iPhone Woes
Three weeks ago, after I finished my tour of the Escort – Beltronics plant in Mississauga Canada, I drove down to Niagara Falls and took the “Lady of the Mist” boat ride at the bottom of the falls.
Prior to getting on the boat, the staff provides a thin plastic “garbage bag” type of a rain coat for everyone to wear to keep from being soaked to the bone. My problem being over six foot six and 300 pounds, the bottom of the bag only covered me to the waist.
After being drenched waist down and while debarking from the boat, I unclipped my trusty Blackberry from my belt to make a call, only find it inoperable.
As being one that always tries to find an opportunity from misfortune, I thought that this would be a great time to upgrade my phone to one of those iPhones that were just being released that week.
After arriving home I shot over to my local AT&T store and had them first inspect my Blackberry. After opening the battery case they confirmed that it was toast and it could not be repaired.
I then asked them about the availability of the iPhone and I was told that I was in luck, that they just had several eight meg units shipped to the store and one could be mine for only $600.00 and change.
I signed up for their two year contract and took one home and spent the next several hours picking the songs from my MP3 collection that I was going to load into the phone.
The phone worked flawlessly the next few days as I serviced and packed up my Harley Davidson to make my annual pilgrimage to Sturgis South Dakota for bike week.
After my departure to Sturgis my first stop was Flagstaff Arizona to fuel up and to eat a hearty Mexican dinner. While eating and surfing the net on my iPhone a strange message appeared: “Repair Needed iPhone cannot make or receive calls. www.apple.com/support”
I pulled out my trusty old Tough Book laptop from my backpack and quickly brought up Apple’s support website, but could not find any troubleshooting for this message. I powered off the iPhone, packed up my belongings and headed back out to the open road.
Late the following morning I pulled into Denver and powered up the iPhone and to my pleasant surprise it was working. I made a few telephone calls to family and friends, freshened up and headed back onto the road.
Late that evening I rode into our camp in Custer South Dakota and called it a night.
The following morning I disconnected the iPhone from the 12 volt charger to call my wife to tell her that I made it safe and found the phone displaying the message of death again, that my iPhone needed repair.
Using a wired phone line at the camp, I called iPhone service and this is where the real fun started…..
I explained to the first service technician that I was on vacation in South Dakota and the message that was appearing on the phone. She paused a few seconds and then related “We can only offer support to our customers in North America, so I am unable to assist you any further”.
Flabbergasted, I gave the technician a bit of a geography lesson, explaining that South Dakota was indeed a state in the US and that it was just above Nebraska, east of Wyoming. She replied that she was sorry, but South Dakota was not on her list of states in the USA and she could not help me. She then asked if I wanted she could transfer me to someone else, I said “yes please”!
The next operator was confused as to why I was transferred to him, relating that he offered support on laptops and had no clue on the iPhone. However he chuckled when I explained that the last operator said South Dakota was not in the USA and replied that he would make it a point to find someone at their headquarters that could help me.
Finally I was transferred to an iPhone service specialist and I explained my dilemma. She explained that she had never heard of such a message and that this message was not in her service database, but that she would walk me through a few troubleshooting methods.
She asked me to hold down the power button and the menu button at the same time to hard boot the phone and to wait till it powered up. After the iPhone powered back up and while it was searching for service, the “Repair Needed” message appeared again.
The service specialist explained that it appeared that my phone would need to be replaced, however since I was on the road on vacation without any real shipping address that I would have to wait till I returned home. There I could bring the phone back to where I purchased it so it could be replaced or repaired.
I packed up my iPhone for the next couple weeks and begged, borrowed others to use their phones to call my loved ones while on my vacation.
The following morning after arriving home, I headed off to the AT&T store where I purchased my phone to obtain service. I was told at the store that they could do nothing for me at the store that I had to call Apple to obtain support.
At the store I called Apple and explained my three week dilemma having no telephone service. The service specialist said that he had a solution, that I could drive to their Apple Store in Phoenix and that they could either repair or replace the phone while my phone was being serviced.
