Genus Bar won't see me if 3 minutes late to iPhone appointment!!!!

[Illusiveman88]

As an Apple Employee, let me tell you how this works because our jobs hard and you should understand how this works.

1. Be on time. are you ever late for an appointment for a job interview or a doctors appointment? Even when you go to the doctor or an interview there is a wait time even if you're there.

2. We have over 200 appointments a day at the Genius Bar not including one to one lessons or open sessions. My store isn't even close to the biggest one where I'm from. Being a few minutes late adds up

3. Policy is 2 mins max for a iOS device and 4-5 for a Mac Regarding lateness. Mac appointments are 10-15 mins and ios are 10 mins max. This is company wide policy. If you wait 25 minutes its because:

a) we're trying to give the best customer service we can which sometimes requires more time
b) there are a lot of *******s who argue about appointments or cause a fuss to take advantage of apple saying their water damaged Mac should be covered. We call these escalations and we count WAY to many a day. This delays us all in getting to everyone else.
c)sometimes we are ahead and we squeeze in more appointments every 10 to the hour because of the people who don't even know they need an appointment, which can sometimes be an issue with the large number of people who bitch and beg for one.

4. Replacement phones or macs etc are all brand new and not refurbished. If they are replacing a Mac you even watch a genius order one and bring it out directly from the box. iPhones have their little black boxes but they are specifically service parts. Think about this for a minute, iPhone 5 came out and people were replacing them at the bar the same day. Does that make any sense?

We work hard, and in some cases to try and catch up by multi-tasking up to 10 customers at once. It works because of waiting for phone restores etc take time. Anyway point is, don't knock us, we can sometimes seem like *******s but we deal we hundreds a week individually. If there is something I didn't answer shoot it at me.

 

[MacManTexas56]

#1. Scuffed iPhone
#2. Wifi blows
and now...
#3. 3 mins late for my 12:30 appointment means I have to come back at 7pm.

Apple... you're pissing in my Cheerios a lot this week.

keyword....."late"

 

[Rocko1]

You don't see this?

Image

You mean that speck of dust, that nanometer of missing anodizing, that made up scratch? No, I don't see it at all.

Any normal human sees that damage and this is not acceptable.

 

[ericrwalker]

You don't see this?

Image

They just need to throw that one out, worthless phone.

 

[auero]

I don't think some of you consider that events happen. Traffic, car accident, car issues, anything. To be turned away after 3 minutes is stupid.

You're lucky at least though. My store usually makes ME wait 30-45 minutes until after my reservation. My last few experiences at the genius bar haven't been that great. My local store needs a renovation though. It's too small for the amount of customers they get.

 

[Illusiveman88]

Traffic and car accidents? Be aware of when to leave and if you have a car accident no matter how minor, why are you still running to you're appointment. Do you expect that everyone has a car accident and we need to be prepared for that. We make exceptions and I bet we would work around that one. You bet everyone else will be waiting longer though because we're trying to help you out

 

[MacManTexas56]

I don't think some of you consider that events happen. Traffic, car accident, car issues, anything. To be turned away after 3 minutes is stupid.

You're lucky at least though. My store usually makes ME wait 30-45 minutes until after my reservation. My last few experiences at the genius bar haven't been that great. My local store needs a renovation though. It's too small for the amount of customers they get.

there are appointments for a reason. Next interview you go on show up 3 minutes late and just say traffic was bad lol

late is late. the dog ate my homework doesn't apply in the real world.

 

[matttye]

I don't think some of you consider that events happen. Traffic, car accident, car issues, anything. To be turned away after 3 minutes is stupid.

You're lucky at least though. My store usually makes ME wait 30-45 minutes until after my reservation. My last few experiences at the genius bar haven't been that great. My local store needs a renovation though. It's too small for the amount of customers they get.

Like I said earlier... the customer only has their own schedule to worry about.

I can only remember being late for an appointment once, and that was because I was late getting out of work on my lunch break because people kept coming into reception (I was a receptionist at the time). I called the place, apologised that I would be a couple of minutes late and asked if I could still be seen.

