Hello.
At the end of March, we published a material stating that service centers were faced with a lack of new supplies of components, they could not carry out both warranty and non-warranty repairs. Received different reviews, one might even say diametrically opposed. The owners and managers of large service centers assured me that there were no problems and I was misled, and when I asked to speak and say this publicly, I received evasive answers: “Now is not the best time, you understand, the issue is political.” I wanted to return to this topic a month later to see what has changed and how much. The first text has not lost its relevance, although it was released at the end of March.
So, at the moment, the only companies that fully form the stock of components for the operation of service centers are the South Korean manufacturers Samsung and LG. Chinese manufacturers actually froze the supply of components, for example, they brought a small number of new products to Xiaomi, but they did not provide any service support for them, only a 100% replacement is expected if there is a marriage (applies to both smartphones and headphones). Given that the company is under a lot of pressure from a business standpoint, how easy it will be to get such a replacement remains an open question.
But let’s look at the work of Apple. Since March 1, the company officially suspended work in Russia, but it needs to provide post-warranty service, it cannot refuse it. I turned to several authorized SCs, everywhere I received an answer that there were no detailed explanations, the company went underground. It appears that the company refuses to discuss these issues with partners. I will give a fairly detailed description of the problem from the owner of one of the authorized SCs that has been working with the company for about ten years. First of all, it should be noted that literally everyone with whom I spoke does not want to openly talk about problems in the hope that the company will return, pay this or that money for repairs. Here is the text that describes the problem first:
1.1 From about mid-March, there were interruptions in the supply of spare parts. At first, we were told that “everything is in order, supplies will come,” but when seemingly simple things like AirPods or Apple Pencil began to run out, we began to question this phrase.
1.2 The biggest pain is, of course, the MacBook. We are experiencing a huge shortage in the supply of displays, top cases (battery with keyboard) for running models such as MacBook Pro 16, MacBook Pro 13 M1, MacBook Air M1. For some repairs, for example, the top case for the MacBook Pro 13 M1, they offered to replace the top case with an English version, but the shop was quickly closed.
As of the end of April, we cannot get any information about the supply of spare parts from both our internal support and AppleCare Russia, which supervises us. Either there is no answer, or aggression is felt.
2.1 On March 9, without warning, we received a letter of assignment of payment. We used to pay for spare parts directly to Apple Rus to a Russian account, now we pay directly to Ireland (JP Morgan). Problems started from day one. Nobody provided payment instructions, because of this, many colleagues in the Russian Federation made mistakes. Money hung, and for a long time, and some still have. We thought that increasing payment acceptance from 2-3 days to 5-7 days would be the only problem, but no. Our accounts at Apple began to be blocked by the Hold procedure. We are completely blocked from performing paid repairs, including on-site repairs of such simple things as a battery or a display, until we pay off the debt. We do not make any concessions, whether it is an increase in the credit limit or payment terms.
2.2 Since March 25, payments through Sberbank or Alfa Bank have completely stopped. We learned about this “the hard way” when payments stopped coming to JP Morgan’s account. From the personal correspondence of colleagues, we learn that Apple Rus says the following: “Well, you can see for yourself what is happening, these banks are in the block.” The process of moving Apple from one account to another takes 1-2 weeks. Colleagues with blocking Hold became even more.
3.1 Due to delays in spare parts, many repairs are already approaching (and in some places already) the legal deadline of 45 days. We expect a wave of claims and lawsuits. Similarly, from Apple we do not see any concern.
3.2 For several years now, a mail-in repair strategy has been operating in Russia. In this strategy, we perform repair assistance, i.e. we transfer the device for diagnostics to the main Apple repair center located in the Moscow region. If the diagnosis is successful, repair or replacement is performed. There are a lot of replacements. Due to the shortage, a new device is not sent to us, and the old one goes through the recycling procedure, as a result, it is not possible to return the client device. The curtain!
3.2 We are also seeing a tightening of some regulations and procedures aimed at reducing the number of orders for certain parts, for example, Apple’s quality programs. Similarly, we observe failures in the main repair center for modifications. Some colleagues began to collect statistics and in a week it reaches 50 refusals, which are not substantiated by anything.
Impressive, isn’t it? Responsible business from Apple turned out to be a small-town sharashka that does not fulfill its obligations. In fact, now the ACS will begin to face a flood of appeals to regulatory authorities and courts, since warranty repairs do not fit into 45 days due to the lack of spare parts. In another service center, they described the situation to me like this: “We see that a person brought a broken MacBook and the breakdown was not his fault. Previously, we could repair it for free under warranty, now we refuse to repair it under any pretext. We physically cannot repair it, there are no components. If we take over the repair, we will not meet the deadlines or we will not repair at all, the client will go to court and win it. Therefore, we have almost 100% failure in warranty repair for the same MacBook, which is ridiculous even from the point of view of statistics. For us, this business has become unprofitable, we are losing money. We will look for ways to make money, we are looking at how to carry out repairs on our own and without Apple support, through the second window”.
The Russian market and its customers were thrown into Apple, this can be considered a fact. That is, the company decided that it was necessary to sell the remaining components in the Moscow warehouse, and withdraw the money to foreign accounts (nothing personal, just business). The fact that under such conditions the partners will begin to refuse warranty repairs is exclusively the partners’ mistakes, after all, Apple employees did not give such an order, either explicitly or implicitly. They simply created all the conditions for service support in Russia to end like a class.
What can I say? Luxury buyers should suffer more than anyone else. Having got used to a more or less decent service, now they cannot get it in principle, since the manufacturer has abandoned the Russian market as such. And the problems of the natives should worry only them, glass beads are expensive in every sense.