I had three things go wrong with this iPhone purchasing cycle. 1, iPhone Upgrade Program eligibility issues due to repair. 2, phone reps making up false information. 3, impossible to preorder iPhone as a gift. Anyone else have these issues? Details below:
- I had to spend an hour with three different Apple reps yesterday trying to figure out why my iPhone wasn't eligible for the iPhone Upgrade Program, despite buying my iPhone on launch last year and having bank statements showing $40.75 deducted from my account every month. In the end it was because my iPhone was replaced last autumn with the overheating home button and random restart issue, so they had to give me the serial number and IMEI from my old device to get the upgrade to work. You'd think having an iPhone replaced wouldn't be that uncommon, especially since the program comes with AppleCare+!
- I had two different reps tell me that I could do the iPhone Upgrade Program online and that I'd be able to print a shipping label to return my old iPhone without having to visit a store. I have no idea where they pulled this information from, but I've never had such a bad experience with customer support at Apple just making up random crap to customers like this. And what's even more frustrating is that it should be this way! I have to drive 120 miles just to do this iPhone Upgrade Program. Last year they told me I should be able to just upgrade online once I enroll, but turns out it doesn't work that way at all. Each year you have to have a credit check and it's a new line of credit that is established. The way they do this is extremely stupid. I wish I could just pay cash up front for half the iPhone and the 1 year of AppleCare+, but I can see how that wouldn't work because people would just keep the iPhone for half price. But there must be a simpler way to do it online and ship it in.
- It's impossible to buy an iPhone outright as a gift for someone not on your account. I was trying to buy one for my grandpa and was going to surprise him (they love their iPad and have been talking about getting an iPhone all summer). Every time I tried to select Verizon, it kept asking me to input my account information. Wouldn't let me select sim-free or anything, even though I was paying full price with no contracts. What…the…hell. And it wouldn't even take my Verizon account information for some reason—perhaps a glitch in the system? IDK—is that billing password different? My website password works fine. I'm super pissed because I was planning on surprising them next weekend. I'm even thinking about just adding them to my Verizon plan, but it wouldn't have been possible anyway because I'm pretty sure I need to go in to the store with them to transfer their landline number from AT&T, which they told me they want to do so they don't have to change their phone numbers everywhere.