Usually I get to places about 20 mins early.

 

[ritmomundo]

The glaring flaw in your time table is that not every appointment is 10 minutes long. Some are longer, most are shorter. Apple plans their scheduling around a little longer than the average time, that way an appointment which takes a little longer than average won't disrupt the entire day.

No one is saying the OP should bump the next person in line, but it shouldn't take Apple 7 hours to squeeze him in. There should be a method of standby where if things are moving quickly the OP could be fit in an available gap.

Glaring flaw? With adequate reading comprehension, you would've understood that it was hypothetical, based on arguments made by the four people I originally quoted. I know that in reality, it's not exactly 10 minutes each, I was just proving a point. Thank you for missing it.

 

[auero]

there are appointments for a reason. Next interview you go on show up 3 minutes late and just say traffic was bad lol

late is late. the dog ate my homework doesn't apply in the real world.

Yes because this is a equivalent to a job interview. Appointments are made for a reason. So why do I wait every single time at my Apple store to be called?

Like I said earlier... the customer only has their own schedule to worry about.

I can only remember being late for an appointment once, and that was because I was late getting out of work on my lunch break because people kept coming into reception (I was a receptionist at the time). I called the place, apologised that I would be a couple of minutes late and asked if I could still be seen.

Usually I get to places about 20 mins early.

My point is you can leave as early as you'd like. That doesn't mean it'll prevent the inevitable from happening.

 

[NT1440]

Not saying its right, but from working for Geek Squad, do you know how long 3 minutes seems to clients waiting in line while you're standing there appearing to do nothing at all?

It's not fun, and it feels like an eternity, especially with people in line who apparently have never had to wait for anything in their lifetime (thats how they act anyway, "why are you just standing there not doing anything when I'm in line!?!?", "Mam, I'm on the phone with a client...").

 

[kalexn]

You don't see this?

Image

Now I do, but that is still only 1 or 2 mm.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

Now I do, but that is still only 1 or 2 mm.

Last time I went to an Apple store, my girlfriend and I got there at 6:51 for a 6:50 appointment. By the time we found someone to check us in, it was 6:54, and they rescheduled us. They were then 10 minutes late for our "new" appointment.

 

[skidbubble]

That attitude is irrelevant in the fact that the apple store is supposed to STRIVE to provide GREAT CUSTOMER SERVICE!

And they are. They are providing GREAT CUSTOMER SERVICE to the next guest (after Mr. Late) who did the responsible thing and showed up ON TIME.


It isn't Apple's problem if you're late.

----------

I don't think some of you consider that events happen. Traffic, car accident, car issues, anything. To be turned away after 3 minutes is stupid.

Oh please. It's always somebody else's fault. Blame the other guy. Nobody can ever take accountability for their own actions anymore.

Yes, events happen. Leave earlier next time.

 

[MacManTexas56]

Yes because this is a equivalent to a job interview. Appointments are made for a reason. So why do I wait every single time at my Apple store to be called?



My point is you can leave as early as you'd like. That doesn't mean it'll prevent the inevitable from happening.

And what was the result of being late to his appointment?

 

[darngooddesign]

Glaring flaw? With adequate reading comprehension, you would've understood that it was hypothetical, based on arguments made by the four people I originally quoted. I know that in reality, it's not exactly 10 minutes each, I was just proving a point. Thank you for missing it.

I'm assuming your point was that a hypothetical and unrealistic timeline can't be used as justification for making someone wait 7 hours just because they were 3 minutes late. However, if your point was that if everyone were that day were unrealistically late and their appointments took exactly 10 minutes each then appointments later inthe day would start later, I did get your solid point.

My point isn't that someone late should be accomodated immediately, my point is that being 3 minutes late should mean a 7 hour wait. And as the Apple employee who posted said, they do this as they are sometimes ahead of schedule.

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c)sometimes we are ahead and we squeeze in more appointments every 10 to the hour because of the people who don't even know they need an appointment, which can sometimes be an issue with the large number of people who bitch and beg for one.

