Warning: iPhone AMEX refund isn’t dead yet

There was a blip of people who got AMEX to refund the difference, but that bubble is over. Or is it? I just got off the phone with AMEX and…

Let me clarify my position that I do not feel that I have an entitlement to a $200 refund.

That said, if I were running a company (like Apple or AMEX) where customer service is vital to my bottom line, I’d do everything in my power to build a burst of good will right before a holiday season.

For fun, let’s see of the sure fire headlines work.

Last night I went to the Apple Store in Tysons with a friend who bought his phone one week after me, putting him within the 14 day window. Apple credited him $200 on the spot.

I perhaps have one of the worse case situations, in that while early adopters have had their phone for a long time, I’m just outside of the 14 day window, meaning I don’t qualify for the price guarantee match, nor can I return my phone, nor did I get $200 of fanboy usage from the device.

Apple, however, was helpful and friendly. They looked up on my account and indicated that American Express was used to purchase the phone, and that I should call them. They even printed out a fresh copy of the invoice for me.

In the Jerry Seinfield and Superman commercial shorts by American Express, Jerry tells how, by using American Express, he’s protected from theft, damage, and so forth. Could it be true?

I looked at my American Express card, and found out I was a Platinum Member via Costco. Nice!

After looking up AMEX Best Value Guarantee with Google, seeing that a Gold Card Page mentioned BVG, and discovering Return Protection on Platinum Benefits, I felt it was worth a call to AMEX – given the Apple Store made the same suggestions as this newsworthy blog, this tech news article, and this tidbit.

I called 1-800-297-8019, and after a fairly long time on hold due to an enormous “unexpected” call volume, I reached a human who confirmed I had the right number. He explained that the Best Value Guarantee was discontinued in November 2006 (ah, the BVG article above was from 2003).

Turns out, the non-existent Best Value Guarantee would have meant AMEX would have had to pay $200. However, the “Apple won’t take my phone back [so I can purchase a new one at a cheaper rater] which is in affect puts them out $300 – though there’s the possibly you may have to send in your iPhone.

Follow along, cause this gets weird. Even if you paid $600 for the phone, a $300 credit from AMEX and a $100 from Jobs, gets you pretty darn close to the cost of getting a new phone (say if you’ve damaged yours dropping it or such); in fact, it might be just enough to make a point if you’re mad enough.

If you bought the cheaper phone, you very well could be beyond the break even point.

AMEX knows this, and they are well aware of the iPhone situation.

Because AMEX is getting hammered, they are looking for a compromise. Apparently there are enough people who are willing to return them iPhones that have been bricked in order to get $300 that AMEX doesn’t want to deal with that.

As such, they are looking at simply refunding the price difference (which is actually cheaper), especially if that means they don’t have to refund a larger amount and get stuck with a bunch of damaged phones with nothing in the file system and missing a SIMM card.

American Express took the date of purchase, the kind of iPhone, there price (with tax) of the iPhone, and the total cost of charges for the purchase and opened a case for me.

They claim they will review them individually, but the rep was fairly certain they’d be handled in bulk.

By bulk, I assume that means putting them in groups. Speculating here, I believe one group, will be the whining early adopters who will get nothing, another group will be those that are in the 14 day period and should be dealing with Apple, another group of questionable pro-rated matching, and a group that meets the intent of the policy (which is where I fall in), in that I’m just shy of being able to resolve it with Apple but haven’t had the long usage.

If AMEX comes though for me, then great, I will be using their card a lot more often.

If AMEX does anything, and I mean, anything at all, they come out looking like the heros, and have just secured themselves the holiday season as the card to purchase everything with.
Steve Jobs has one chance left to steal the thunder back, however. Tell people they are getting $100 back, but give a certain portion in the purchasing window $200 instead. Suddenly Apple looks beyond fair, but customer centric again.

I will note, however, that there were more people in line with iPhone receipts at Tysons than there were people buying the new iPods, while I was there. The early adopters are clearly gun shy.

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