An Apple Story.

An Apple Story.

I was working on my one year five month old MacBook Air one morning, two months ago, at home,  when I got up to get a glass of water. When I got back from the kitchen, the screen was blank. Thinking that  it just went to sleep, I pressed the spacebar to activate the screen. It was still blank. The power cable was working but the MacBook Air was dead.

For the next several hours and three days, I searched online for a fix for my laptop problem. I tried a number of things suggested in Apple Forums. No success. 

An inquiry with an Apple Service Centre - Powermax Computers here in downtown Lismore, NSW- told me that a diagnosis would cost Fifty Five Dollars. I let it go at that, wondering,  if somehow, one day, my Macbook Air would just suddenly spring to life. 

Finally, after a month or so, I tried to turn it on. Still dead.

I brought it to the service centre and after a day, they told me that the Logic Board needs replacement and the parts and labor would cost more than Six Hundred Dollars. I decided to just pick it up and pay the diagnosis fee since the cost of repair was beyond what I could afford at the moment. 

The service technician, Bryan, was very helpful and gave me some advice. He informed me that the logic board was usually covered by a two year warranty, but since I bought the laptop in the Philippines, the warranty could not be applied in Australia. He told me to try and give Apple a call, and see if they could make an exception and provide warranty for my unit. He said all I would lose is thirty minutes of my time. It seemed to be a pretty neat suggestion. 

When I got home, I looked up the Apple Support online and since they did not allow you to email a request, I was pondering whether  to give them a 1300 call, wondering how much a thirty minute call would cost me. 

In their support site, I noticed that you could ask them to give you a call and I thought, this is great. It would save me the cost of a  lengthy telephone call. I logged in, typed in the required serial number of my MacBook and pressed next. The site then asked me if I had  Apple's AppleCare Protection Plan, which I don't. This nearly prompted me to just pick up the phone and dial the number, costs and all. But.... just below the link where you say Yes or No to the question was another link that asks you if you want to request for an exemption to the AppleCare Plan, for the reason that your Apple product is fairly new. Obviously, I clicked on that link and was prompted to enter my phone number. Which I did. 

After 2 seconds (no exaggeration), my phone rang and a Call Centre agent (who I found out later was based in the Philippines) asked me about my problem. I explained my predicament and she told me that although I should not expect any possible exception to the warranty rule, she will get in touch with her supervisor and asked me to wait for a few minutes. 

So I waited. Around five to eight minutes, which I did not mind since they called me up and I was using Facebook while waiting. She got back on the line and told me that she will transfer me to her supervisor.

When the supervisor was patched through, he introduced himself and told me that he was also named Alan, spelled correctly with one "L" just like me. 

He then proceeded to tell me that unfortunately, the service centre gave me the wrong information and that even if they allow the servicing in Australia, the warranty for the logic board was actually for just one year, and not two as Powermax Computers told me. I thanked him for the clarification and for taking the time to discuss it with me. 

But the story does not end here.  He immediately told me that he did not feel good about leaving me hanging since their accredited centre gave me the wrong information and that I would be stuck with a broken Apple product. 

He informed me that although they cannot make it a policy to extend the warranty beyond what they have stipulated, he was willing to make an exception and provide my unit with the warranty to cover the logic board replacement. He even added that if the service centre found any other matter to repair and replace, that I should give him a call ( he gave me his direct extension number) and he will see what he can do. 

He there and then updated the record of my MacBook and asked me to just bring it back to the service centre and they will be able to fix it up since the record would reflect an active warranty cover. 

Two days later, I had my Macbook Air back, up and running. And it just cost me the diagnosis fee of  Fifty Five Dollars 

Customer Service. Apple style. 

Excellent.