Thanks for weighing in. How would you handle someone like the OP. Do you just tell them 7pm or do you have proceedure for standby people and how does that queue work with the regular queue of appointments?

 

[asdfqwerty]

late is late. they are not accepting if you are late but apple is late in attending to your appointment.

 

[VI™]

As an Apple Employee, let me tell you how this works because our jobs hard

You're basically a customer service rep at a retail store and your job is hard? I guess EMTs, Cops, Surgeons, soldiers, etc... all have it made with their easy jobs. I guess it's a good thing no one's life ever depends on the actions of those people

You're just there to help Apple turn a profit. Those people actually do something. Hell, I currently flip papers for a living and I'd like to think that my job is harder than someone working at an Apple store. After all, whether or not criminals can be prosecuted for what they do starts with what I do.

Anyways, my biggest gripe with Apple's customer service is that if anything hardware related happens, I have to drive over an hour to get to the closest Apple store. I'm actually heading to one in Bethesda instead of the Apple store in Columbia mall like I actually planned to do two weeks ago.

 

[gnasher729]

I would have asked to see a manager right away and lit him up. I can't count the times I've had to wait 10, 15 even 25 minutes past my appointment time. Besides, given the issues you already experienced the least thing they can do is let you be 3 minutes late.

You had to wait because the guy before you arrived late.

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late is late. they are not accepting if you are late but apple is late in attending to your appointment.

Apple will be late with your appointment because the person before you took longer than planned. Use some common sense: If A has an appointment at 15:00 and B has an appointment at 15:15, and A's appointment takes 20 minutes, then they can either send A home with his problem not fixed, or make B wait five minutes. If you are B, I suppose you'd rather wait than risk being sent home if _your_ problem takes longer.

If A doesn't turn up at 15:00, then again it is common sense that they serve someone else who came without an appointment instead of having an employee twiddling their thumbs and waiting until 15:15. So at 15:03, that employee is busy serving someone else.

 

[Mr_Brightside_@]

Slightly off topic, but you guys are replying to a years old thread that a newbie bumped

 

[Mr Rabbit]

I guess it's a good thing no one's life ever depends on the actions of those people

The issue though is that people certainly act like this is the case when their devices break. As someone who spent several years behind the Genius Bar, and another several years for third party Apple resellers and service centers, I couldn't begin to count the number of crying fits, temper tantrums, threats, etc that I witnessed. Is it absurd, absolutely. Is it incredibly stressful for the poor sap who has to deal with it, absolutely.

Anyways, my biggest gripe with Apple's customer service is that if anything hardware related happens, I have to drive over an hour to get to the closest Apple store. I'm actually heading to one in Bethesda instead of the Apple store in Columbia mall like I actually planned to do two weeks ago.

Two things...

1 - Absolutely untrue. AppleCare (1-800-APL-CARE) and support.apple.com are both available for support. Suspected hardware failure? Call or contact AppleCare and they will do their best to find the best course of action, which may or may not include sending you a box in order for you to send it in to Apple for repair/replacement. With next day shipping and very competitive out of warranty pricing options it's actually pretty hard to beat by third party service centers (AASPs). Heck, if it's just an iPhone they will even ship the replacement to you before hand (provided you allow them to put a hold on your credit card) so you can avoid downtime without a phone.

2 - How many other manufacturers have a wider range of dedicated retail locations where you can make an appointment to have your device/issue looked at by someone trained specifically by them? I'm not talking about third party service centers that do a wide range of computer/device work, but specific manufacturers (Apple, Microsoft, Samsung, etc)

Several weeks ago a friend's Galaxy S3 failed, wouldn't power on any more. They visited two different T-Mobile stores, had to contact T-Mobile phone support, eventually transferred to Samsung support and finally in the end had a replacement phone mailed to them once they had sent theirs in. I don't know if they could have had the replacement sent in advance or not.

