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Apple Voiding Smokers' Warranties?
Mr2001 writes "Consumerist reports that Apple is refusing to work on computers that have been used in smoking households. 'The Apple store called and informed me that due to the computer having been used in a house where there was smoking, [the warranty has been voided] and they refuse to work on the machine "due to health risks of second hand smoke,"' wrote one customer. Another said, 'When I asked for an explanation, she said [the owner of the iMac is] a smoker and it's contaminated with cigarette smoke, which they consider a bio-hazard! I checked my Applecare warranty and it says nothing about not honoring warranties if the owner is a smoker.' Apple claims that honoring the warranty would be an OSHA violation. (Remember when they claimed enabling 802.11n for free would be a Sarbanes-Oxley violation?)"
They have an obligation to the customer under the terms of the warranty. They also have an obligation to their employees. They need to honor both, not pick and choose. If they really believe that opening the computer represents a health threat then they need to issue protective clothing and breathing apparatus to their employees. Simple as that. OSHA does not prohibit working with dangerous materials (manufacturing and maintaining computers DOES involve doing so), it just requires proper safety procedures be observed when doing so. The possibility of working with computers that have been exposed to cigarette smoke was not unknown or plausibly considered to be remote at the time when these warranties were issued.
Screwdrivers are legal too, but use one on your Apple and bang goes that warranty
Why did you choose it if you you did not like it?
Gloves and a face mask.
Murphey's fighting Occam, and we're in the stands.
its because second-hand smoke is bad for the Apple workers
But there isn't any "second-hand smoke" actually in the computer. There's the residue that you get from smoke, but that's not actually smoke. It's not particularly harmful unless you breath in a big cloud of it, but that's true of any kind of dust. If you're poking about inside dusty equipment, you should be wearing appropriate PPE anyway.
What a bunch of bs .... post the medical findings and I'll listen.
.. working in a bar 8 hours a day that is filled with smoke is. Living in a house with parents that smoke is. But NOT walking through a cloud of smoke for 5 seconds, or working on a computer.
.. they can STFU.
I have not seen ANY studies that suggest that OCCASIONAL exposure to second hand smoke is a hazard. Yep
Find one that suggests how often somebody has to walk through a cloud of smoke or work on a computer and I'll accept this. Until then
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
The only thing that had changed in my life compared to the past was the smoke absorbed in the walls and furniture.
Really? That's the only thing that changed? Did the thought that there might be any number of other invisible toxins in that apartment ever enter your mind or did you just stop at the first one you could pull out of your ass? You also don't think it could be a physical reaction to the stress of moving and having to adjust to an entirely new environment either? It couldn't be anything else? You've managed to discount every other possibility and the most plausible one is "smoking residue"?
I've seen more computers clogged with cat hair than I've seen clogged with cigarette ash.
Disgusting is not a legal reason to void a legal contract.
I find cigarette smoking to be pretty repulsive myself, though I do enjoy a good cigar from time to time. I think we've gone too war with the war on smoking though. There are actually municipalities now that are considering banning smoking outdoors. WTF is wrong with that picture?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Why did you choose it if you you did not like it?
House, barn, stable and several hectares of land for (relatively) peanuts.
We have these things, called detergents, also water which can be used to "clean" things. I know that's a novel concept for many smokers. Then we have this other stuff called "paint" which can be put on top of pre-existing walls with a "brush" or "roller" to cover what cannot be "cleaned".
Deleted
Please tell me this a joke right? Smoking is a personal choice and should be left as that. You wanting to impose HARSH penalties on smokers is nothing more then you wanting to dictate the actions of another person. You even want to impose your will in my private home? What the hell man. What would give you, or anyone else, the right to tell me what I can do in my own home? I choose to smoke cigars and pipes and I will continue to do so even if illegal. They can come and take them when they come for my guns.
1200 in the US die every day from smoking related illnesses 135 of these are from passive smoke 115 fatal car accidents happen every day in the US (no mention of how many die in each)
People die from one or the other, but how much is a life worth?
