14 DAY TRIAL // Three US legal firms filed a lawsuit against Apple Inc. accusing it of scamming customers with shorter warranty periods and distributing old kits as if they were new.
The lawsuit was filed last Thursday in San Francisco, and it represents consumers and resellers in two separate subclasses.
The consumer suit accuses Apple of selling used computers as if they were new. It also points out that Apple has been shortening on purpose warranty periods on its computers, beginning them from the date of shipment to the reseller rather than the date of customer purchase.
Resellers in the suit are accusing the company of breaching confidentiality. Apple is using resellers' customer lists to find new customers for its own retail network of Apple stores, and this all began in 2001. Another complaint the resellers are making is that Apple damaged their image by selling old equipment as if it were new. Apparently, Apple also charged resellers for computer parts they ordered for machines still under warranty. Should the distributors try to straighten all out, it would take at least a few days of heavy negotiation between the two parts.
The suit now has to be certified by the court before beginning the long road to a trial. If the suit succeeds, resellers hope that Apple will cease further similar approaches to doing business and that the company will compensate users for the price difference between new and old machines.
RESURSE
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