You can’t Even PAY Apple to Repair their Watch

Ray Alner
Jan 19, 2022
11 min read

Apple’s Headache

Apple has a long history of poor repairability. Even if you want to PAY Apple for a repair, it can be a long arduous process. I came across this personally with this very frustrating experience with trying to get my watch repaired with Apple. I had contacted Apple because my Apple Watch 5 WiFi edition was not lasting as long as it had. Here’s the story about what went down.

Messaging Apple

I started this long arduous process a couple months ago, around November 2021. I was realizing my Apple watch was not lasting as long as I had experienced in the past. Usually, I take my watch off the charger at 12AM when I head to bed and put it on the charger at 9PM the following evening, with around 10%-20% left at that time depending on how I used the watch. At the time in November 2021, I was needing to put the watch on charge as soon as I got off work, around 5PM, and might eek out till 7PM on regular use. That’s a range of 15-17 hours. I’ve dealt with batteries losing their ability to keep their change, and even Apple mentions it on their product page, so I am well aware of devices degraded performance.

I messaged Apple in November and asked what the process is to get a battery replacement on my watch and was told that it would be $79 based on their website. They asked if they could run some diagnostics and told me that your battery was still within normal operating percentages, at 85%. I was fine with that, and said ok, maybe I’ll wait for a little bit longer until it was becoming a bigger frustration.

January 2022, I was traveling and I was starting to get frustrated at the number of times I had to charge my watch, some days it would last the full day with light use, some days it wouldn’t last past 6PM. I checked the percentage and see its at 82% charge capacity. Just enough to be annoying and sure, if I wasn’t so paranoid about how long the device would last for, I would have been fine with it. I’m a bit more proactive about my equipment because of the amount of technology I have and frankly was OK with paying the price for a battery replacement even at 82%. I just wanted it done so I didn’t have to deal with it in my busy season, knowing how much work it seems to be to get a replacement sent.

I messaged Apple again in January to start the repair process. We start with the typical diagnostics, run some tests, and such, very normal. Once it’s complete, I confirm the battery replacement is $79, and they confirm the battery replacement cost. I agree to the cost.

This is where it gets very confusing, frustrating, and aggravating. I am asked to unpair the watch from my iPhone, I asked why this is required right now, as I told them I could unpair it once the box arrives, as its very cumbersome for me to re-add all my payment cards. My payment cards don’t add like Apple wants them to and takes me about 15-20 minutes to re-add all my cards, plus the time to sync all my apps to the watch. They said it won’t let them mail the box until I unpair the watch. I ask them why this is a requirement and was simply told I could provide feedback about the process if I wanted to, but there was nothing they could do; if I wanted to have a box mailed to me I had to unpair the watch. I ask if I can re-pair the watch after they have checked the box and was told I most certainly could. So I don’t know why this requirement is in place. It makes no sense for this to be a requirement. At this point, I’ve been chatting for about an hour for a $79 battery replacement.

I do the unpairing and they check the box to ship the box, and I re-pair the watch and spend the 15+ minutes re-pairing the watch, getting all my credit cards back on the watch. After this rigamarole I am told to check my email and pay for the repair. I check the email and am surprised that the total repair cost is $330. I ask why it’s a $330 charge and they respond and say they put a hold for the entire amount of the watch repair. I again ask why this is the case because I am only requesting a battery replacement, not a watch replacement. They respond saying “Apple needs to place a hold for the entire cost of the watch... once the battery is replaced the hold is released and I get charged for the replacement.” This doesn’t make sense, I don’t go into a car repair shop and get charged for the entire amount of the car “as a hold” for a car repair. I ask what is stopping Apple from charging the entire amount, and they said they would email me to confirm any further repair. I ask them why not at that point confirm I want to continue further repair, then bill for any further repairs. I don’t get any clear answer on that question. Another side-step.

I decided with the travels I will be doing this year, I best get it fixed now so I don’t have to deal with it later on this year when I might not be able to be without my watch. I begrudgingly pay for the entire repair amount, and get a notification the box has shipped.

The Box

After the notification the box shipped, I was finally relieved that I will be able to get my watch repaired and finished. Phew, that was a lot of work to just get a box. I was surprised there was no shipping information about when the box would arrive, nor any information about carrier or shipping number. It wasn’t a big deal at the moment but then realized that I had a door tag saying they attempted to deliver the box, but the box required a signature.

What?? An empty box required a signature?? But why??? I couldn’t even ask for the EMPTY box to be left at the door, they removed that option. For an empty box. I check the door tag, and get a text saying the empty box was at a FedEx location a few miles from my location. I drive to the FedEx location (which is about as far away as an Apple Store for me, so convenience is out the window) I bring the watch with me so I can just package the box up and ship it out right away.

The “Repair”

I want to preface this section with what Apple’s website shows about battery replacement.

Let's scroll down to the battery replacement section:

Even additional service pages show no information about what is to come next, so my expectation is: I send the watch in, the watch is reviewed and a replacement battery is installed, or a like new watch is mailed back to me within 2-5 business days. I thought the hard part was over.

The watch arrived at their facility a few days later, I notice the watch has been signed for. Nice touch. At that point I was expecting another email saying the service techs reviewed the product request and are sending a replacement watch out.

Nope.

I get an email with the following information:

What??

Like what the heck??

There are two pieces of information I want to point to on this email. First, they “weren’t able to process my request.” Why? More information is provided in the box. OK... Keep this in mind, this is important later on.

