Apple Apologises to China For Unfair Warranty Policies

For several weeks angry Chinese consumers have been voicing their concerns over Apple’s repair and warranty policies in their country. There was dismay at how Apple wasn’t replacing defective products with brand new ones in China, something they do in most other countries as standard. The trend didn’t go unnoticed as Chinese consumers gradually became more vocal and public in their anger against anger with the entire country gradually becoming hostile towards Apple. The feud even escalated to the point where many Chinese celebrities began to publicly “bash” Apple via social networking mediums.

After all of this Apple finally decided to do something. Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, said the company had been listening to consumers concerns and will fix the wrongdoings in the Apple service. He also offered an apology on behalf of the entire company. From now on defective iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S models will be fully replaced if still under the 1 year warranty and Apple says it will provide better and clearer explanations of its warranty policies in future.

We think what this means is that Chinese consumers will get replacements now, but in the future Apple will write in some more T&Cs to its warranty policy to allow it not to offer full replacements for most Chinese products. There must be a reason why Apple doesn’t want to offer replacements in China, probably due to the volume it sells or the fact they sell for lower prices than they would in Western markets.

What are your thoughts on Apple’s treatment of Chinese consumers?

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