Apple Steals – A Letter to Tim Cook

Hello Tim Cook at the Office of the CEO,

I am compelled to bring my utter dissatisfaction with Apple Customer Support, The Apple App Store, and with Apple, Inc. directly to your attention. I feel that Apple is stealing $130 directly from me and I am seeking restitution. If you were inclined you can read through the entire support case below but here is the “executive summary”.

• Customer Jeff Windstrup purchased approximately $130 worth of apps from your Mac App Store.
• The customer change his Apple ID county association and credit card from France to USA.
• The customer is now no longer permitted to update or redownload his original purchases.
• Because of this the customer cannot install and use the software he purchased on his new MacBook Air.

The apps I am referring to are available in both the US and French stores. I understand there are different sales rules, legalities, and currencies in different countries. Furthermore, maybe your back-end systems cannot cross-reference these purchases. That said, if I had bought the software on physical media or even downloaded the apps directly from the editor I would be able to install and use the software as expected.

I feel that your customer support unnecessarily ran me round in circles and didn’t take the time to understand my issue. They were obviously copy an pasting phrases in their responses that were at times not relevant or would have made my issue worse. Their false platitudes were in the end infuriating and they left me feeling like you and your company had stolen directly from me.

I can imagine that your company Apple, Inc. is well within its legal rights based either on your terms of service or international sales procedures to deny my request. However, I ask you, is that the way you wish to run your business?

• To leave your customers without what they purchased.
• To provide only superficial or non-helpful customer service.
• To have your customers feeling like they have been robbed by you.

I hope your answer is no and that you will follow-up and do what is right to rectify this.

Sincerely,

Jeffrey Windstrup

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I wrote this in desperation after a lengthy and unproductive support case that left me feeling that Apple had stolen $130 directly from me. I did receive a followup by phone where an Apple PR person told me that Apple was within its terms of service and that I would not receive a refund because that was policy. That may be; but it is no way to run a business.

I’m posting this to alleviate some of my frustration and for posterity sake to anyone else having a similar difficulties with Apple.  That said, still for me it was a lesson in futility. I’ll include the entire support dialogue leading up to this in the comments for completeness.

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