Customer service can be an absolute nightmare these days, from not talking to an actual person to major delays and sometimes communication issues.
YouTuber Mrwhosetheboss, also known as Arun, wanted to compare the customer service of Apple and Samsung.
To do this, he sadly had to 'impale' two phones - an iPhone 14 Pro Max and a Galaxy S23 Ultra - to see how each company handles repairs.
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He broke both phone screens by applying the same amount of pressure to the exact same spot on each device.
'We can find out who's going to take longer to repair it, who's going to charge more, and who's actually going to repair it better,' Arun announced.
Starting with Apple, the YouTuber endured 'lots of long periods of silence' after passing through an AI voice.
He finally got advice to either visit a store or send his phone off for repairs, with a price estimate of £474.24 ($610.50 USD) for the cracked screen that he had to pay upfront.
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'That's half the price of the phone,' Arun said.
Though Arun described the rep as very 'thorough' who went 'above and beyond' to make sure everything was ready on the device before sending it off.
For a 30-minute call, he got his answer, a price estimate and a process for repair. He hoped the same for Samsung.
Again, after passing a robotic voice, the 27-year-old was quickly connected to the right person. And after 12 minutes of details and reading out a GDPR statement, the rep arranged for a DPD collection the next day and said a price would be emailed once an engineer inspected the phone.
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For zero upfront cost and minimal effort, Arun was pleased.
However, things went downhill when Samsung reported a delivery issue five days later, even though the phone had been collected the day after his call.
'It's slightly scary that they didn't seem to know where my phone was or that it had been collected at all,' he described. 'But we're on top of it now.'
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On the other hand, Apple sent text updates for collection and when the phone reached the repair shop.
Two days after shipping, Apple returned the repaired phone.
A week passed with no word from Samsung. It was found that the company got Arun's email wrong but didn’t attempt to call him and on day 15, they returned the phone, unrepaired.
After going through the entire process again, Arun eventually received a repair quote of £223.99 ($288.35 USD) and a repaired device after a total of 29 days.
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So, what's the verdict?
'Apple charged a lot of money. They charge it upfront without even checking the device,' Arun explained. 'But at least for that [price], the phone was back with me 5 days after I first made the call.'
Meanwhile, 'Samsung was more affordable but every part of the service experience reflects that.'
He concluded: 'Honestly, neither of these was a reassuring experience.'