Battery Exchange // A True Story

UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE: I ended up talking to a real person (Jeremy) at Apple. It sounds as if they've recruited everyone to man the phones, as Dr. J (as I now call him) claimed to be a "tech nerd." I talked to him way too long, because I can't help trying to be funny with these guys, and also try to sell them one of my books. For a tech nerd, he was extremely good with the Customer Service JuJu (I better look up the word JuJu and make sure it's not scandalously bad JuJu to use the word JuJu), and I walked away feeling like a happy Apple customer. How did he do that? If you get through to the Apple Customer Service folks (and it will take you some time... be patient and listen to the comforting music... I wonder if that music is powered by an iTunesserver...), ask for Jeremy. On second thought, don't ask for Jeremy. Now that you've got someone on the line, just place your order and hang up. There are people waiting in the queue behind you. Don't be a jerk like me and try to sell yourself. Honestly. Now I have guilt. UPDATE UPDATE: I finally got through the approval process on the serial numbers page, but it's telling me that my zip code is incorrect. And it won't let me complete the order process without the correct zip code. Good thing it offers me a corrected zip code. Please note, however, that the corrected zip code is identical to the zip code it offers me. Which is, as you may have guessed, not only bad customer service juju, but extremely annoying. UPDATE: Apparently I'm not the only owner of an apparently dangerous battery who is apparently getting rejected by the apparently not-especially-helpful website, as I've already heard from a few folks from the flickr community who've had the same exact apparent problem. Apparently Apple is not prepared for a recall of this scale, and though I have no doubt that I'll eventually receive satisfaction, I'm further frustrated by the fact that my power cord has never been particularly trustworthy, and therefore when I do as Mac says and pop out my battery, I've got myself a touchy computer that tends to just shut right the hell down once in awhile. Damn.

Battery Exchange // A True Story
by Terry Bain.
Terry Bain's description at flickr (if there is one) » So it looks to me as if my battery should exchange nicely, but I get this message on the Apple website. This is better than the nothing I was getting earlier, when the Apple servers were utterly smashed. But still frustrating. My battery is contributing to global warming, so I want a new battery that doesn't melt the polar ice caps.

So I call the support number. Very handy of them to list it right there on the failure page.

The first few tries I get the customer support menu on crack cocaine. It only makes it through the first few options before shutting me down.

After fifteen minutes or so (I do wait... no sense overloading AT&T in the process), I get a real menu that seems to be responding and listening when I say "Powerbook G4."

"Okay," says the menu guy. "I'll transfer you to a Powerbook Dude."

Okay, those weren't the exact words. But you know what I mean.

Then the menu woman says "Please wait."

Then.

Utter busy signal. The line it's just transferred me to gives me the busy signal with no way to back out and no way to leave a message and no way to do anything but sit and listen to the busy signal.

Which is bad Customer Service JuJu, and not at all like the Apple I know.

My stock in Apple is likely to tank today. But I don't care. I just want my new battery. And right now, I don't have a really good way of contacting them.

Because, well, you know, over a million people need new batteries. And they don't want their powerbook to burn the house down.

That, of course, would be considered even worse Customer Service JuJu than the busy signal.

I'll let you know if things change.



Terry » bainbooks » connect
» cat book | cat-a-log » dog book | dog-a-log

Terry says » I need a new battery.

Can Mr. Jobs do anything?

Or should I call Sony? It is, after all, their battery that's causing all this trouble and ugliness.

Tags: | | | | | | .

Bookmark and Share

Comments (View)

Dipity Timeline