A Tale of Two Apples.
My sister and I both have Apple I-phones. I bought the I phone 4 in mid August 2011. She bought I phone 4S,(that's with Siri), when it was released a couple of weeks ago. She had a minor issue or two, went into the Apple store in Augusta, that's maybe 10 miles at the most from her house. She had fantastic service. She raved about the reps taking the time to teach her a few things, like shutting down apps to save battery power. Then, there's me.
The battery in my phone has a problem. On Saturday night, the phone was charging for 8 hours. I picked up the phone off the charger on Sunday AM to go walk the dog. I never walk around the hood without the phone. I went to take a picture of some trash, and the battery was dead. Not dying, dead. There was a picture of a little electric plug. That was it. What the hell? I charged it with a different charger. Nothing happened. I then used a car charger. It finally started charging a little bit. It never got out of the red zone. I went online to Apple. I have full coverage at this point. I put in a claim. All day on Sunday, the phone would not hardly charge out of the red zone. On Monday, I got it to 30+% power. I couldn't go online with it, but I could make phone calls. On Tuesday afternoon, I called Apple about my claim.
The rep on the phone was OK. But the news sucked. He said I could send the phone to Apple- it would cost me $29.95 and I would be without the phone for 15 BUSINESS days. WTF? Or, I could let them put some exorbitant hold on my credit card- (REALLY? what credit do I have these days?) and they would express me out a phone and then I send them back mine. They would charge me if I did something to the phone or what ever. Option 3, I could drive to Apple store- Hmmm. Closest ones to me- Augusta, GA - 2 1/2+ hours away, Charleston, SC 2 1/4 hours away... So, I make an appointment to go to Charleston, SC on Thursday at 11 AM.
I get there on time, not greeted at the door, I see the "Genius" counter at the back of the store. I stand there for a bit then finally I get checked in.
The rep hooks up my phone to a computer and says, there is nothing wrong with the battery. By now, I've gotten the charge up to almost 50% but I haven't used it at all for 3 days. The battery usage shows on a chart on his computer. While my phone showed the red zone, and NO zone on Sunday, the computer showed about 40% power on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, but NO data for Sunday. I said, there, that's the day with no power. He says, do I know how to shut off apps that are running to conserve battery power? I said No. He does something and says there is nothing more he can do for me. He doesn't show me how to do anything. "Since you drove all the way here, why don't you spend a little time here in downtown Charleston. Come back in an hour and see if the phone has significantly less power". Then he can do something. I have spent about 2 minutes with the rep after driving almost 2 1/2 hours ONE WAY.
So, I guess, it is location, location, location. Apple Store in Charleston SC SUCKS.
Yeah, that really suxs big time. I have been to the Apple store in Augusta twice now and both times I have had excellent service. The second time I went to the store, I only made it to the door when I was approached by three "genius's" I swear, I only took three steps and the genius was awesome. Showed me little tricks to use less key strokes and showed me how to stop apps from running. I filled out the survey they sent me and praised the customer service and the product. I love my phone.
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