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One way is to make the check-in person more than a dumb data enterer. My iPhone suddenly stopped getting any carrier signal one day. I took it to the Apple store that evening because I needed to go out of town the next day, and I had to have a working phone. I checked in at the front of the store and waited 2.5 hours for my turn with a Genius. The fix was to press the very specific "reset network settings button" (which isn't under Cellular settings, it's under General->Reset). I was relieved it was such a simple fix, but it was ridiculous to wait over 2 hours to press the right button. The check-in person should ask what you've tried and do the most basic triage to avoid this kind of problem congesting the store.

I can see how this division of work makes sense. Genius training is expensive, and it's important to quickly check in customers. That said, I like your idea of equipping these employees with a basic remedy or two. After inputting the issue, the iPad could display a prompt with common self-solve solutions. The trick is how the employee frames it. You don't want customers thinking it is the solution, as no diagnostics have been performed, nor do you want them thinking less of Genius Bar if it does not work.

> If an Apple exec wants to bring back the dedicated area for the Genius Bar, how does one avoid the logistical nightmare of those lines?

Maybe I misunderstand the issue but the problem is not lack of table space but the lack of free personnel. in that case increasing the surface only make for longer logistic times and the risk of being missed if you are outside their field of attention.

The problem is that a line delivers crucial information: you can estimate roughly how much time it'll take before you're up next, you can see the constant progression, and you know you're not being forgotten or skipped over.

If you want people to sit around all over the store in a haphazard fashion, you need to somehow provide these things. Without them, you will massively increase customer anxiety and therefore impatience.

>The problem is that a line delivers crucial information: you can estimate roughly how much time it'll take before you're up next,

The Apple employee checking in customers usually tells you what the estimated wait time is. Last year when I went in for the free iPhone 6 replacement battery, she said the wait was about 2 hours. Sure enough, the wait turned out to be 2 hours.

>, you can see the constant progression,

I agree you can't see this. Maybe Apple can mount a LCD display that constantly updates the customer wait times. Something like the LCDs at airport gates showing standby passengers their status. Or they can simply text you a status every 10 minutes on your iPhone. That may be preferable as customers can leave the Apple Store and do something else to kill time and return later.

> If an Apple exec wants to bring back the dedicated area for the Genius Bar, how does one avoid the logistical nightmare of those lines? You still have to work within the same finite retail floor space.

The 'logistical nightmare of those lines' is just how every other store that has a similar problem operates. It maybe wasn't great, but the alternative of having people randomly milling round the stores (and usually getting in the way of people who want to browse) is much worse and a terrible customer experience. 'Every table is a potential Genius bar' is a great line to sell the idea internally, but it's a disaster in real life.

In Apple worldview, 50 people milling about the store bored and confused looks nicer than 50 people standing in line (and doesn't scare off shopper as much as seeing all these people waiting for repairs), and therefore is preferred.

> I don't see how the old dedicated space for a Genius Bar would work better. The problem is that the old way tied tech support to a spatial location in the store. The new way assigned tech support to a person instead of a location. This allows any and every table in the store to become a temporary "genius bar" for that customer session.

It's better UX. As a customer, I know what a service counter looks like, but I can't recognize a tech support employee roaming around.

> If an Apple exec wants to bring back the dedicated area for the Genius Bar, how does one avoid the logistical nightmare of those lines? You still have to work within the same finite retail floor space.

Their current process is a logistical nightmare. Basically they take a description of what you're wearing, then tell you to hang around in a crowd by the "Genius Bar" next to the iPhone cases. Eventually some employee is supposed to pick you out of that crowd based on the description they entered earlier.

Lines are a well understood, tried-and-true technology for managing crowds. What they're doing is different but not better.

>, I know what a service counter looks like, but I can't recognize a tech support employee roaming around.

But you don't have to recognize them. The idea is that the Apple employee greeting you at the door brings the tech support person to you.

>Lines are a well understood, tried-and-true technology for managing crowds. What they're doing is different but not better.

I guess I'm underestimating typical customers. Would most people really rather stand in line for 45 minutes to 2 hours instead of just sitting down somewhere? That seems very uncomfortable.

A lot of times, I see customers sitting on the cube chairs and waiting there. Example photo of those chairs: https://9to5mac.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2018/06/img_0...

Standing in line seems way more uncomfortable and therefore worse UX.

As comparison, Apple's "check out" process to buy something isn't tied to a specific location of a bank of cash registers. Instead, each employee uses their iPad/iPhone as a "roaming register" to process credit-cards and send receipts. In effect, the whole store's floor space acts as a checkout register. I just don't see customers complaining about that and wishing that Apple would just consolidate all checkout processes to a specific location because they prefer to stand in line. Customers seem to comprehend the "no line" checkout process without trouble. Apple does more sales than Tiffany's jewelry store that has traditional fixed cash registers. It seems like Apple extended the concept for "roaming checkout registers" to "roaming genius bars".

> But you don't have to recognize them. The idea is that the Apple employee greeting you at the door brings the tech support person to you.

N = 3, but that's never happened to me. They're always busy with someone. Customers actually have to wait in line to greet the greeter (3-5 deep last time I was there, when I had a Genius bar appointment that I was on time for but they weren't).

> A lot of times, I see customers sitting on the cube chairs and waiting there.

The store I go to is pretty busy and they haven't dedicated space for seating like that, so you get to join the crowd waiting next to the phone cases.

> Instead, each employee uses their iPad/iPhone as a "roaming register" to process credit-cards and send receipts.

That's one retail innovation they've done that actually makes some sense. Given that almost every large retail store has roaming employees, if you can flag one down you might as well finish your transaction with them.

> The problem is that the old way tied tech support to a spatial location in the store.

Apple has been at war against its former genius for decades:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2003/04/finder/3/