Apple Briarwood — Local services in Ann Arbor

Very Unprofesional and inconsiderate staff. My husband and I walked into the store without any acknowledgement he had to greet staff a woman and guy walked completely passed us as if we weren’t good enough. Anyway the day before we had a very long talk on the phone with our phone carrier and Apple about a replacement phone because my husbands phone was accidentally broken we pay for Apple care and insurance through our carrier so the phone is well insured and they went over and beyond to make sure we were satisfied customers the woman we spoke to from Apple Care name was Mary ex1137904 she was very nice and helpful and went over and beyond. She gave us 3 options to go to Briarwood mall and pick up replacement device, get a box sent to our home and when we send our broken phone they will proceed to send our replacement device,and lastly they could’ve sent our phone with a card on file holding the full payment of the new device until we send the broken phone. She insisted we just go to our nearest Apple store she specifically said briarwood Apple store, because it was the closest to our location which was an hour away. So we did just that I called Briarwood Apple store and talked directly to a person to make an appointment so I wasn’t waiting because I know how busy Apple can be and the guy I spoke with said no you don’t need to make an appointment to pick up a replacement phone I said okay so I won’t be waiting he specifically said No! So when my husband and I finally arrived after getting ignored and having to greet ourselves to the young lady that walked passed us she asked what we were here for we gave her the run down she then said okay I’m gonna have a specialist take a look at your phone you have to go to the back table and wait I was very annoyed at that moment and I told her I would’ve made an appointment if I knew I had to wait awhile for a specialist I told her I called and they told me I was fine she said “You talked to someone from here” I said yes and she kind of rolled her eyes as if I was lying and didn’t say anything else about it. We still had to wait! So our specialist finally came to us and remind you I gave T-Mobile and Apple care a full description of the phone and why we needed a replacement prior to us going to Apple at briarwood. They guy sits down take a look at our phone on file and he immediately start to ask what happened to the phone how far did it get dropped we told him and he said I really don’t care I just like to ask but I felt like he was judging at that moment. Nevertheless, he proceeded to tell us he can’t do anything with the phone he can’t give us a new phone because the system isn’t letting him, then he said the SIM card is red flagged, just coming up with multiple reasons. I was very angry because I drove an hour after being told to pick my phone up because I’ve been with my carrier for over 15 years they made sure we were well taken care of and we didn’t have to pay a deductible either for the replacement phone which is usually around 150.00. I told him is their a way he can talk to Mary from Apple and get ahold of someone we talked to he said No, “I can see your information right here on the computer” and he told me I didn’t talk to anyone from Apple that it was only a T-Mobile specialist, basically calling me a liar and might I say again her name was Mary ex 1137904, so I beg the differ. I would like to say I felt we were being racial profiled, for two I feel that he specifically put something in his computer to red flag our device which is a 100% legit device that I pay insurance on every month! So I was offended and I don’t understand how that I gave the specialist the SIM card number the imei number the description of phone, the damage that was made to the phone and they approved everything but when I get to Apple Store in Briarwood mall it’s all of a sudden a red flag and I can’t get my replacement phone. I’m very disappointed with that Apple store I’ve been to novi Apple store and Somerset Apple store and always great...

AVOID APPLE BRIARWOOD. They conned me into signing repair authorization of an insane quote. DECEPTIVE. IMPATIENT. RUDE. I don’t even bother to describe how unprofessional their genius is when it comes to customer service. A lot of other 1 star comments already say plenty.

If you have to visit this store, please make sure that you:

1. Read through entire document whenever they ask you to sign
2. Record your conversation with any employees in that store
3. Just put extra caution for everything

[Update3]

Met the store manager today. I was well prepared and was not surprise at all to see a guy with similar attitude as the employees in this store. He blamed me for not reading through the entire work authorization when I signed it (lol, as if it is perfectly fine for his employee not presenting critical information on the work authorization to customers). He ended up asking me if I were going to pay and claim my laptop today. After all, money is all they want.

The name of the genius who conned me to sign the work agreement is Eric. If you visit this store and happen to work with an Eric, you better watch out.

[update2]

Wow. This store is really an eye opener. I called Apple Care to see if they could help me. Apple care hotline employees are good and helpful. They tried to talk to the store, and the reply from the store was, in the original words, "we explained it to her about this for about an hour". Instead of checking their own problem, they sounded like I was the one being unreasonable.

[update]

I called the store twice in the morning. First person, Chris, was very impatient and rude. 2nd person (forgot her name) at least exhibited some sympathy. Both ended up telling me there was nothing they can do to help me since they got my signature on the work authorization form which they conned me to sign on in the first place. What an irony.

