Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!iuvax!bsu-cs!mithomas From: mithomas@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Michael Thomas Niehaus) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac Subject: Re: Can we get what we pay for? Message-ID: <6938@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> Date: 25 Apr 89 21:20:46 GMT References: <29440@apple.Apple.COM> <2432@nmtsun.nmt.edu> Organization: CS Dept, Ball St U, Muncie, IN, USA Lines: 102 In article <2432@nmtsun.nmt.edu>, vogelei@nmtsun.nmt.edu (Todd Vogelei) writes: > > This was back in October or so. It is not remembered if the not too > computer literate secretaries taking orders for systems suggeste > (presumably because of the great RAM famine) that she buy a 1 meg model > and buy a 1M and a 2M upgrade kit (I saw the system description list and > there was not one hint that this would be an illegal combination) so as > to speed up delivery, that they wrote it down wrong themselves, or that > simply the right system was ordered but not shipped correctly for > memory shortage reasons mentioned above. I have never known Apple to make mistakes in their shipments (although I don't discount the possibility). Your problem here points out a problem with many of the education order centers across the country: THEY DO NOT KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING. Here at Ball State, I was forced to deal with a mistake that was made by the educational order center: With the Apple Pays Half promotion, they sent in an order for a user that used the keyboard for the peripheral. So, he expected to get a $150 refund, because he bought a CPU and a peripheral (or so he thought). But, he didn't get anything -- a keyboard is not a peripheral, so he is not eligable for a rebate. But telling him that was not very easy. He was planning on making about 4 months of loan payments with the rebate. All I could do was apologize. The mistake was on the part of the educational order center -- their consultants are students who know very little about the Mac. All I could do was file a complaint with them. Sigh. Events like these give Apple a bad name. > At any rate, the mac in question went poof (power supply and main board) > twenty nine days after its delivery in December and was fixed under warranty > by a qualified apple mechanic. While the box was in the shop, the rest of the > memory arrived. When sis went to pick it up she took the upgrades with her > to let the tech install them. Said tech did install the 1M (4-256k SIMMS) > and thus informed sis that there were no more expansion slots for the > 2-1M SIMMs and that the best he could do was 2M. Any qualified consultant would know that an order like this would be completely unacceptable. The technician in this case did the best that he could, since the 1MB SIMMs must be installed in sets of four, and there are only 8 SIMM slots. ... > Enter Apple representative in Chicago (who shall remain nameless until > I determine if something can be gained by releasing his name). Said > rep did tell the secs (two women who got a little power and lost their > minds) that only the 2-1M simms would be accepted after a 15% restocking > fee was deducted + $20 shipping although nothing would be accepted if it > had been installed (even by the registered apple mechanic mentioned > above) ever "and we got ways of tellin" he said. The Apple representative is right: there is a restocking charge. But, I think that it should be the secretaries that are responsible for that cost, since it appears to be their mistake. I would be fuming if I had to pay for it. As much memory as a place like that should sell, they wouldn't even need to send it back to Apple. ... > Questions continue to plague me as I grapple with the big issues like: > Can these profit hungry student haters actually be the makers of the > same apple // series of computers I owned and learned to hack on in my > youth? Since when was it good business to take a UFO (you f***ing own it) > to people you want to upgrade to your next snazzy box in a year or so? > What should our next move be? Only John Scully comes to mind. How do I > reach him? In my own opinion, Apple should require that all university resellers be forced to attend training that makes them certified consultants. I think it is time to do away with resellers that don't even know how to turn off a Mac II... As for reaching John Sculley, I don't know. I will post the addresses of Apple customer relations (and any other useful addresses that I find), though. > If any of you mac-netters out there have any suggestions on how my sister > can end up with the 4M machine she paid for 7 monts or so ago. Drop me > some mail. We are about ready to toss the whole thing through the front > windows at apple to make a point. Well, you will probably need to sell the 256K SIMMs (all eight of them). I would expect that you can get about $25 for each of them. Then buy two more 1MB SIMMs (look around for a $200 price). So it will end up costing you $200 more. What amazes me here is that the "consultants" didn't realize that the package deal (Mac IIx, 40MB hard drive, and 4MB of memory) would be cheaper in the long run. At the time you bought it, it may have taken a couple of weeks for Apple to ship one, but that delay would have been preferable to the problems that you are having now. > Sorry for ranting. I think this case calls for ranting... > Todd -Michael Niehaus -- Michael Niehaus UUCP: !{iuvax,pur-ee}!bsu-cs!mithomas Apple Student Rep ARPA: mithomas@bsu-cs.bsu.edu Ball State University AppleLink: ST0374 (from UUCP: st0374@applelink.apple.com)