After 3 strikes your out! As suggested go to a different inventory source. I suspect the issue is a different subject and not phone related. May I suggest medical marijuana?
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iPhone XS I'm on my 16th iPhone Xs
- Thread starter PumpkingKing
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Don’t believe it...I talked to an Apple store employee when I was there and they said they would never just keep bringing boxes of phones out and open for inspections till you find something you like, were these boxes in plastic or already open boxes?
The corollary is that with millions of events, it's statistically likely an improbable event occur.
[doublepost=1544567856][/doublepost]As number of events grows, it becomes more and more likely that one improbable event will occur
I personally think OP is lying. If you assume that each time you get a phone, there is a 1% (probably a high estimate) that the phone needs to be exchanged, then to have to exchange 15 phones and be on your 16th would have odds of (10^-2)^(15) = 10^-30. That's not like the odds of winning the lottery. That's odds on par with winning the lottery jackpot 3 or 4 times in a row.
Either OP is not a reasonable buyer and was exchanging phones that were perfectly fine or OP is full of sh*t.
Either OP is not a reasonable buyer and was exchanging phones that were perfectly fine or OP is full of sh*t.
Next time someone complains about Apple's "high" margins, they should read this thread. Sixteen units will now be sold as refurbished because one person refuses to seek treatment for their obsessive-compulsive disorder. 
Seriously though, Apple's defect rate is probably around 0.05% or less. I work with manufacturers in China and guessing this from experience. Plus, proper QA process would likely reduce the number of units shipped with defects well below that number.
There was a situation once where Apple sent back millions of iPhones to the factory due to excessive fail rate. I don't remember the details, but it happened some years ago. Could that be the case here? Possible, but highly unlikely. The statistical probability of one person consecutively picking out sixteen defective units must be astronomically small.
Seriously though, Apple's defect rate is probably around 0.05% or less. I work with manufacturers in China and guessing this from experience. Plus, proper QA process would likely reduce the number of units shipped with defects well below that number. There was a situation once where Apple sent back millions of iPhones to the factory due to excessive fail rate. I don't remember the details, but it happened some years ago. Could that be the case here? Possible, but highly unlikely. The statistical probability of one person consecutively picking out sixteen defective units must be astronomically small.
If I were Apple you’d be done and not allowed to purchase another phone. There is absolutely no excuse for you doing this. Go buy a different phone from a different manufacturer if you aren’t happy with the product that Apple is delivering. It’s people like you who when companies lock down return policies can’t get their phone exchanged when they have a real issue.
Your behavior is embarrassing.
Your behavior is embarrassing.
Why does this seem to be more of a person lying to cause everyone here to get riled up......I don't believe it because Apple would never allow that many exchanges.
I'm on my first iPhone XS and it's perfect.
I missed this part of the story. Dude please, this is complete BS. Apple isn't going to trot out phone after phone for you to open up and inspect. Take you fantasies to reddit and see if someone will buy them there. You got a nice little thread going here for yourself but ruined any chance of belief with this little nugget. Good try though.
OP is nuts, but to be fair this has happened to me before. Back when I got the Air 2, I kept getting units that had significant and visible dust under the screen, like it was visible with the screen on. This was SEVERAL. The rep was kind enough to let me go through like three (or four, I can’t remember) before I reached one that didn’t have this problem. That was the only time I ever had that kind of problem, and it was embarrassing to be honest.
I’m not defending anyone, because this is the Internet and that’s not my intention, but I don’t think the OP is lying. I do think they went through a multitude of iPhones to be exchanged when Apple permitted them. Did the OP really return 16 iPhones? I can’t answer that. 16 is a huge number to be returned, but there have been other members were they have returned 8 iPads, or 10 iPhones, etc. If this thread is accurate, then it’s partially Apple‘s fault for allowing _that_ many returns, when they should have a limitation in the first place to how many units can be returned.
He's not even claiming 16 legitimate returns--he's stating that they actually let him open a bunch of phones to inspect them with no transaction being made. What store (with a sane person in charge) would allow that? Is it worth one sale to open 6 or 8 or 10 phones for someone so they can look for a 'good one'? (assuming they don't just re-wrap and still sell as new) At some point the customer is just wrong no matter what they tell you in training. That guy would have been banned from my store for eternity for even suggesting that I allow that.
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I can see why this would seem unbelievable. But in reply, there was another member in the iPad forum about a year ago who claimed that Apple allowed them to open up multiple iPads in store, because they were so disgruntled they kept receiving defective units, Allegedly Apple wanted to make sure that they received a unit without the defects before leaving the store, so I’m not exactly sure how many iPhones the OP was allowed to open, but we can’t necessarily call him a ‘liar’, because no one has proof that this didn’t actually happen, so in theory, we don’t have to necessarily believe him, but we can’t prove otherwise either. We have to be fair in both respects.
I do have to say, amongst all the scrutiny in the 15 pages of this thread, the OP remained fairly levelheaded and well balanced with their arguments, which is another reason why I don’t necessarily think they were not lying either, but I try to see both sides of the spectrum before making any judgments.
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So, I waited for my rebate to come in to do an exchange. Get the exchange back, scratch on the back..small. I say eff it, I'm done going back. As I'm about to apply the screen protector to the front, I notice a scratch on the screen. I am not dealing with a scratch on the screen - time to take it back....again. What is interesting is many of these phones, despite being sealed band boxed, are coming with large dust particles stuck under the plastic wrapping that houses the front and back of the phone. This is such garbage QC. I can understand a spec....but why is there dust (which in some cases can scratch) found housed in direct contact with the screen, as the phone is jostled all over the place.
I would suggest that you remember to use your limited discretionary time on this earth for activities that allow introspection, toward a goal of inner peace and well-being.
