AfterDawn: Tech news

Apple waives 10 percent restocking fee on iPhone 4

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 03 Jul 2010 2:16 User comments (17)

Apple waives 10 percent restocking fee on iPhone 4 Apple has waived the 10 percent restocking fee for iPhone customers who return their phones, following the revelation that their devices have had a flawed signal strength indicator for years now.
The company added buyers could return the smartphone for a "full refund" within 30 days if they were not happy with it.

Until the announcement, Apple was charging $20 for a returned 16GB iPhone 4, and $30 for a 32GB model.

The decision to drop the fee is likely in conjunction with a recent class action lawsuit filed by angry customers who say the company shipped defective iPhone 4s and have been collecting on the restocking fee.

Says the suit: Apple is willingly selling defective products and consumers "are unable to return the phone without incurring a substantial restocking fee."



In general, Apple is facing a growing number of complaints about signal strength, and dropped calls, which appears to occur when you hold the phone in the lower left corner. Apple even had the audacity to tell buyers to purchase a case for their phone to avoid the problem.

Apple will update iOS 4.0 in the coming weeks with a new strength indicator algorithm that should show an accurate reading.

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17 user comments

13.7.2010 14:44

Apple sure is doing their best to take away any advantage the lawsuit may have against them

23.7.2010 19:21

iPhone has a fault and what do Apple do? do they fix the fault? f#$k no they rewrite the software indicating the fault, the fault is still frikkin! there

33.7.2010 21:06

Lol this is so funny. Now apple is turning this around and putting the blame on the service provider who they where in partnership for years lol. Man this guy just won't admit the truth.

43.7.2010 21:52

This is why you don't become an early adopter with Apple. I think every CE device they've released in the past has always been flawed and/or greatly improved upon with it's successor. iPod, iPad, iPhone, etc.

Likewise the 3rd iteration seems like a minimal upgrade at best and a money grab.

54.7.2010 00:56

yeah Apple has been screwing up really bad lately. maybe they will test their products thoroughly before they release them to market. seriously. dont you think it would of been cheaper to make that metal band around the phone out of composite plastic rather then pressing metal? apple is so stupid. 2ndly why so much glass? the back has glass and the front. u only need it on the front. that phone is delicate like a chandelier, except you put it in your pocket. Apple you fail miserably.

64.7.2010 03:00

They were going to charge a fee to re-stock a device that did not work!!!!!.Ha Ha Ha. the Apple name has been badly damaged by this,just like Toyota and the issues they had.

74.7.2010 06:26

a fee for returning an item that didnt work.thats gotta be the dodgyest thing ive ever heard.btw i remember returning 4 mad catz xbox controllers in a month cause they were faulty and 3 discmans that were faulty.

84.7.2010 12:45

i wouldnt buy a iphone when it comes out for one im not gonna spend that much on a phone that will be outdated in about a year and they always have gliches

94.7.2010 16:31

can i go to an apple store and buy the latest iphone at a reduced price now that people can return them?.i must email apple.

105.7.2010 08:30

So it looks like there are going to be a bunch of refurbished iphone 4's available shortly.

115.7.2010 13:21

Originally posted by snardos:
So it looks like there are going to be a bunch of refurbished iphone 4's available shortly.
yeah..Maybe I will pick up one for my wife since my iPhone 4 seems to work perfectly.

125.7.2010 19:40

So what about getting a free case for those who have supposedly "reception problems". If they can do this and waive a simple restocking fee, there's no reason whatsoever that they can give the case for free. It's shit like this that burns me up about companies like Apple. Very annoying, but that's reality unfortunately.

135.7.2010 22:20

I feel very happy that Crapple is going down !

Remember the underdog Gizmodo:
"Wherever goes around, comes around"

146.7.2010 00:18

Originally posted by DoomLight:
yeah Apple has been screwing up really bad lately. maybe they will test their products thoroughly before they release them to market. seriously. dont you think it would of been cheaper to make that metal band around the phone out of composite plastic rather then pressing metal? apple is so stupid. 2ndly why so much glass? the back has glass and the front. u only need it on the front. that phone is delicate like a chandelier, except you put it in your pocket. Apple you fail miserably.
They tried testing their products; but the testers kept leaving them in bars...oh, and they tested them in cases that made them look like iphone 3gs units. Way to go apple; the case you used to disguise your phones serves to disguise a problem with the phones, and then you leaked two of the phones anyway, making the disguises completely pointless.

At least that is sort of explainable...now how do they account for the fact that half of the units came with yellow splotches on the screen, and all of them have a yellowed look to anything that is white? Surely some of the test units must have gone into testing within a few hours of being built; didn't they ever see splotches on these screens?

156.7.2010 15:05
Zealous Development
Unverified new user

HAHAHA..WoW

Go apple, really. The great stunt of leaking it out and then release a product that does not work and tell the customer they are wrong. I am sure they have enough money to hire a bombay call center for the complain department overload.

I waited for the 3GS 32gig which was the last one before the i4 and it works reasonable to a point but the next generation of phone that would of sold more then anything in history if working has done what ever other company has done and just fuck the customer in the ass and try to recover costs.

I bet everyone at Google is celebrating and going out for a pub crawl over this. Apple is behind in the race with Google because they screwed up more then Microsoft with the Red Ring, at least MS shipped the product back to you refurbished and working then charge you to take it back when by Fair Trading if the product does not work the company has to replace or refund it.

168.7.2010 12:00

I give companies that acknowledge their problems a thumbs up. Sony acknowledged a disc read error in PS2 but not YLODs, Apple acknowledged this problem and battery problems in the iPod Minis and Microsoft acknowledged the RROD. They could be like Dell and "act stupid" and have 97% of Optiplex GX240s fail and not do anything.
http://www.myce.com/news/lawsuit-dell-co...r-issues-31403/

1722.7.2010 17:52

Apple is still charging restocking fee on IPhone 4 returns. http://yfrog.com/cbqpyp

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