Does your iPhone 8 sometimes freeze up, restart, or refuse to power on? If so, the device might be eligible for Apple’s new repair program. The company has announced that a small percentage of iPhone 8 devices suffer from defective logic boards and has offered free repairs to affected customers.
This program only includes the basic version of the iPhone 8, so owners of the 8 Plus or X who are suffering similar problems are not eligible for the free repairs. Beyond that, the repair program is limited to customers in the U.S., Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Macau, and New Zealand. The program will extend to devices that were sold for up to three years after the original retail date of November 2017. If you have questions about whether or not your iPhone qualifies for this program, you can simply enter the serial number on Apple’s website and it will let you know.
Those who do qualify for the repair program have three options available to them. Their first is to contact Apple’s support team and arrange to have the phone mailed to the company’s support center, where the device will be repaired and then mailed back to you. Affected consumers can also opt to make an appointment at an Apple retail store or go through an authorized third-party. However, the website does specify that, regardless of which method is chosen, the device will still be sent to an Apple Repair Center.
In terms of cost, the repairs to the logic board will be free of charge. However, Apple does warn that hardware issues, such as cracked screens, may need to be fixed before the company can work on the logic board. If the company has to fix one of those issues, then users may incur extra fees. In such cases, it might be better to get any outstanding hardware issues fixed first as to avoid any unexpected charges.
As is always the case before sending your phone off for repairs, Apple advises that users back up their data through iTunes or iCloud. Otherwise, there is a risk that their phone’s data may be wiped during the repair process and won’t be salvageable.
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