Compare that to my experience this past Sunday. Sunday morning I returned from a run to my wife asking if her 5C was under warranty. Turns out it had shutoff without warning and was refusing to power back on. I hopped online, went to Apple.com/myretailstorename and clicked the Genius logo to make an appointment. Within 3 minutes I had set an appointment to be seen at 4pm that same day. Had the store been inconvenient, as is your case, I could have called 1-800-APL-CARE and had a replacement on the way, likely within 20-30 minutes. We show up to the store at 3:55, are found by the Genius at 3:58, she has a new phone at 4:05. The worst part of the situation was that we had to wait an extra 5-10 minutes after the replacement because our repair had been flagged (surely because I'm an ex employee), they needed to verify the serial numbers matched in the device. All said and done we left the store around 4:15 or so.

 

[VI™]

The issue though is that people certainly act like this is the case when their devices break. As someone who spent several years behind the Genius Bar, and another several years for third party Apple resellers and service centers, I couldn't begin to count the number of crying fits, temper tantrums, threats, etc that I witnessed. Is it absurd, absolutely. Is it incredibly stressful for the poor sap who has to deal with it, absolutely.



Two things...

1 - Absolutely untrue. AppleCare (1-800-APL-CARE) and support.apple.com are both available for support. Suspected hardware failure? Call or contact AppleCare and they will do their best to find the best course of action, which may or may not include sending you a box in order for you to send it in to Apple for repair/replacement. With next day shipping and very competitive out of warranty pricing options it's actually pretty hard to beat by third party service centers (AASPs). Heck, if it's just an iPhone they will even ship the replacement to you before hand (provided you allow them to put a hold on your credit card) so you can avoid downtime without a phone.

2 - How many other manufacturers have a wider range of dedicated retail locations where you can make an appointment to have your device/issue looked at by someone trained specifically by them? I'm not talking about third party service centers that do a wide range of computer/device work, but specific manufacturers (Apple, Microsoft, Samsung, etc)

Several weeks ago a friend's Galaxy S3 failed, wouldn't power on any more. They visited two different T-Mobile stores, had to contact T-Mobile phone support, eventually transferred to Samsung support and finally in the end had a replacement phone mailed to them once they had sent theirs in. I don't know if they could have had the replacement sent in advance or not.

Compare that to my experience this past Sunday. Sunday morning I returned from a run to my wife asking if her 5C was under warranty. Turns out it had shutoff without warning and was refusing to power back on. I hopped online, went to Apple.com/myretailstorename and clicked the Genius logo to make an appointment. Within 3 minutes I had set an appointment to be seen at 4pm that same day. Had the store been inconvenient, as is your case, I could have called 1-800-APL-CARE and had a replacement on the way, likely within 20-30 minutes. We show up to the store at 3:55, are found by the Genius at 3:58, she has a new phone at 4:05. The worst part of the situation was that we had to wait an extra 5-10 minutes after the replacement because our repair had been flagged (surely because I'm an ex employee), they needed to verify the serial numbers matched in the device. All said and done we left the store around 4:15 or so.

1) Every single time I've contacted Apple over the phone or web chat they have said that I have to go to a genius bar. When I've been to a genius bar and they have to repair hardware instead of swapping it out, you know what happens? They send it off to have it repaired and mail it back to me at my house. That wastes 2-3 hours of my time and nearly a tank of gas. There's not much that an apple store is going to do for something like a separating case or a power button that's fallen through the case.

2) When I had issues with a Dell laptop that I owned, they sent me a box and I had it fixed and sent back within a few days. I wasn't required to find a Dell store and make and appointment to have them just send it to a repair center in the mail and send it back to me.

I was going to make an appointment for the lock button not working on my 5 at the Columbia mall within the last two weeks but there was a shooting there and the following days had complications because of that making me have to rearrange plans. Due to work and school schedule I can only make a trip that long every other saturday. I had to find another store and schedule it 2 weeks later. I have an appointment for this Saturday at 10:30. I'm going to have to get up early, travel over an hour from WV to Bethesda, MD. Make sure I'm leaving early enough to account fo traffic and the possible snow storm we're having this weekend and then make the trip home.