Passive smoke and roadkill isn't that different really. Where the real hipocracy is, is when life-time smokers expect expensive treatment to keep them alive for another 5 years.
As a rake (and smoker) myself, i am already aware of the years (of boring life) I won't get, I need no treatment, i may live 5-10 years shorter, but i enjoyed every single day of what i had. As for the 135 passive smoke deaths, it could be avoided with considerate smokers, just as considerate drivers rarely kill anyone.
Liberty isn't just about money, guns and cars, it's just as much about what kind of life you wanna lead urself.
If I was as pragmatic and objective as I claim to be, would I be commenting?
They need to grow some balls. An underpaid janitor gets to clean rotten piss off the bathroom floor everyday.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Yes, hear you. Everytime I go to the States my skin gets all sticky from second hand fat.
We should have law against fat people, They should pay more taxes , because the occupy more volume, add more wear to the roads when driving, put more shit througth the sewers, have bigger impact on the environement, etc...
Its a reason to exercise the 'replace' option in the 'repair or replace at our discretion' portion of your warranty agreement.
Platform advocacy is like choosing a favorite severely developmentally disabled child.
The outgassing from those computers is worse for your health than cigarette smoke residue, I assure you.
Ecplain to me why an unsupported argument gets a mod-up to +5, Insightful.
Second hand smoke is certainly a health hazard.
But the computers in question aren't emitting smoke (if they were, I don't really think they're fixable), they have a gunky residue.
Computers are made of all kinds of toxic substances. Just don't lick them, and wear surgical gloves, and you should be okay.
I fully support banning smoking in bars and restaurants
I'm not even sure I support those. I really enjoy going out to bars without smoking. It was absolutely disgusting previously. Had take a shower and wash my hair twice when I got home. It also irritated the hell out of my eyes and nose too.
Despite that, the Libertarian in me has a problem with a private business being told that it can't allow smoking on it's property. Nobody forced me to visit that bar. Nobody forced the employees to work there. If a bar wants to ban smoking on it's own then all the power to them -- I'd vote for them with my wallet -- I just don't see it as something to get Uncle Sam all worked up about though.
but sidewalk bans are going too far.
Well, at least we can agree on that :) When is some sanity going to break out over this issue? I can't wait for the nanny-staters to switch targets and start going after the fast food industry. McDonalds made me eat these big macs and now I'm overweight. Why'd the Government allow them to do that? Woe is me.....
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
About 15-20% of adults smoke. The number for Apple users may be somewhat lower due to the younger and more "chic" demographic.
In any case, at the time Apple was designing its warranty coverage, it knew smoking by its customer or others in the household or business was not so rare or so offbeat that it would be reasonable to exclude it, nor is it obvious to consumers that smoking is bad for the equipment.
At the time of the sale, Apple had 3 choices:
*specifically and prominently state that the warranty is void if the computer is exposed to tobacco smoke
*plan on honoring the warranty
*set the stage for a fraud lawsuit
Since they didn't due the first one, they get to pick from the next two.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
You might actually have a point ... if they also voided warranties for people who owned pets.
Or lived in dusty climates. Or where computers were used in places like ... motorcycle shops. Or, any of the myriad of conditions that would have the exact same effect on the computer.
See, this is yet another example of where the logic of singling out one stupid little thing while ignoring 10 million others somehow makes sense.
I own dogs and live in a high desert climate ... it requires regular cleaning of the PCs with an air compressor. The fans suck in dog hair like you wouldn't believe, and there's *always* dust here in the summer no matter what you do. I can gauge the "cleaning cycle" by how much the variable speed fans are running in the box (which right now is at "You should really clean me" by the amount of noise coming from the machine)
I also used to run a motorcycle shop. You should see what those PCs look like after a while, especially the one that's used to run the dynamometer. (Badly running vehicles spit out a lot of soot, not to mention all the other residues from various vapors from cleaning chemicals)
So ... exclude everything else that could possibly harm the PC, and you have a point. Otherwise, you're picking one little thing out of many simply because the cause has become a socially unacceptable behaviour.
