By SteveJack
On Monday, I returned after lunch to find my 17-inch MacBook Pro sitting oddly on my desk. Thinking I’d gotten a cable or maybe the Apple Remote stuck underneath, I tilted the base of the MacBook Pro up and looked underneath. Nothing to be seen. After checking again, I noticed the battery had popped its case.
Yes, I’d been struck by the MacBook Pro expanding battery issue!
One of the MacBook Pro’s battery latches had unlatched due to the pressure, but there was nothing wrong with the MacBook Pro’s chassis. The battery, of course, was kaput.
What to do?
I called 1-800-SOS-APPLE and I took notes from here on out:
After answering a couple perfunctory questions via the automated system, an Apple representative answered. I did not mention MacDailyNews; the Apple rep had no idea that this would be reported on MacDailyNews regardless of how the process went. I explained that the battery had expanded out of its case, gave the woman my MacBook Pro’s serial number, confirmed my name and address, and she – no questions asked – said she would send out a new battery immediately and I was to return the bad battery in a pre-addressed, postage-paid box. Total time spent from dialing the number to hanging up the phone: 6 minutes and 22 seconds.
I have another battery, so I popped that one into the MacBook Pro in case I wanted to roam in the meantime. And, no, we did not purchase AppleCare for this particular MacBook Pro which we bought on May 6, 2006.
21 hours and 17 minutes after I hung up the phone, the new battery arrived. I popped it into the MacBook Pro and it began charging. I placed the old battery in the box provided, peeled off my address label to reveal the address Apple wanted the battery sent, and called the DHL pickup number Apple had provided and placed the box outside for pickup.
That’s it. Done. The whole thing took less than 10 minutes of my time. Try accomplishing something as effortless and smooth with Dell or any other PC maker.
SteveJack is a long-time Macintosh user, web designer, multimedia producer and a regular contributor to the MacDailyNews Opinion section.