After driving over 3200 miles the past few weeks, I didn’t think much of another 100 mile trip to the Apple store to get this resolved.
A couple hours later I was greeted at the Apple store and I explained my problem. I almost fell to the floor when I was told that they could make an appointment for me later that week so I could meet with a service person!
Holding my temper I tried to explain my situation again and adding that I lived almost one hundred miles away and that I couldn’t possibly come down later that week. The Apple store person explained that I could wait as an “on call” incase someone didn’t show up for their appointment, but that there were already several people ahead of me and couldn’t guarantee that someone would assist me today.
Feeling totally defeated I headed home and I called Apple Support back. Finally after speaking with a few more specialists, I found one that took apathy in my situation and explained that he would waive the $29.95 service fee and send me out a replacement iPhone overnight with instructions on how to return my inoperable unit.
A few hours ago my replacement iPhone was delivered by FedEx and I connected it to my computer to restore my files and settings. While waiting, I packed up my inoperable phone and dropped it off at the FedEx store around the corner.
Upon returning to my computer and iPhone I found that all my settings were restored and unplugged the phone and powered up.
After the iPhone found service, indicating four bars, I began dialing my first number and paused when the message appeared that seemed all so familiar “Repair Needed”!
Update:
Well after posting this entry I figured that I would charge the iPhone by plugging it into the computer. A few minutes later I noticed a yellow warning on my iPhone saying “Please connect to iTunes” and a message box on my computer saying that I had to do a restore. All of my other settings in iTunes for the phone were gone. I pressed the restore button and an hour later get the message “The iPhone cannot be restored, An unknown error occurred” (-50) I’m guessing that I am going to have an interesting conversation with someone again at Apple Support in the morning…
What total shit. I feel your Apple woes, but not to your extent. I’ve had an iPod shuffle for a bit that I finally got working. Turned out I had to get it to start restoring, interrupt the process (by unplugging the shuffle from the charger), closeout iTunes, put it back in the charger then after it prompted me that it wanted to pick songs for me to quickly go into the settings, select that I wanted to use it for data, and then apply the change. After that it worked normally, but WHY, I have no idea. This almost makes Windows seem logical…
Update:
Finally after three weeks of running around I got connected to a iPhone specialist that took the time to try to help me.
He first walked me through a full restore of my iPhone to get that running.
While the phone was doing its restore he made a few telephone calls to try to identify the problem. He came back and told me that AT & T heard of a situation where a metal case was causing simular problems.
I explained to the specialist that I had puchased my case at the AT & T store when I puchcased my iPhone and that my case was plastic.
After getting the phone restored I was able to make a couple of telephone calls (finally) without the message.
The specialist gave me his direct telephone line and told me to call him if the problem with the error message came back.
Keeping my fingers crossed!
I feel your pain, I am going through the support hell at the moment too with the same issue.
So much for having the highest customer satisfaction and support scores in the US. I think I would have been better off talking to someone in India that works for Dell and can’t even pronounce South Dakota little alone spell it with their name “Mike” and their email signed sanjaya abdual rahib.
It is irritating and disgusts me that not even a month after having the phone such an issue occurs and rather than replace they will try to repair. Very poor customer service if I do say so myself!
I hope I do not have to spend as much time as you, but I am glad to hear you did get yours fixed. Wish me luck.
This is why I hate Apple.
Everything they make is proprietary
and has to go through them for repair.
I’ll never buy an iPhone for this
very reason. I mean, the Phone won’t
even let you install 3rd party apps.
It’s a Treo or Blackberry Curve for
me. I hate the way they treated you
you deserved a lot better….
Boooooo Apple.
Anyway you could give me that guys direct line? It would be really helpful because I have been having the same issue for the last 2 weeks.
Update 8-23-2007
Last week I got back my I Phone and returned their loaner, I have to admit turn around was very fast.
The repair tag that came with the phone said that the repair was under warranty and that is all. No mention of what they did.
