After hanging out for 6 months with cracked screens, I had decided to replace my 2 iPhones (6 & 6s) with an iPhone 8 and an iPhone X.
In the meantime, I made the mistake of upgrading my iPhone 6 to iOS 11. Now apps can take literally SECONDS to open. Certainly way longer than with iOS 10 where apps open instantly. And to be honest iOS 11 doesn’t have that much functionally that makes it functionally very different from iOS10. The visual GUI is fancy and gentle on the eye… but definitely not worth the speed loss.
iPhone 6 users beware before upgrading!!!!
To be fair, apparently, the iPhone 6s works fine with iOS 11. No app opening issues.
That’s just a small gripe!! My main gripe stems from some very shonky sales practices in the Apple HK store when I went to buy my long awaited and anticipated iPhone 8.
I was in HK for 24 hours of business meetings one of which was in IFC, so I thought I would take the opportunity of a break between meetings to grab a Starbucks and look for an iPhone 8 as the Apple store and Starbucks are virtually next door to each other. Pretty much knowing what I wanted by way of an iPhone 8 I stopped there first.
I was sent to stand in a corner whilst they found someone to attend to me. To be honest it was only a few minutes wait, definitely not long enough for irritation levels to rise.
“What would you like” I was asked. “iPhone 8, 64Gb memory, space grey.” “Apple Care?” “No thanks”. Too easy.
HKD6000.00 give or take an HKD or 2. Great I thought. The purchase as usual with Apple was slick and smooth. Then I was asked if I wanted help with the setup. I said no thanks. The sales guy then said, “There is a ‘no returns’ policy with iPhone 8s, so I suggest you go upstairs and at least open it up with our support staff”. “Weird.” I thought. But went up the stairs and took the guys advice. The girl with apple support said, “do you want to set it up?” I said “nope, I can do that myself. But the sales guy suggested I come open it up with you as there is a ‘no returns’ policy” The girl said fine. We opened it up and switched in on and went through the initial set up with all seemed to work fine. So we packed it back into the box and I thought no more of it…
…until that was I caught up with some friends the next day and bragged about my new iPhone purchase. They then proceeded to tell me about scratches on the cases, dust in camera lenses, dust in the screens. Suddenly the penny dropped – “No returns policy, recommend you open it in the store” it all fell into place. And raised my blood pressure levels a few notches at the thought that Apple had knowingly sold me a potentially faulty product but not bothered to tell me of the possible faults so I could see if they were present on the iPhone I had bought. And all while sneakily advising me (the poor unsuspecting customer) of a no returns policy and the specific flaws that they new could well exist. And covering their backsides by encouraging me to open the box while still in the store.
What kind of company sells customers a product that they know is not up to there standards and doesn’t tell the customer of the possible flaws or even check the product for the flaws before it leaves the store?
This is shocking behaviour and practice from a company that apparently prides itself as the leading phone technology provider with huge pride in its design and quality control processes.
That it clearly appears that Apple has had a major QC disaster but have decided to cover it up, compromise their own high standards and sell a potentially flawed product to unsuspecting customers, is hugely surprising and shocking. And as a religious Apple customer of many years standing, I now find myself no longer able to rely on receiving the quality of product that I had once bought unquestioningly. Never again will I be able to buy an Apple product in the certainty that rigorous product QC is in place.
Perhaps it is now time to move on to a different manufacturer. At what cost, Apple, have you allowed your to standards to sink so low? And your honesty and integrity to become so questionable?
Still in shock!!