- Nov 20, 2009
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Yesterday and today I tried to buy an iPhone from two different Apple stores around Atlanta. In both cases they had plenty of the exact product I was looking for and I wanted to buy the item outright. Only problem was I needed an appointment to hand someone my credit card and in return hand me the product. The product was an iPhone SE 2nd Gen. Yesterday's experience happened around 1PM. I was told I needed to make an appointment for 7:15 or 7:30PM. I declined. This morning I get up at 6AM and see another store, halfway across Atlanta, with the same item in stock. I drive there. Their store isn't busy and there are at least four red shirt associates standing around doing nothing. I try to buy the item, but once again am told I need an appointment and the first available is 5:30PM this late afternoon. I declined again because I'm hopping on a plane in the early morning and didn't want to be sitting on the other side of the city waiting for a red shirt to stop socializing with other red shirts before handling me.
In both cases I asked why I needed to be 'parented' for something like this. I was told scheduled appointments each come with the customer's initial purchase, but they have to reserve the [remote] possibility that appointment customers might but one or more units of every single Apple product in their store and they get priority over people there and now holding plastic and cash. On a remote chance? I ask how many people have scheduled appointments with paid-for items that have been removed the store's inventory and for this particular product they said "none." WTF is this kind of retail madness? The silver lining in all of this is that Apple has done a wonderful job on making sure I do not spend my money on their product. LOL
In both cases I asked why I needed to be 'parented' for something like this. I was told scheduled appointments each come with the customer's initial purchase, but they have to reserve the [remote] possibility that appointment customers might but one or more units of every single Apple product in their store and they get priority over people there and now holding plastic and cash. On a remote chance? I ask how many people have scheduled appointments with paid-for items that have been removed the store's inventory and for this particular product they said "none." WTF is this kind of retail madness? The silver lining in all of this is that Apple has done a wonderful job on making sure I do not spend my money on their product. LOL
