All new phones from respected companies come with warranties.
Of course, you have to meet certain conditions in order to make a warranty claim, and every company has its own set of conditions.
Certain actions tend to automatically void a phone's warranty.
However, the warranty conditions are not always cut in stone and you might find some grey areas.
One such area was recently discovered about the iPhone warranty and it has since been ironed out.
The wakeup call that made Apple take notice of a weakness in their warranty policy came in the form of a class action lawsuit.
Quite a few customers who had been turned down after claiming warranty repairs came together and started legal proceedings against the manufacturer.
The problem that gave origin to the law suit is water damage and whether or not it was covered under warranty.
There is a liquid contact indicator on the iPhone and iPod touch near the dock connector or headphone jack.
The indicator is basically a strip of white paper that turns pink or red when it is exposed to water.
This is a good way to identify if the device has been in contact with water.
If the contact indicator had changed color in the devices that people brought for warranty repair, then the people would be turned away.
However, the company that makes the indicator intimated that the indicator might change color as a result of high humidity and not liquid water.
This tore a hole in the liquid damage policy, and meant that Apple should not have denied people repairs based on the liquid contact indicator (LCI) alone.
The people affected by the liquid damage policy include owners of many devices right from the original iPhone to the 3GS to several generations of the iPod touch.
What this means for Apple is that a $53 million settlement has to be made to people who were denied repairs.
The settlement amounts to $200 or more per person, depending on the number of claims made.
This is a testament to the fact that Apple is committed to compensating people who are affected by product failure that has not been caused by them.
Apple went a step ahead and changed its warranty policies in order to make sure that warranty claims were no longer denied solely because the liquid contact indicators had been triggered.
This policy was introduced shortly after the LCI indicator weakness was discovered, and therefore the proposed settlement does not apply to people who bought their devices after 2009.
For these people, they are allowed to buy brand new phones for a subsidized price, (which is a win for them as well as for Apple).
According to the statement released by Apple about the iPhone warranty, a protracted legal battle was not only unwarranted but also wasteful and distracting.
The first such lawsuits were filed in 2010 and they were consolidated and continued up until 2012, when Apple decided that they had gone on too long.
Even though the proposed settlement is not an admission of guilt, it is a big step for consumers towards safeguarding their investment in Apple devices.
Of course, you have to meet certain conditions in order to make a warranty claim, and every company has its own set of conditions.
Certain actions tend to automatically void a phone's warranty.
However, the warranty conditions are not always cut in stone and you might find some grey areas.
One such area was recently discovered about the iPhone warranty and it has since been ironed out.
The wakeup call that made Apple take notice of a weakness in their warranty policy came in the form of a class action lawsuit.
Quite a few customers who had been turned down after claiming warranty repairs came together and started legal proceedings against the manufacturer.
The problem that gave origin to the law suit is water damage and whether or not it was covered under warranty.
There is a liquid contact indicator on the iPhone and iPod touch near the dock connector or headphone jack.
The indicator is basically a strip of white paper that turns pink or red when it is exposed to water.
This is a good way to identify if the device has been in contact with water.
If the contact indicator had changed color in the devices that people brought for warranty repair, then the people would be turned away.
However, the company that makes the indicator intimated that the indicator might change color as a result of high humidity and not liquid water.
This tore a hole in the liquid damage policy, and meant that Apple should not have denied people repairs based on the liquid contact indicator (LCI) alone.
The people affected by the liquid damage policy include owners of many devices right from the original iPhone to the 3GS to several generations of the iPod touch.
What this means for Apple is that a $53 million settlement has to be made to people who were denied repairs.
The settlement amounts to $200 or more per person, depending on the number of claims made.
This is a testament to the fact that Apple is committed to compensating people who are affected by product failure that has not been caused by them.
Apple went a step ahead and changed its warranty policies in order to make sure that warranty claims were no longer denied solely because the liquid contact indicators had been triggered.
This policy was introduced shortly after the LCI indicator weakness was discovered, and therefore the proposed settlement does not apply to people who bought their devices after 2009.
For these people, they are allowed to buy brand new phones for a subsidized price, (which is a win for them as well as for Apple).
According to the statement released by Apple about the iPhone warranty, a protracted legal battle was not only unwarranted but also wasteful and distracting.
The first such lawsuits were filed in 2010 and they were consolidated and continued up until 2012, when Apple decided that they had gone on too long.
Even though the proposed settlement is not an admission of guilt, it is a big step for consumers towards safeguarding their investment in Apple devices.
Source...