Apple: Amazing Customer Service
Here I am, in London (as I post this; I'll be in St. Neots by the time it gets posted). My Mac was DOA. I met Bruce Badger, Giovanni Corriga, Peter Monroe, and Steve Wart near Paddington at 10:30, and told them that I had to head to the Apple Store on Regents street to see if there was anything that could be done.
Mind you, my expectations were low; not only am I not at home, I'm not even in my home country. I get to the Genius Bar, and they ask me whether I have an appointment - no, of course - I only just got here. The store is packed, and the board displaying the queue of customers to be helped is long. The guy agrees to look for a few basic problems, but if it's the display, it will likely be days.
So I wait. A bit later he comes back, and says it's not the display, not the memory, it's probably a board - and that will be 3-5 days. At this point I'm in anguish - I'm doing a tutorial tomorrow, and I need this machine. He gets the next guy up the food chain, and he agrees to have a look. My guess is, the purpose of that first speech is to weed out people who aren't utterly desperate :)
I wait another few minutes, and the second guy comes back with paperwork. I fill in Bruce's phone, since that's the only way to reach me during the afternoon, and he tells me it should be fixed before 6. Ecstatic with this news, I head to the pub.
One lunch, a few wines, and a coffee later (not to mention the great convesation!), the phone rings - my Mac is alive! We walk back to the store, present my copy of the paperwork, and bam - there's my Mac, good as new.
Oh, and I need to thank Bruce Badger - he was a huge help all day while I got the Mac sorted out, and helped carry my very heavy bags around - Thanks Bruce!
Oh, the relief. Now, step back and consider: with any other machine, if you were outside your home country and something went wrong, what are the odds you would get a fix within hours for no charge (yes, I have Apple Care)? I can tell you this - I'm completely sold. The next system I buy for any kind of home use will be a Mac.
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Comments
yeah, Apple has really stepped up the service
[Randal L. Schwartz] March 15, 2008 15:27:14.224
I've seen similar comments from many blogs and the press. Apple is starting to become the Nordstroms of the computer world. Yeay.
Customer Service
[Andres] March 15, 2008 19:18:07.727
At the heart of your experience, there is Customer Service. When I called Apple to research the purchase of a new computer, not only they were beyond helpful --- they actually researched their own records to see if I qualified for discounts. Nice surprise: I did.
An honorable mention also goes to Western Digital in this regard. I had one of my new drives fail, and their advance RMA system by which they ship you a replacement drive before you turn in your bad one, just so that your down time is shorter, is fantastic.
not anly Apple, Dell too
[Giorgio] March 16, 2008 6:55:16.729
James, I owned several Dell portables (Latitude), and still own one, parallel to my new MAcBookPro (still alf loaded with software and alf waiting to de filled up. Moving pc is always a nightmare).
My feeling about Apple and customer service was a bit different, not for bad experience on Apple, but on the service level offered.
My Dell where allways covered by a complete service, with a quite low price. This service included for 3 years full repair next business day everywhere in the world (or at least almost everywhere) . I tested it 3 times in the lates 5 years and the service was perffect, with a spare part sent to me next day if part where easyly changeable by customer, like a new keyboard the day my one lost a key, or a techical guy plus parts sent to my current address (current hotel included) nex day.
When I bought my apple, I asked for a 3 years warranty, and discovered that the amount of money was much higer than Dell's one, and service was not including coming to me, but me going to an Apple Store with no warranty of time for the repair.
You where lucky, and your experience rise my faith about Apple services , but I think they should give a more time constrained service, the way Dell do, and do for a cheaper price,
I start using Mac, and I like it (the initial reason I bought the MacBook pro was physical factor, not the OS) , but not all on the PC world is bad.
ciao
Giorgio
I wonder if that's a branch specific experience
[Troy Brumley] March 16, 2008 7:57:18.496
Hi Giorgio! Here in the States Dell support is called Dell Hell, in homage to DLL Hell, I guess. I don't hear much good about Dell support for consumers over the years. Glad your experience is different, but I do wonder if that's a local office thing. Troy.
Interesting..
[Giorgio] March 16, 2008 11:14:05.673
Hi, Troy,
I would suppose USA support would be better than italian one but it seems that, sometime, we have something better here...
I was talking about 3 years extension warranty. (both for Dell and Apple), something you have to pay apart from the computer, and Dell has an agreement here saying they will give next day on site support, and this is what they did on my case. Apple as a different kind of agreement, one without on site support. Is not that in the US you have a different agreement also for Dell?
Any case, nice to know Apple is good for support...
Dell's service is good also in Germany
[HKN] March 17, 2008 4:37:02.864
I have good experiences with the Dell service also here in Germany for both my laptop and my PDA