UBreakIFix Bad Repair Leads to Broken Phone Citrus Heights California
On July 5th 2015, I took my iPhone 6 in for repair due to water damage to iBreakUFix at 5500 Sunrise Blvd, Suite 300 Citrus Heights, CA 95610. The phone was completely dead. The technician got the phone working and explained that the home button and earpiece still needed replacement and it would cost $157.18 for this service. I agreed to the repair and the price.
They had to order the home button so the repair took a while. On July 7th I called for a status update and they explained they were waiting on the part and to call back on the 11th if I don’t hear from them. I called on the 11th and they said it would be ready for pickup on the 12th.
On the 12th, I picked up the phone and tested it in the store. I quickly discovered that the home button was not recognizing my fingerprint using Apple’s touch ID process as it had done prior to the repair. Also the ear piece was still not repaired either but I only discovered this once I returned home that day. I mentioned to the technician in the store that the home button was not working correctly. The technician at the store told me to backup, erase, and restore the iPhone using my computer and this would resolve the issue with fingerprint recognition on the home button.
I followed the instructions exactly as given to me by the technician and this caused the phone became locked up and frozen in recovery mode and the computer showed an error 53. Prior to this action the phone worked (except for the two parts that the technician repaired). All other functions on the phone worked prior to following the directions of the technician.
Before returning to the store, I performed a 10 minute search online and discovered that it is not possible to replace the home button on an iPhone 5s or above. The button is specifically linked to the chip on the phone and replacing it will cause this issue when the phone is restored. So in short, this company which is supposed to know the technical details of a repairing phones did not know information that can be found on the internet in 10 minutes. Because of this, they made a bad repair and then exacerbated, the problem by giving me bad instructions that directly led to the phone being useless, where before it was 95% functional. This was after they had my phone for 7 days.
Had the tech told me that the home button could be replaced but I could not use the touch ID nor backup and restore the phone ever again I could have made a decision on if I wanted to go forward with the repair or not. I was not told this information either because the tech did not know it or the tech did know it and negligently repaired the phone anyway, presumably for the business but that is speculation.
I contacted the manager of the store, Ms. Olivia Duarte and she explained that she would like to try to repair the phone for me and indicated that she thought it could be fixed and assured me that if the business could not fix it they would replace my phone due to the bad repair / advice.
After 24 hours Ms. Duarte said the business would be replacing the iPhone as several attempts on her part to fix the phone failed. She asked that I make an appointment at the local Apple store for the following afternoon (07/15/2015) so she could have one more chance to fix it. If she couldn’t repair the phone, she would have me take the phone for an exchange at the Apple Store and IFixUBreak would pay the difference in cost meaning there would be no additional cost to me other than the $157.18 I paid for the initial repair.
24 hours later Ms. Durate called me and informed me that because it was water damage that they would not replace my phone after all and instead they would refund my $157.18. At this point they had the phone 11 days.
I disputed this resolution and explained that the phone was working except for the home button and ear piece when I picked it up and furthermore I felt it was the responsibility of the technician to tell me the risks of replacing a home button prior to replacement. I feel that the risks of replacing a home button is information that is readily available online to the public and I would expect a professional to know this. I also explained that due to that technicians advice given to me the phone is now useless where before it was still had 95% of its functionality.
Ms. Durate called the corporate office and said they would call me back to hear my argument. Naturally they didn’t call me until I put in another call to the Ms. Durate and insisted they call me, she would not give me their contact information so I could call them. Then they called me back 10 minutes later.
The corporate office patiently listened to my story, took notes and then contacted the owner and regional manager to discuss it. 24 hours after my initial call to the corporate office, I received a call stating that they decided that they would not replace my phone.
My next step is to file a small claim against the owner of the company (it is an individual franchise so my suit is local, not at the corporate level) but I thought I would contact you first. I have sent a certified letter asking for a payment of $808.92 (a replacement phone and sales tax).
Michael O’Neill