me who get financially affected by having to return every contract we sell, outside of the networks policy but still being able to sell the damn things. In all honesty, I have not seen one phone come back with this signal fault and most customers struggle to recreate it. I'm seeing more problems such as, the display going blank, the phone not reading the sims, freezing, crashing, rebooting and so forth.

swilliam

Sale of Goods Act applys. Use it !

bubblesmoney

MissKeith wrote: »

I understand that entirely and I would like to be able to prioritise my customers but as a "little man" working for a big company, I cannot override either my companies rules or the rules of the networks for fear of dismissal. People like me are stuck in between a rock and a hard place, the only thing that has been communicated to us is that Apple are offering a free case for those users who experience the signal fault.

As it is, I am waiting on some definite response from the networks and the company I work for before I start promising returns to customers. I still have so many customers clamouring for an iPhone 4 and as much as I try to convert to an android handset, all they want is an iPhone 4. If there is such a huge issue with this phone, why aren't Apple recalling it from sale? I just can't understand this mentality of offering refunds to unhappy customers whilst still continuing to sell the product.

I would not be happy at all having to wait many weeks for a much awaited phone, realising there is a fault, waiting two-three weeks for an exchange only to realise that they are all the same and having to settle for another phone which isn't an iPhone 4. And then there's people like me who get financially affected by having to return every contract we sell, outside of the networks policy but still being able to sell the damn things. In all honesty, I have not seen one phone come back with this signal fault and most customers struggle to recreate it. I'm seeing more problems such as, the display going blank, the phone not reading the sims, freezing, crashing, rebooting and so forth.

are the returns on the iphone 4 more than usual average for smartphones or other iphone models that you have sold.

what are the returns like for phones like the htc desire and samsung galaxy s.

just curious to see how the returns percentages compare in general.

MissKeith

bubblesmoney wrote: »

are the returns on the iphone 4 more than usual average for smartphones or other iphone models that you have sold.

what are the returns like for phones like the htc desire and samsung galaxy s.

just curious to see how the returns percentages compare in general.

I'm not sure about facts and figures but my team were discussing how we have never seen as many other Apple products come back in such a short period of time, ever. I have sold more Galaxy S and Desires than iPhone 4s (mainly due to lack of stock) and I've still done more exchanges on the iPhone 4s. I think I've done one faulty exchange on the Galaxy and one with the Desire. I've done 4 faulty exchanges in a week with the iPhone 4, all for different faults and that's just me. My partner has done 4 also and he works in the same branch as me. I've had to email my RGM three times to see if he can outsource one from a different part of the business and I'm still waiting on two of these.

So yeah it's pretty bad. It's hard because I end up pushing to convert customer's to an android phone but they generally just assume I'm trying to get a sale due to lack of stock and am lying about the many faults I've seen with the iPhone 4. They end up walking out and I assume, buying from a competitor. So Apple have us over a barrell. We're losing out on sales, 30% of each faulty handset that comes back and poor customer experience when we can't resolve their issues immediately.

I was present for the launch of both the 3G and 3GS and of course seen a few come back but the volume is much, much lower.

Intasun32

MissKeith wrote: »

IPeople like me are stuck in between a rock and a hard place, the only thing that has been communicated to us is that Apple are offering a free case for those users who experience the signal fault.

As it is, I am waiting on some definite response from the networks and the company I work for before I start promising returns to customers.

In all honesty, I have not seen one phone come back with this signal fault and most customers struggle to recreate it. I'm seeing more problems such as, the display going blank, the phone not reading the sims, freezing, crashing, rebooting and so forth.

@swilliam,

When it comes to the telecoms industry, like many laws, the Sales of Goods Act has many grey areas. Saying that in this case it should apply, or does it? There have been many reported cases of customers taking the networks to the small claims courts to be met by high flying lawyers. The networks will try to defend their position at all costs. Even though there have been successful cases against the networks for a bad signal sadly it does not set a precedent in law.

@MissKeith

Like the networks the big retailers like CPW and others will do their hardest to protect their profit much to the disadvantage of the mobile phone customer. Some of the posts I have read over time I find it hard to understand how these companies get away with it with consumer law being what it is. I would not get away with it.

This brings me back to the telecoms industry and how it seems to work within a grey area of sales, contracts & mobile phone fraud against the interest of the consumer. With a multi million pound industry and too many people people making a very good living out of the consumer, our voice is ignored even when the manufacturer has admited to a faulty designed product. You have said that you have not seen one signal problem even as in this case when we have been told by Apple that every Iphone has the same signal fault. It just should be accepted, not disputed by the retailer. I don't need to tell you that signal strength will change from block to block, sometime yard to yard.

:beer: