iPhone media blitz missed battery 'fee'

Red Tape Chronicles is MSNBC.com's effort to unmask government bureaucracy, corporate sneakiness and outright scam artists.

Bob Sullivan covers Internet scams and consumer fraud for MSNBC.com. He is the winner of multiple journalism awards for his coverage of online crime and is the author of the book Your Evil Twin: Behind the Identity Theft Epidemic.

http://redtape.msnbc.com/2007/07/why-was-iphones.html

iPhone media blitz missed battery 'fee'
Posted: Monday, July 9 at 06:00 am CT by Bob Sullivan

While hundreds of thousands of eager consumers waited anxiously for the iPhone last week, most probably didn’t know about the hidden fee attached to their purchase.

Now the obvious question is this: With all the words spoken and written about the iPhone prior to launch, why didn't someone tell them?

The iPhone battery will only survive about 300-400 recharges, the company says. Because the unit is sealed, consumers can't swap out dead batteries. Instead, dead phones must be sent to Apple, where battery replacement will take three business days and cost $79 plus a $6.95 shipping charge. Those who can't live without their cell phones for those three days can rent a spare iPhone for $29.

This pricey, and apparently inevitable, aftercharge never made it into any of the voluminous news stories written and filmed about the iPhone prior to its launch on June 29. Why not?

According to the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, Apple's Web site made no mention of the battery fee on the morning of June 29, when thousands of Apple faithful lined up all around the country to buy the phone, which costs $500 or $600, depending on model.

Harvey Rosenfield, director of the foundation, is calling on Apple to promise free battery replacements to the estimated half a million iPhone buyers who may have purchased the phone without knowing its true costs.

"This was insensitive, inappropriate and possibly illegal," he said. "We're going to monitor their response carefully."

Explanation of the fee now appears on Apple's Web site, although it's not clear when that was posted. Published reports indicate the notice was posted as early as the evening of June 29, though it was not easy to find.

Apple didn't immediately respond to requests for an interview for this story.

One week later
Blogs began mentioning the battery replacement fee early last week, after the launch. The first prominent reference to it seems to be in a Wall Street Journal column written by Walt Mossberg, which appeared in the newspaper on July 5.




Hmmm, Lets see.....I included this bit of info in my post on July 6th.