Let me turn that around on you. Nobody forced those people to work in coal mines without proper lung protection. Nobody forced those people to work in asbestos mines without protection. We have laws to protect workers because they are generally not in a position to protect themselves. When you need money, you can't afford to refuse to work in a place that allows smoking. If you think otherwise, that probably means you have never been poor enough to understand.
Regarding the city streets, that smoke turns into dirty-looking sidewalks from the tar, cigarette butts floating up on the beach and in our streams, and other environmental harm that goes way beyond the immediate harm to people nearby. As far as I'm concerned, if people want to smoke in their own homes, that's okay. As soon as they inflict it on other people, they're crossing a line. People don't choose to be asthmatic, and they don't wear big signs that say "stay away from me if you smoke". I would argue that nobody forced the smokers to smoke around other people, but they do, and often without caring who it offends or even makes sick. And *that* is why people fight back and pass laws about smoking in public places. It's because smokers egregiously abused their rights and harmed others.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
So I take it that you don't live in a city then? Because in most cities I can't seem to smell the smoke from peoples' cigarettes unless they're almost rubbing up against me due to all the "healthy" pollution from cars, trucks and other combustion engine-powered vehicles.
/Mikael
Greylisting is to SMTP as NAT is to IPv4
No, there's nothing legitimate about it at all. You just account it as good will or customer service. SOX doesn't care in the slightest about that so long as you're not cooking the books.
It's amazing how many corporate apologists write off all their crappy behavior as mandated by (fictional interpretation of) law.
I can't say whether this new policy is in line with their warranty, but I don't see how anyone would make a case that it's discriminatory even where smokers are a protected class. They are targeting the smoke itself, not the smokers. If you're a smoker but you don't do it around your computer, or it just happens to be reasonably clean, you're going to be fine. If you don't smoke, but you like to store your computer in your chimney flue, they're still going to refuse to work on it.
On the other hand, smoke residue is hardly the most dangerous or disgusting thing anyone has had to deal with on the job, and using OSHA as an excuse seems pretty weak. If they just acknowledged that they're going to treat excessive smoke exposure the same way they would excessive heat or humidity, that would seem entirely reasonable.
Who cares? If he enjoys killing himself with cigarettes, it's his business. He's not hurting anybody but himself.
Why are some people so obsessed with controlling other people's lives?
Maybe not
I think the people who have never seen the damage a heavy smoker does to a computer just need to shut the fuck up.
It may be more of a danger to children, but to dismiss an environment that is coated with poison dust as harmless without further study is absurd.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=what-is-third-hand-smoke
First, let's change the rhetoric to "chemicals" instead of the FUD "poison." Virtually the same chemicals exist in wood smoke that exist in cigarette smoke--unsurprising since they're both combustion byproducts of plant matter. If you want some pretty reliable numbers on amounts resulting from combustion, I refer you to the EPA's AP-42 for wood combustion (scroll down to Ch. 1.6). Pretty much every scary-sounding chemical in cigarette smoke is also in your friendly campfire. Dioxins, arsenic, mercury, lead, etc. The difference is people actively breathe in the smoke from a cigarette, which leads me to...
Second, how a chemical enters your body and in what quantities is equally important. Just as you haven't died from your first exposure to a campfire, so too will you not die from incidental exposure to cigarette residue. Inhalation and injection are efficient ways to get chemicals into your body, but absorption through undamaged skin is pretty damn inefficient for most.
All this to say that "third hand smoke" is a FUD buzzword. It's nothing more than the microscopic particulate traces (i.e. ash) containing the same compounds you'd find from standing near a campfire. Back to the topic at hand--that incidental exposure to a surface stained by cigarette smoke is unlikely to cause anything other than personal discomfort as long as you wash your hand afterwards.
