My new Ipod

I wanted to blog about my new IPod Touch last week. But due to unexpected twists in events, delayed my blogging. Here what transpired on my purchase from Apple which I expected it to be a breeze in the park which turn into a hellish nightmare.

On Monday morning, I called up Apple 1-800 line to make my purchase of IPod Touch via Citibank's Employee Purchase Program (EPP). I wanted to get 2 units. One of myself and another for my good pal, Teong Wei. In the mailer ad sent out, it was shown that the sale was for IPod Touch (2nd Generation). Thanks to Teong Wei, he reminded me that 2nd Gen IPod should have volume control and speaker functions.

So I called up Apple and made my purchase. To my suprise, they cant find any info in their system for this EPP price which supposedly to be sold at $241. So 1st round was a failure. They called me back again 5 minutes later, saying that they can now accept my order. So fine, I relayed my order to the telesales. And I emphasized again, its 2nd Gen and it supposed to come with vol control and speaker. The telesales said yes.

So on Wed, I got my Ipod. Happy-lah. At night, open up the packaging, and browse through the box. Next morning, in office, I plugged my Ipod into my laptop after installing latest version of the I Tunes. To my horror, I couldnt find the vol control nor the speaker. Something is amidst here. So I called up Apple again. And told them that they might have shipped me the 1st Gen instead of 2nd Gen.

2nd nightmare starts to unfold. They admittedly confessed of making an error in the ad. There are no refurbished 2nd Gen in the market, considering the fact that this release is so new. Heck, its not my problem. I expect Apple to make good of their offer.Right? After rounds and rounds of talks, they finally came with a so called appeasement plan. Plan A was for me to return the Ipod Touch and in exchange they will give me a $60 voucher. Plan B is I can keep the 1st Gen 8Gb IpodTouch and they will refund me $100. Hell no to both of this ideas.

So they asked for an extension and promised to get back to me again latest by Wed. So on Tues, Apple called back and offered another plan. I can either return back and get a voucher of the same value or they can come and exchange my Ipod with a 16Gb version.

Alas, I took up the offer of the 16Gb. But I was dissapointed with Apple for not making good with their offer of advertising the 2nd Gen Ipod. Yes, their call centre team overall was courteous, but thats beyond the point. the point here is that when you sell a product to your customer, one should make good of the offer.

And to makes matter worst, their appointed courier company (TNT) screwed up their delivery plan when executing the 1-1 exchange. I do not want to go into details of that as well. Basically I am so so fed up with the whole supply chain of Apple. I think the management that made the decision to not honouring their advert of selling the 8Gb (2nd Gen) refurnished should read the book, Hug Your Customers. I think that will give them the ABC of how to better value their customers.

I dont have any hard feelings with the call centre team because I know they went through shit from a mistake by their Marketing folks. What I am unhappy is how Apple top dogs here in Singapore did not honour what they advertised. Yes I could have choose to decline the product and get a voucher, But why should I do that? Apple enticed me about a good offer, and I am supposed to walk away just like that because of an error made by them?Hell no!

Anyway I try to put this behind me now. I dont think I want to buy anything from Apple ever again. Too much hassle and time wasted. As for now, I am enjoying my Ipod Touch listening to songs from Oasis and Snow Patrol.

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