However since getting the phone back, it has been working fine and I have not gotten that error message since
I just received this same message on my iPhone, googled it, came up with your post and decided to call Apple support. The support rep told me that the issue is a faulty SIM card, and that I need to go to an AT&T store to replace the card. Which could explain why both iPhones you used got the same message.
My take so far. Apple is Apple and I’m pleased with their service. AT&T is AT&T and they pretty much suck, but that’s to be expected.
I’ve had an iPhone for a few weeks (month and a half?) and haven’t had your experience. What a bummer!
Apple is an odd company — you either love them or hate them! I’ve been using their products for about four years now and have not gone through the nightmare with customer service you described. My 23″ cinema display died a couple of years ago, abruptly. The technician walked me through some diagnostics and sent a replacement power supply via overnight delivery. When that didn’t work, they shipped me a box and call tag and had the display repaired and back to me within a week.
New products almost always have issues. That’s not to excuse your horror story, but it’s been my experience too. I guess I’ve just been lucky that my Apple products have not needed repairs.
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that Young Son’s 30GB iPod video went for a swim (in his pocket)! Apple replaced it under warranty for a charge of about $30. Again, they even sent a shipping box and call tag.
It ain’t all bad… But it sure can be frustrating. (Don’t get me started on the recent suite of Toshiba notebooks! 😉
Update: 9-24-2007
Had my “repaired” iPhone now for over three weeks and this problem has gone away….
Still don’t know what they did to fix it however
Late to the game with this comment(came here for the Passport 9500i), but here it goes:
Many of Apple’s iPhone error messages are very ambiguous or generic. In your specific case, the “repair needed” was actually caused by the absence of an AT&T network for the phone to connect to. Apple’s almost paranoid lockdown of the iPhone will make it have a seizure at even the most remote network issue.
Hope you had your phone working for you trouble-free after they repaired/replaced it. At least you should have gotten a free prepackaged paper clip, including user instructions, out of the deal.
This is what I did the first time I got the ‘Repair Needed’ error on my iPhone:
1) Take out the Sim
2) Turn off your iPhone
3) Turn it back on
4) You will get a message, something like “No Sim”
6) Insert your Sim Card
5) It will take a moment to activate, then your all set.
What if the SIM card won’t come out with the paperclip?
This is just disgrace… I was just thinking of buying one, and I am very glad you shared all the details of your story with us. This surely sounds like the technology of the iphone is not mature yet, and it is best to wait until the 2nd or 3rd editions before spending your money on this. And bureaucracy is shit!
we have the same problem my phone was displaying “repair needed cannot make or recieve call” I need help how to fix this problem i already try 2.0 – 2.2.1 firmware by still no luck. please email to me on how to fix this problem. iphone dev-team help me please.. thank you.. please email to me at alejandro_decaprio@yahoo.com
Alejandro, did you read the posts before yours? I just finished reading this whole web page of what I would consider typical Apple support issues. – – I dove head first into the Apple world a good number of years ago taking a position at a Warner Music Group Sub. supporting an art dept. of all Apple computers with only a few years of IBM compatible experience. My overall opinion after OS6 to OSXing my way through many solved support issues is: Great hardware after the first version or more bugs are flushed, bad support still unless you call me (no I don’t work for them), and yes, each piece or version of hardware usually requires a different fix, update or configuration. If I were a typical user, I can’t say I’d choose Apple. Being the analytical thinking support geek that I am, I don’t call support… If I can’t fix it, it’s not worth or can’t be fixed. So Alejandro, read what iCeMan and iPhoneveragain wrote. I’d be your answer is there. Curently only using a iPhone 3G 16G which cost a whopping $33 in replacement lcd after being given the broken one. I don’t use AT&T 3G service. Just use the thing for it’s cool free apps including home automation, A/V, computer control and skype for voip over wifi. Thanks to Radar Roy for keeping my ticket list short and this post long. Roy, free support if you ever get fed up with Apple’s again! Man did this take a long time to peck out on my iPhone! DVG ** tr – it’s not long enough, your not stabbing the beast hard enough or your hair gel has cemented it and you’re hosed.