If I had been in a car, both vehicles would have been close to being totaled because this moron pulled out into traffic that she couldn't see coming because of a line of stopped cars, which she admitted to the police officer. Because I was driving a motorcycle, I was able to react far more quickly than in a car. If I had been in a car, I would have rear ended her at 45 mph and ending up with head and neck injuries that could have cost far more. Because I was on a bike, I was able to veer sharply to the right. I bounced off her rear quarter panel, kept the bike upright, and I coasted to a controlled stop. Total bike bill --- $900. Her car received over $2K worth of damage from my foot peg and foot.
The cost to society because so many morons drive cars and DON'T PAY ATTENTION is far more disproportionate than their contribution to society, regardless of whether or not motorcycles are involved. The majority of motorcycle crashes are caused by either alcohol (mostly single vehicle crashes that result in the application of Darwin's theory of evolution) or idiots in cars. Motorcycles, and their handicapped twin the scooter, cause far less congestion and road wear due to their smaller size and could reduce the amount spent on road costs every year. They use far less gas (my bike gets 45-50mpg, about what a Prius gets), require fewer resources to make, and are much cheaper. If Congress mandated catalytic converters on bikes, they would generate far less pollution also. But converters get up to around 800F degrees, and it's tough to find a place to put them so that legs don't get burned.
In other words, you don't know what the fuck you are talking about.
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
As for the 135 passive smoke deaths, it could be avoided with considerate smokers...
I haven't met any. Ever.
I don't know if you guys realize this, but to those of us who don't smoke, we can really smell it. I mean, really smell it. It's headache inducing if you're just wearing the same clothes that you smoked in yesterday.
I don't know if it causes physical harm or not that much later, but the smell is overpowering and disgusting, and if you really were considerate, you would go out of your way not to subject us to it. Your coworkers, because they can't avoid you without potentially losing income. And your friends, because you like them, and even though they're willing to put up with it, it's kind of a scumbag move to actually make them put up with it.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
1) Smokers pay far more taxes than non-smokers. They are well within their rights to tie up whatever medical resource that they want.
2) A car pollutes the air far more than a cigarette does. While a smoker might be the cause of secondhand smoke, a driver is the cause of air pollution, low visibility haze, global warming and the eventual death of the planet.
3) Mind your own business. Is your life so miserable that you have to impose yourself upon someone else's?
Who cares? If he enjoys killing himself with cigarettes, it's his business. He's not hurting anybody but himself.
That's an oversimplification.
Smokers have more sick days off of work. When they get sick they often get sicker than non-smokers and take longer to recover. More visits to the doctor and more hospital stays meaning more load on the health system meaning less room for others (although that argument is questionable - the health system will always be underfunded).
I'd argue that he is hurting others, but I still agree that a smoker has the right to smoke, as long as the rest of us retain the right to complain bitterly about it.
If smoking is as dangerous as they claim it is, people 50+ would be dying from lung problems and other smoking related problems in droves - but they're not.
In 100 smokers, 17 will die from lung cancer. In 100 non-smokers, 1 will die from lung cancer, often a second-hand smoke victim. About 87% of lung cancer in USA are caused directly by smoking.
Out of population 300 million in USA, about 11 million will die from lung cancer caused directly by smoking. That's with historically low percentage of smokers in USA, which is now about 22% on average. That's for lung cancer only, where smoking also is a major contributor to other illnesses among which heart attacks and strokes, the numbers of which probably make lung cancer deaths pale in comparison.
Do the media exaggerate? Compared to what? Swine flu has caused about 4000 deaths in USA and still we see panic-inducing coverage every day. That is exaggerating. Millions of people quietly dying from smoking caused problems is a hard number. The reason you believe people don't die "in droves" from smoking seems to be more a case of wilful ignorance on the subject.
This is A-Grade bullshit. I have been a chain smoker for five years. You could probably tarmac a small freeway from all the crap that has fallen into my keyboard. But there is no tar whatsoever on my heatsinks or fans. I just cleaned them last week ( after five years ) and there is dust, yes, but no tar.
The most disgusting computer I ever saw was one kept in a screen-printing factory with a concrete floor. Grey dust 2mm thick over the whole motherboard. Can people refuse warranty service on computers because they don't like your carpet?
Take your anti-smoking FUD and stick it somewhere else.