Australia fines Apple $6.7 million over misleading 'Error 53' repair practices
A court in Australia has fined the company for misleading iPhone and iPad owners over whether or not they were allowed to repair their devices.
According to The Sydney Morning Herald, the ruling from Australia's Federal Court followed an action by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), a government regulator, over the infamous "Error 53" issue which disabled some iPads and iPhones subjected to unofficial repairs.
Apple was fined $9 million in Australian dollars, which translates to $6.68 million in American dollars. The ruling concludes an ACCC suit filed last April.
Error 53 codes first appeared on iPhone 6 series units in early 2015, but the issue gained public notoriety when media outlets reported the supposed glitch in early 2016. The ACCC lawsuit, which targeted codes resulting from screen repairs, specified an active case timeline between September 2014 and February 2016.
The glitch impacted hardware that had undergone Touch ID module -- or in some cases screen, flex cable and water-damaged component -- replacement by a repair firm operating outside of Apple's Authorized Service Provider network. Apple later acknowledged the issue, saying the error message was tied to Touch ID security.
Some customers had taken their devices to third party repair shops, and Apple has admitted that, in a 12-month period that ended in February 2016, at least 275 customers in Australia were told they could not have their devices repaired if it had previously been worked on by a third party. Apple launched an outreach program afterwards, which was offered to 5,000 consumers affected by Error 53.
"If a product is faulty, customers are legally entitled to a repair or a replacement under the Australian Consumer Law, and sometimes even a refund. Apple's representations led customers to believe they'd be denied a remedy for their faulty device because they used a third party repairer," ACCC Commissioner Sarah Court said in a statement. "The Court declared the mere fact that an iPhone or iPad had been repaired by someone other than Apple did not, and could not, result in the consumer guarantees ceasing to apply, or the consumer's right to a remedy being extinguished."
It's not the first time the ACCC has tangled with Apple; in 2017, the commission denied the country's three largest banks permission to collectively bargain with Apple over participation in Apple Pay. Five years earlier the body leveled a $2.3 million fine for misleading consumers with iPad marketing promising 4G compatibility.
According to The Sydney Morning Herald, the ruling from Australia's Federal Court followed an action by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), a government regulator, over the infamous "Error 53" issue which disabled some iPads and iPhones subjected to unofficial repairs.
Apple was fined $9 million in Australian dollars, which translates to $6.68 million in American dollars. The ruling concludes an ACCC suit filed last April.
Error 53 codes first appeared on iPhone 6 series units in early 2015, but the issue gained public notoriety when media outlets reported the supposed glitch in early 2016. The ACCC lawsuit, which targeted codes resulting from screen repairs, specified an active case timeline between September 2014 and February 2016.
The glitch impacted hardware that had undergone Touch ID module -- or in some cases screen, flex cable and water-damaged component -- replacement by a repair firm operating outside of Apple's Authorized Service Provider network. Apple later acknowledged the issue, saying the error message was tied to Touch ID security.
Some customers had taken their devices to third party repair shops, and Apple has admitted that, in a 12-month period that ended in February 2016, at least 275 customers in Australia were told they could not have their devices repaired if it had previously been worked on by a third party. Apple launched an outreach program afterwards, which was offered to 5,000 consumers affected by Error 53.
"If a product is faulty, customers are legally entitled to a repair or a replacement under the Australian Consumer Law, and sometimes even a refund. Apple's representations led customers to believe they'd be denied a remedy for their faulty device because they used a third party repairer," ACCC Commissioner Sarah Court said in a statement. "The Court declared the mere fact that an iPhone or iPad had been repaired by someone other than Apple did not, and could not, result in the consumer guarantees ceasing to apply, or the consumer's right to a remedy being extinguished."
It's not the first time the ACCC has tangled with Apple; in 2017, the commission denied the country's three largest banks permission to collectively bargain with Apple over participation in Apple Pay. Five years earlier the body leveled a $2.3 million fine for misleading consumers with iPad marketing promising 4G compatibility.
Comments
Presumably, if they said, 'yes we will repair it but it will cost you because you took it to someone who was unauthorized to work on it,' they would have been ok.
But honestly, if the ACCC thinks Apple should foot the bill for the repair after someone else has screwed it up, that's crap.
That fact is noted in this ABC news article.
iDevices trigger an error code if a third party attempts to perform a repair and the only company that can repair such device without generating an error code is Apple?
As if they don't make enough money 300 to 400 percent on the sales of a product, they make it impossible to repair without paying their high charges. it's not right .... period.
If the repair shop incorrectly performed the physical repair itself then it should be on them to deal with the repair, but this is wrong.
Sorry sir, you replaced your own windshield and that triggered an error that leaves your car unusable, if we replaced your windshield everything would've been fine.....BTW cost to replace windshield with us , $1500.00.
LOL
- Phone had a broken screen
- Owner took phone to 3rd party repairer to get screen replaced
- Phone was fixed and worked fine ....
<insert lifestyle montage of temporarily happy phone owner here>
Several months later...
- Owner applies a software update to their phone that has been working fine the whole time
- Phone is totally bricked with error 53
Apple's response was "we can't do anything because you want to a 3rd party repairer. Here buy a new phone"
In Australia, that response is not legal, and the ACCC totally made the right call here. The Error 53 behaviour was Apple's fault, and they should have either replaced the hardware or issued a software patch to fix it, at no cost to the customer. For some customers who were already stuck, a hardware repair at Apple's cost might have been the only way to fix the problem, and Apple ought to have worn that cost, and not refused service. They eventually did all the right things here (before the fine was issued).
If the failure mode had been "touch ID won't work again on a phone with a 3rd party screen repair" (which is kind of where it landed up after Apple released a later software patch) this whole thing would have been a non-issue. If the error 53 bricking had never happened, it would have been a non-issue.
For the benefit of our American cousins - this is what protection of consumer rights and not being ruled by corporations and kleptocrats looks like.
We’d built a packaged system using DBASE (the bad old days) and sold it to a number of customers. When it came to upgrade it, one of the customers said it had broken the database. We took his date, imported it to the test system, and yes, it broke.
But when we examined the data, we found that some of the field definitions had been altered. There were extra tables and the existing tables had odd weird strings.
After weeks of pressing the customer, he finally admitted that they'd got a junior developer to make changes to the database and write a few C modules to help them integrate with another third-party system. The customer said we should fix it because our upgrade broke the system. We said we won't fix it because it was their messing about that broke the upgrade, not the upgrade itself. Every other system worked with the same upgrade.
What the customer had to do was fix the original problem: his modification. Once that was fixed then the upgrade worked.
Same here: It wasn't the upgrade that broke the phone. It was the unauthorised repair.
Now, this bit about Apple being able to charge for repairs if the phone was broken by an unauthorized fix. That doesn't to be what it says here:
So are they saying that a guarantee cannot be invalidated because a customer used an unauthorised dealer?
How odd.
Read it again. You can have the device repaired by Apple or an authorised Apple repair shop.
In much the same way that I can my Prius Hybrid engine repaired by Toyota or an authorised Toyota Repair Shop. If I take it somewhere else then Toyota won't honour the guarantee, and quite right too. They have no idea what some idiot with no training might have done to the car. If they repair it and it breaks, then they're the last people to touch it, even if the fault was caused by Honest Bob's Hybrid Chop Shop (No job too big, or too small. Cash Only please)
But do chime in again.