My first reaction is I am paying for this repair. If I took my car into the shop and asked for a new battery, then went to another shop and asked for a new battery 20 minutes later, they could tell me “the battery is fine” and I could say “I don’t care, change it.” and they would scoff, think I’m an idiot and replace the car battery. It’s my car, it's my watch, it's my prerogative to do whatever I want with the device even if it doesn’t make sense. I’m paying for it. I’m WILLING to pay for it. Not asking for a freebee, not asking for them to do it without payment. I’m WILLING and ABLE to pay for the repair.

The second thing that caught my eye, is “Delivery of all other products: An adult might need to sign for the package.” OK cool, they are requiring a signature. This is important for later in this saga.

The Second Contact

I message Apple again, asking why my watch is being returned to me unrepaired, I am WILLING and ABLE to pay for the repair. I get a surprised message saying they haven’t a clue why your watch is being returned unrepaired.

OK... That makes me feel great, no one has a clue what’s going on here. They reach out to their next level support tech, introduce me, then start again to look at what is going on.

Their response is they are unable to reproduce the issue, and their diagnostics says nothing is wrong with the device. I told them I don’t care what the diagnostic said, it's MY watch if I want the battery replaced, I should get a begrudged service tech thinking I’m an idiot and complete the repair. But I know the watch is having performance problems so that’s why I sent it in. I wanted a new battery.

At that point I get the support person saying they will have someone call me and ask for my information. I provide my contact information. I get a call with another support rep, and I share my experience so far. This part is fuzzy, so I’ll do my best summing up the conversation, I was tired and annoyed at this call at this point.

I ask what the issue is and still get some confused and relatively unhelpful communication and end up talking to a manager about the issue, sharing my experience so far and the confusion I’ve had getting the watch repaired. I get some questions as to what communication I had so far; I share the email and the lack of information on the website as what qualifies as a repair or a return unrepaired. The first major thing the manager asks is “why don’t you go ahead and purchase another watch.” I knew this question was coming because of the sketchy practices I’ve heard the Apple store take when a person comes into the store with a device Apple doesn’t want to repair. They heavily press the customer to purchase a new device even if the device is functioning. I replied saying that there is nothing wrong with the watch, and it works perfectly, except for the diminished battery life, which I want to pay to get repaired. She understands, and says when you get the watch, go ahead and put another service request in and I will put a note that you are still requesting the battery gets replaced, but it is the service tech’s prerogative to return the product unrepaired. They said there was no way for them to tell the service tech to replace the battery, nor was there any way I could communicate with the repair tech to ask for more information on why they rejected the service request. I was perturbed at that point expressing that I am willing and able to pay for the repair as stated on their website and the lack of other official options leave me with a diminished watch battery and no official way to get the repair completed.

I asked if they would put “customer is requiring a battery replacement.” She laughed and said I’ll put that in but it probably won’t change anything, like she knew it wouldn’t make a difference. This call took almost an hour to get bounced around to other agents and ended with no real actionable solution. Still had a broken watch. Still no confirmed method to get the watch repaired.

The Return Package

A couple days later, I got my unrepaired watch back. Remember earlier when I said cool, they require a signature? Yeah, so that wasn’t the case. Signature not required. Once again, I was confused; is Apple is so concerned with delivery when they are on the hook that they require signature? Even when it’s an empty box? But when the device is deemed by them as something they don’t want money to fix, they don’t require signature and wipe their hands clean of it? To me, they clearly don’t have their customers in their best interest.

Next thing that was confusing and frustrating. Remember they said more information is provided in the box with your device? Yeah, that wasn’t the case. There was no information as to why they refused to repair my device. There was a packing slip with what was shipped, but no letter in the package to share why they said “no, we don’t want your money to replace the battery.”

Right to Repair

I have always been for the right to repair. That’s one reason why I like Framework Laptops and enjoy watching Louis Rossmann talk about all the things in the world of Right to Repair. That’s why I type this on a Lenovo laptop which is more repairable than most systems out there. It’s important.

It clearly isn’t of importance to Apple, who’s marketing department is speaking the speak of showing they are “green” and “care about their customers” while simultaneously making it impossible to get products repaired.

I want to pay to get it repaired. I want to pay someone for just a battery replacement, not a corporate marketing plan. I want to pay to do what I want to do with my product I purchased. Right to Repair seems to be the only clear method make corporations think twice before rejecting a repair request.

Final Thoughts

Will I get my watch repaired? I don’t know. I spent more than 3 hours organizing, planning, attempting, understanding, and deciphering all of the cryptic responses I got from Apple. For a “laughing chance” of possibly getting it repaired, I’m not sure I want to try again. I have better things in life to do than beg a corporate bully. All I know is my watch sucks battery, and Apple refuses to take money to repair it. Why do I stick with Apple products? Because of the network effect... and my mom, who was emailing me every response because she didn’t have a way to text me reliably.

Clearly this is the new way of Corporate America. Restrict the market and make it hard enough that people get fed up and buy a new product instead of repairing the one that works fine. That scares me. I want to be able to have access to products far in the future, and at this rate, current corporate profits will strip the supply of all limited resources so fast that there will be no more resources to sell at an optimum price. That’s when these corporations will flail at the government asking for bailouts and low interest rates to bolster their failing supply of non-renewable resources simply because they think NEW is better than USED. Mark my words.