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Comment by sambe | Hacker News Reader

There is (currently) a two-year EU-mandated warranty, Apple was even taken to court for not emphasizing this enough when selling AppleCare.

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Detail worth knowing: under the EU warranty the first year is covered by the manufacturer, the second by the reseller. If you buy a MacBook outside an Apple Store, after the first year you're supposed to bring it back to the place you bought it. There is even a difference between ordering it online through apple.com and buying it at the brick and mortar Apple Store as those are legally not the same. In practice though I have never had a problem having it fixed on the spot at an Apple Store but this is mostly because Apple cares about their customers.

plain wrong. there is a 2-year warranty within 6 months the seller needs to actually prove that it worked correct. after that you (buyer) need to prove it. there is __never__ a warranty (under law, the manufacturer can make a special guarantee like apple care of course) between the manufacturer and the buyer (at least in the eu and might change if seller == manufacturer) the warranty is always between the _seller_ and the _buyer_. if the seller is something like amazon than you give your defective product back to amazon (amazon than of course has the same warranty between his seller/manufacturer). b2b is the same (but also has some special rules and might be (more) country dependant).

( Source: http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/guar... German EU LAW: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/DE/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX... (99/44/EG) )

Edit: Well the most important fact of course is that there is no "eu law" there are just policies that the countries than can enforce/make a law out of it (http://ec.europa.eu/info/law/law-making-process/overview-law...) well european can than make claims against the country, but sometimes they even fail to do that.

Of course there can be a manufacturer warranty, there just isn't a legal requirement for one (and it can have rules like "talk to the dealer if you bought it recently, we cover you only when you can't go through them anymore")

Precisely. Most of the time electronic device manufacturers set the commercial warranty[1] to one year, but that's purely their prerogative. That's why you can go the Apple Store with your MacBook during the first year[2] even if you bought it from FNAC or Amazon or whatever. Apple Care extends that duration to three years, and possibly sets additional coverage terms like with Apple Care +.

On top of that, as merb said, following the EU directive, local law (in France, that's the Hamon bill) says the legal warranty of compliance[0] covers for the whole two years. So Apple can tell me to buzz off past the first year if I bought their hardware from Amazon, but so that I can go through them directly instead of going the roundabout way through the seller during the first year. The seller can never tell you to buzz of (as long as you duly prove the defect past 6 months as merb said), even during the time a possible commercial warranty applies, but it can be more efficient to go through the manufacturer directly, as is the case with Apple Stores, but I've been using this for other brands where the wait list was months long through the seller whereas the manufacturer fixed it in less than a week and even footed the bill for the postage.

[0]: https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F11094

[1]: https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F11093

[2]: https://www.apple.com/legal/warranty/products/mac-french.htm...

EU directives are in practice no different to national law. Sure, countries can refuse to enforce them but they can refuse to enforce their national law as well. If we are at that stage all bets are off. "Can enforce" sounds like this is optional which it is really not. Courts refer to EU law just like they do to national law.

> "Can enforce" sounds like this is optional which it is really not. Courts refer to EU law just like they do to national law.

In practice it's a mess system. Courts choose and pick however they want to implement the directives, even in countries where courts should be independent the ruling political countries have enough pressure on the courts. Sometimes they even enforce invalidated directives which is unlawful but then again if a country has enough money they could just pay the fines. Therefore there is so much unhappiness about the EU in the general populace, local politicians blame the EU laws, EU politicians blame the local laws and no one is accountable, it really sucks and isn't what a democracy is supposed to be.

Relevant: https://www.apple.com/uk/legal/statutory-warranty/ http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/guar...

I still don't understand how these make sense together...

It is perfectly clear to me, in the very link you have posted:

"This 2-year guarantee is your minimum right. National rules in your country may give you extra protection: however, any deviation from EU rules must always be in the consumer's best interest." (which is the case of UK law).

From your reply I understand you didn't notice the second link, probably due to my bad formatting. Compare your analysis of the first link with what Apple states in the second. I don't understand how they can say it.

I saw the link, but I thought your issue was with the 2/6 year thing.

I still don't see any problem. Apple states that you get 1 year of "Apple" warranty, which allows you to get your product serviced by Apple, at no cost, independently of where you bought it.

Beyond that date UK law will apply, but since it applies to the seller, and not the manufacturer, they say to contact the seller (as I said in another post, a bit cheekily, since they will be also the seller in many cases).

Unless of course you buy Apple Care, that will allow the same level of service as the 1 year warranty...

Notice that this only applies to B2C transactions. Company-bought products do not have that protection.

They fixed the logic board of my 3 year old Macbook Pro. They quibbled at first, but agreed to do it free of charge after I quoted the EU legislation.

I'm confused, you quoted the 2-year support requirement and they then fixed your 3-year old laptop?

It is possible that it could be three years old but they had purchased it new and owned it less than 2 years. Just means that particular one sat in inventory for awhile.

The legislation doesn't have a fixed period, it provides a vague 'reasonable use for a reasonable period of time' type clause. This was a £1700 laptop, so I had a right to expect it to last longer than 3 years, which was supported by claims on Apple's website.

Therefore, Apple either has to say "our laptops are only good for three years", or say that particular laptop was defective and fix it.

> The [EU] legislation doesn't have a fixed period.

Sure does: 2 years. http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/guar...

You are right! It's the UK implementation of the law that's more fuzzy.

The uk implementation is 4/5 years depending on your region.

Some countries, including the UK, have longer requirements in national law.

Many EU countries have protections stronger than this. Eg after 2 years you might have a right to compensation proportional to expected product life.

Do you know since when it's two-years? Apple's warranty has been (still is?) only one year in Germany IIRC.

For a long time. Note that there is a difference between the manufacturer's warranty (voluntary) and the seller's warranty (two years mandatory, "Gewährleistung" in German). When Apple talks about their warranty they mean the former.

They even have a page outlining the difference: https://www.apple.com/de/legal/statutory-warranty/

"For further information please contact the seller"

It is kind of cheeky, since in most cases for Apple products, the seller is also Apple.

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