Best part in this entire thread
No, I actually disagree with this. Let OP buy as many iPhones as they wish. However, if they have any issue with their phone in the future (even if it's Apple's fault e.g., manufacturing defect) they are not allowed to return it or ask for a replacement for any device they purchase.
I noticed similar things with my two X models. First one had pretty deep scratches on the back and slight scratch on the screen. It also had "popping" case, display was terrible (uniformity problem where two sides of the screen had different hue and viewing angle very narrow and it had to be kept in certain angle within degree or so without getting even worse uniformity). Scratch on the screen was likely only in oleophobic coating (even I could feel it with my fingernail) since I could not see it once screen protector was installed. Was the scratch on the screen just under the Face ID notch? Mine was.
I had it replaced with another brand new and this time it had couple dents on the steel frame where space grey colour had chipped off, there was scratch on the camera lens and it was very slightly bent (I posted photos of it here).
However this one had pretty good and very well tolerable screen (not perfect like in another X we have but still very good) and about usable viewing angle. Still battery in this one is not very good.
At this point I decided to accept that and kept the unit even with the problems. I did not want to take anymore chances and risk ending up with even worse unit and my dealer offered me some discount for the cosmetic issues on this one.
Anyway, in my opinion when paying 1k for a phone it better be perfect in build quality. I've had several iPhones before and they were much better build quality. Quality has been my reason for buying Apple. If quality is going to be like in the latest ones, I definite hesitate to buy another high priced flagship model. I don't know if QC is like this these days or is there some huge difference depending on which factory they are made in. My bad QC SG models were both from the factory starting with F (but not the same batch since there is like 1,5 month difference in manufacturing date) and our another 100% perfect silver one is from D. What letter your serial number begins with?
BTW. I also paid attention to that all our three X models had more or less bubbles and dust under factory seal wrapping, even all of them were in sealed brand new retail box from authorized reseller. But I'm pretty sure dust under this wrapping did not cause scratches what I had, they were much deeper. I remember seeing perfect bubble free wrapping in my previous devices, so maybe they have been opened at the factory for some reason.
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Each of us has different priorities. Taking the above into consideration, why would one post, argue, debate, banter, cajole, and/or sneer here at MacRumors on some anonymous Internet forum.
my XS experience was different, the headphone speaker would stop working and require a restart. if i didn’t touch the screen for 5+ seconds and scrolled, there would be slight stutter, or after the 5 seconds swiping the app away would have slight stutter.
my XR experience has been better BUT with the screen brightness turned down low as if reading in bed at night, you can see a ever so slightly dark area near the top of the screen.
apple says it qualifies for a screen replacement but i’ve just learned to deal with the annoying imperfection.
That's unfortunate you had a bad experience. I actually had a pretty rough time with this phone right after getting it but it turned out to be a software issue as everything has been perfect since updating into the 12.1.3 beta (and now final).
I consider myself lucky that I'm not as sensitive to the stutters as some on these forums. It's clearly a real problem as there's a full thread dedicated to it that's got a hefty number of pages but I've just never seen it.
What set's the alarm bells off with me is the part where the OP says he was allowed to open X amount in the store to inspect them for a good one. The store manager would not have allowed this to happen because it is bad practice to allow customers to see a potential problem with a product. The manager/staff would have brought out a small number, 2 or 3 at the most. If quality issues still persisted then the manager would have got staff to check the stock in their storage area. They would have been instructed to inspect the stock, find a good one and give that one to the customer. They would not have allowed the customer to inspect every single one until a good one is found.
If the OP still sticks to his story then the store manager would have most certainly been fired upon Apple senior management finding out the lengths the store went to to show not only the customer but also other customers in the shop observing what was going on, just how bad the iphone is when they see box after box after box being opened.
If the OP is 100% adamant the story is true then give the store details to one of the forums writers/editors and allow them to investigate.
If the OP still sticks to his story then the store manager would have most certainly been fired upon Apple senior management finding out the lengths the store went to to show not only the customer but also other customers in the shop observing what was going on, just how bad the iphone is when they see box after box after box being opened.
If the OP is 100% adamant the story is true then give the store details to one of the forums writers/editors and allow them to investigate.
I don’t see the value in the editors of this website being interested in investigating/reporting such a thing based off your idea. First off, this is such an isolated event, that would be difficult to piece together all the necessary information. Not to mention, if this was more widespread, like other members were reporting having returned defective iPhones in this quantity for the same thing, then that would be believable. I mean, that’s a lot of documentation if you’re considering ‘16 iPhones’ allegedly being opened/returned. Plus there would have to be some waiver and chain of receipts for all the transactions, minus the phones that the OP was reportedly allowed to open in store.
I think something on the lines of 'Apple store in Australia goes above and beyond to help it's customers' is something that is worth reporting on. Then they could focus on the quality issues and report it being an issue worldwide (many threads in iphone section is testament to that fact).
As for 'isolated event', if you click on 'New posts' daily, you will see 'isolated events' reported by Macrumours all the time. Why should the idea i put forward be any different? It would certainly prove if the OP is telling the truth or not, as it's totally Apple related.
Translation: There is not enough credible documentation here to prove that the OP was allowed to open ‘XYZ amount of phones’ in the store, aside from the return history that they posted on a few pages back, what valid information could they actually provide proving that they were are allowed open phones in the store? So this would be an ‘incomplete investigation’ just based on what the OP said alone, unless store manager could verify that. Again, I don’t see Macrumors wanting to report this anymore than any other thread for someone saying they had defective devices, Which I gather this quantity is highly unique, I just don’t see the editorial staff pursuing something like this. Unless you had a variety of members coming forward with similar incidents with returns such as the OP’s, which as I said, this is it _not_ widespread, it’s more isolated.