[Original post]

BEWARE OF THIS STORE. Their genius makes false statements regarding to the repair cost and procedure, and they trick their customer to sign on documents without explaining what the document is about. Later they catch them off-guarded. This is precisely what happened to me. If there is a 0 star rating I would have given 0 star.

I went to have my MacBook Pro 2017 checked on. Accidentally spilled some soda on the keyboard and some keys got sticky. The genius quoted very high number - 500 or 600 - which I did not agree on because in my perception the damage was not that extensive. Not to mention that the keyboard was working, even if it wasn't, it wouldn't hurt for me to live on an external keyboard. He refused to give me more details on the breakdown of the quote saying that he was not the repair technician. (When I think back, he was getting impatient because I was asking a lot of questions; and that I kept questioning him why replacing a single key is impossible). Then, I asked him if it was possible to send it out to repair center for a more precise quote. He said yes. He put up a document, described the situation of my laptop, acquired my signature. Upon signing, I double checked with him that this was to acquire a precise quote from repair center, and he said yes.

After he sent me out, I received an email from Apple. Thinking it was just another acknowledgement email, I did not pay attention to it. If I saw the email I would have returned to the store immediately to save myself out of a $635 trouble.

2 days later I received an email saying my laptop was ready to be picked up. I was confused so I called the store. It turns out the document that I signed was a work authorization form, stating that I will pay $635 to fix my laptop. I was truly astonished, because I was not aware of this AT ALL. I did not see this precise number. Nor was I aware that by signing, I actually authorized them to proceed with the repair. OMG I was still waiting for a re-quote! This is totally a scam in nature. But I might end up biting the bullet because my signature is indeed on the document although it is not what I...

Words really can't describe how bad this location is, both in terms of customer care and overall competence of the employees.

I purchased a new iPhone XS from my carrier, and noticed that the battery seemed to be draining much faster than it was supposed to. I finally called Apple Customer Support, who scheduled me an appointment at my local "Genius Bar". Upon my arrival to the store, I was eventually assisted by "Matt". Diagnostics were ran, and Matt confirmed that my battery was bad and recommended a replacement. He then asked me if I had "3 hours to kill, since we're pretty busy here today". I explained that I had another appointment that I really couldn't miss, so he then told me to go back to my carrier so they could swap the phone itself. He gave me a printout stating that the phone should be replaced and sent me on my way.

I drove the 10 or so minutes to AT&T, where they were totally bewildered by what I was told at Apple. They explained that they never swap out Apple products and any replacements (for parts or phone) had to be through the Apple store. He then called the Apple store on my behalf, explained what happened, and told me to go back to them where they'd "prioritize" me. Again, all Apple's mistake and AT&T went above and beyond, as they usually do.

Back I go to the Apple store, where I worked with a nice woman who apologized profusely for the error and said I definitely should not have been told to leave and go to my carrier (thanks, Matt!), and she swapped out my phone for a "new" one. She was pleasant and apologetic the entire time and was the one good part of this whole ordeal.

Later on that day, after finally getting home, I realize that the "new" phone I was given had a dent/chip in the metal frame, close to the side button. Mind you, I hadn't taken it out of my purse and had solely used my work phone since leaving the store, so it had definitely been given to me damaged. I will say that it wasn't a huge spot and perhaps wouldn't have been noticed without a critical eye, but seeing as how these phones are expensive enough to warrant a black market kidney sale it was bugging me that it wasn't "new" in terms of damage. I sucked it up, called the store to let them know, and they told me to come on back and they'd give me a different phone.

I get back to the store after a quick dinner, and it's around 8pm at this point. A girl finally wanders over to help, and she was young and seemed very new. A guy who was extremely condescending kept coming over to help her and ask questions of me, although the person I spoke to on the phone said that they had made a note of all that took place that day and I'd again be "prioritized". I'll try to summarize from here: I got a replacement, was asked if I wanted to set it up there, I (stupidly) declined and said I really just wanted to get home (it was 8:45 at this point) and left.

I finally got home around 9:45, went to set up the new phone, and saw that the phone displayed an error message stating that it "couldn't be activated due to an error". I call Apple Tech Support who would only suggest restoring the phone through an iTunes backup, which I tried repeatedly, but nothing would activate this thing. They passed me along to a supervisor, and we eventually figured out that the girl at Apple had never scanned in the new phone, so the dented phone they had at the store was still registered to me and this one wouldn't work until that could be fixed (IMEI and serial number error). The supervisor submitted a request to their "Chain Errors" department and said it'd be fixed when they got to it. It finally allowed an activation at 9am the next day, nearly 24 full hours since my original trip to the store. TL;DR don't go to this location if you value your time...