There is a controversy about the fact that there were 3 defective parts in iPhone6. Apple Korea exchanged the phone with refurbished phone320, and this can be accepted that Apple acknowledged it as a real product. Experts assessed this situation and said that it is impossible for defective parts to be put into real products.
Executive Jun KwangPil (not his real name) from an IT business visited an Apple’s official service center in Gyeonggi-do on the 11th of August about a poor calling problem and heard something unthinkable from a repairman. He was told by a repairman that he could not fix his phone because there were fake parts that were used for his iPhone 6. What was more unthinkable was that his phone not only had 1 fake part, but 3 fake parts.
Situation was very serious in his iPhone6 as one of the bolts was completely broken and there was a strange part that had QR Code embedded in it. There are no such codes in real Apple products. Also there was a strange letter ‘F’ that was engraved into ‘flat cable’ that enables signals to be sent and received by connecting liquid crystal and board. When a reporter showed this picture to an Apple product specialist, specialist said that he or she was able to see that the parts were fake by just looking at them once.
At first Executive Jun received suspicion for his iPhone6. There was a suspicion on whether he received repair from a private service center, but this suspicion was proven to be false as official service center said that not even private service centers use these parts. After that some pointed out whether he bought a fake product from the start, but this also proved to be false as it was a product that was distributed through a thorough official route.
Executive Jun bought his problematic iPhone 6 (16GB) from SK Planet and not from a normal retail store because SK Planet managed his insurance on lost phones from SK Telecom that is a company he joined. When he lost his iPhone6 that he bought last year, he received another new product after he went to a SK Planet branch himself in June of 2014. This new product was a real product that SK Networks, which oversees distribution of SK Telecom’s cellphones, bought from Apple Korea and there was no way that fake parts could have intruded.
Even when this happened, Apple Korea and SK Planet maintained their positions that they were not obligated to compensate him. Although he talked with Apple Korea on the phone many times, he did not gain much and Apple Korea changed its position many times. When finally he decided to threaten them by saying that he will file a lawsuit, that was when they finally decided to give him a promise that they will exchange his phone with a refurbished phone320 and he received it on the 22nd of August. Considering the fact that Apple never gives refurbished phone unless it is a real product due to its strict rules about repair, it can be accepted that Apple acknowledged his iPhone6, which had defective parts in it, was a real product.
“Although Apple has great products, it is sad to see that its service is a mess. Although I received a refurbished phone temporarily as not having phone affected work, I want Apple Korea and SK Planet to give a formal apology now and compensate me with a new product.” said Executive Jun who owns 1 iPad, 2 Apple Watches, and 2 iPhones at home.
Experts pointed out that this type of an incident cannot happen and that Apple needs to investigate accurate causes on why this happened because other incidents like this can happen any time if Apple does not do anything. One person who is affiliated with a Korean cellphone manufacturer shortly said that this kind of incident where 3 defective parts were used from a production line cannot happen. Apple Korea said that it is difficult to officially mention about this problem.
Staff Reporter Kim, Yongjoo | kyj@etnews.com