Not everyone has an Apple store 15 minutes away from them.

 

[rhett7660]

Three minutes? Yikes. That is a inert amount of time. 10 minutes I can see, but three minutes. Just wow.

 

[Gav2k]

STOP STOP STOP

**** this thread is two years old people****

 

[Mr Rabbit]

1) Every single time I've contacted Apple over the phone or web chat they have said that I have to go to a genius bar. When I've been to a genius bar and they have to repair hardware instead of swapping it out, you know what happens? They send it off to have it repaired and mail it back to me at my house. That wastes 2-3 hours of my time and nearly a tank of gas. There's not much that an apple store is going to do for something like a separating case or a power button that's fallen through the case.

2) When I had issues with a Dell laptop that I owned, they sent me a box and I had it fixed and sent back within a few days. I wasn't required to find a Dell store and make and appointment to have them just send it to a repair center in the mail and send it back to me.

I was going to make an appointment for the lock button not working on my 5 at the Columbia mall within the last two weeks but there was a shooting there and the following days had complications because of that making me have to rearrange plans. Due to work and school schedule I can only make a trip that long every other saturday. I had to find another store and schedule it 2 weeks later. I have an appointment for this Saturday at 10:30. I'm going to have to get up early, travel over an hour from WV to Bethesda, MD. Make sure I'm leaving early enough to account fo traffic and the possible snow storm we're having this weekend and then make the trip home.

Not everyone has an Apple store 15 minutes away from them.

I feel your pain, we didn't have an Apple store until 2007. I made several trips up to Cincinnati (about an hour to hour & half drive each way) for service, though that was more of an excuse to visit the store.

1) You need to push AppleCare harder. From what I've heard they do push the Genius Bar a bit more since Apple has continued to spread out their retail operations, BUT mail in has always and will likely continue to always be an option. The next time you have an issue, talk to AppleCare and mention that you'd prefer to ship the device in for repair. Use the terms depot and flat rate repair. This applies to iOS devices as well.

I should mention that this isn't as easily available with desktop computers (though the Mac Pro and Mac mini challenge that idea). For this though AppleCare coverage includes on-site repair services for desktop computers at no additional cost on top of AppleCare. It's dependent on location (which can be tough in West Virginia) but as a former on-site technician I can say that I've driven 3.5 - 4 hours one way, on many occasions, to fix Macs. Basically if you're within 3-4 hours of an Apple Authorized Service Provider (AASP) then you probably have an on-site option available. And if not, push them, AppleCare is typically very good about finding a solution.

IF AppleCare does insist on you visiting the Genius Bar for a hardware repair you can push them to contact the store, make sure they have the part in stock, inform the store that you're driving 2-3 hours and to try an arrange a "while you wait" repair. That doesn't mean they can fix it within 10 minutes, but they can likely set aside a Genius and the part to fix it while you grab dinner or whatnot. This is by no means standard practice but far from unheard of. I personally repaired a dozen or so Macs with situations similar to this, where AppleCare kind of arranged things before hand since the customer was having to drive a decent distance.

2) This is the exact service that Apple has offered for many years. AppleCare should offer this as an option if you push for it when speaking with them.

Pushing your desired repair, or what it would take to make you happy, with AppleCare goes a long way. I'm not saying to be nasty, but make it clear that driving 2 hours each way is a huge pain, takes up all of your day, etc. They listen, can grab a senior advisor if necessary, and can more often than not accommodate most reasonable requests. If they insist you visit the Genius Bar, insist that they contact the store since it's going to be an ordeal for you to both take it there and pick it up.

For your current iPhone 5 issue, if it's under AppleCare I would absolutely call them and ask that they replace it via mail-in. They can ship a replacement to you in advance (before you send yours back) if you provide valid credit card info, to ensure you're not just stealing the new iPhone. They would obviously need to verify that it isn't working properly, etc, before offering up and service options but what I describe is absolutely available. It's even listed as an option on the AppleCare information page.

AppleCare+ for iPhone