Awesome Customer Service

[Mr Bigglesworth]

On Thursday night last week, my Macbook power supply decided to change occupation and become a smoke machine. This pissed me off.

Anyway, after having wait all day Friday, I called Apple on Saturday, and they referred me to a Apple Authorised Service Centre in my general area. I called them, took the machine to them and got a pleasant suprise:

1) They tested the power supply on the spot, found it dead and ordered me a new one.
2) They gave me a loan power supply until the other one arrived
3) The technician noticed that the area where the palms and fingers rest was tinged (I posted about it on Zgeek) and said that it was a problem with the early Intel Macbooks that had shitty quality plastic. He then ordered a new cover for the computer under warranty.

I was stoked. My previous employer used to make people wait 3 weeks for a repair, these guys said "we'll call you when the parts come in, just leave the Mac overnight". Very very impressed. We like to whinge whenever a cuntish company does shit, so its time to acknowledge good businesses.

The place was Frequency on Bayswater Road, Rushcutters Bay, Sydney.

[-=[BB]=-]

Thats pretty good service, I had the worst service ever from the Apple reseller in Wollongong a few years ago before we got a propper apple shop.
I had tried to install OSX on a slot loading iMac g3 without doing the firmware update and the screen died, I took it in and they "tested" it and told me that the videoboard had fried and it was going to be $200+ to fix it. In the end I ended up reading up on it on the net and found a way of running the firmware update which fixed the problem. Im still pissed that they scammed me out of $40 to not even test the computer. I couldnt even get my money back cos the bastards went broke.

Ahh I feel better allready after having that little rant. :p

[Craft]

Friends of mine have actually worked for a company that does Apple tech support. The things they told me about were mostly software based annd some of the questions they get are hillarious. "Where did my homepage icon in safari go and how do i get it back?" I guess if you've paid for the phone support you might as well use it.

[onetonnesam]

On Thursday night last week, my Macbook power supply decided to change occupation and become a smoke machine. This pissed me off.

Anyway, after having wait all day Friday, I called Apple on Saturday, and they referred me to a Apple Authorised Service Centre in my general area. I called them, took the machine to them and got a pleasant suprise:

1) They tested the power supply on the spot, found it dead and ordered me a new one.
2) They gave me a loan power supply until the other one arrived
3) The technician noticed that the area where the palms and fingers rest was tinged (I posted about it on Zgeek) and said that it was a problem with the early Intel Macbooks that had shitty quality plastic. He then ordered a new cover for the computer under warranty.

I was stoked. My previous employer used to make people wait 3 weeks for a repair, these guys said "we'll call you when the parts come in, just leave the Mac overnight". Very very impressed. We like to whinge whenever a cuntish company does shit, so its time to acknowledge good businesses.

The place was Frequency on Bayswater Road, Rushcutters Bay, Sydney.



Fark!! I wished I read your post earlier. The same thing happened to my macbook power supply and the retailer Digital City did not want to know about it (two months after the sale). Do dropped it into a place called Next Byte who tested the power supply and took the warranty job, but quoted 7 to 10 days for a replacement and no loan power supply.

Good that you praised the good customer service because frankly, this is quite rare these days. They'll be getting my business in the future.

[Glompbot]

kthnx
i used to work for apple
and i have to say they are one of the few companies that really DOES push customer service as a major plus.


just wait though, i'm getting constant calls from the Official Apple Store opening in sydney... they're trying to get people to work there as mac geniuses, once that happens the in store support levels will have to go up because they won't be provided by third party companies anymore.

[rayjayjohnson]

bull fucking shit.

the apple service centre on glebe point road is the worst place in the world for customer service. and i should know. over 5 years my shitty ibook was repaired 5 times and my powerbook 3 times, not to mention my ipod being replaced 3 times. rarely did i ever wait less than 3 weeks. and not once did they assist me is getting compensation / new machines from apple, even though they were clearly faulty.

maybe it's just that branch

[Glompbot]

You realise thats not apple employees...

They're third party resellers...

Wait till the flagship store opens.

Also, TBH, i used to avoid sending *anyone* to the applecentre broadway, you're better off going to the one at taylor square.

[rayjayjohnson]

isn't all service third party resellers?

[Glompbot]

hardware service, yes, but there is a lot that is done via the callcentre as far as isolating issues.

in a short while you will be able to tke your machine into an apple employee (or contractor anyway) working in the first apple store for australia in sydney... or melbourne...

they keep calling me for that job. i don't think i could do retail support though, it'd be soul destroying.

also apple apple has a small service department... so its not allthird party/

[Dr.P]

That is pretty decent service for an Applecentre service centre.
My Macbook power supply cable decided to melt one day, took the guys in Glebe 2 weeks to get me a new one, and 5 days to tell me that Apple didn't have them in stock. Of course if I wanted to buy one they had them in stock both on the Apple Australia website and at Next Byte Glebe. But transfering one from sales to service was all too much for them.
I couldnt live without my Macbook and just had to buy another power supply.

So now I have 2. Hopefully the cable on these ones will last a little longer.

[Glompbot]

DO NOT GO TO GLEBE APPLECENTRE
seriously
i hated sending people to them

taylor square ftw

[minorproblem]

Third party resellers ussually give better service. I have had two small problems with my HP notebook both times took it to the thirdparty service centre, the logged the fault and let me take my laptop home while they ordered the part (one was a new keyboard cause i ubermicroed it to death and another was a broken wireless card and broken external VGA port). Both repairs only took them very little time to replace afterwards. I figured their service was so good because they just charge all the repairs back to HP so for them its like super easy business and i will always come back to them.

[Icky_Thoomp]

Sapia is right - AppleCentre Broadway are nowhere near AppleCentre Taylor Square in terms of customer service. If my memory is correct, do the Taylor Square guys also run the AppleCentre at Bondi Junction?

The other guys that I can recommend are PowerMedia in Surry Hills, especially if you are into video editing and the like. Top blokes in my dealings with them.

[Icky_Thoomp]

Sapia is right - AppleCentre Broadway are nowhere near AppleCentre Taylor Square in terms of customer service. If my memory is correct, do the Taylor Square guys also run the AppleCentre at Bondi Junction?

The other guys that I can recommend are PowerMedia in Surry Hills, especially if you are into video editing and the like. Top blokes in my dealings with them.

[Mr Bigglesworth]

Give the Rushcutters Bay store a go, theyre great.

[Glompbot]

yeah, powermedia are also good...

glebe applecentre suck ass.