My Mac keyboard is defective but I am not entitled to a refund!

• A judge orders Apple to reimburse the victims of the butterfly keyboard
• This keyboard, present on millions of Macs, works very poorly
• In France, a free repair program exists

It’s done. What is presented as the last part of a legal case of several years, opposing Apple to its customers across the Atlantic, is closed. The lawsuit concerned the famous “butterfly” keyboard of MacBooks released between 2015 and 2019, the design of which makes it defective after only a few days of use. The fault of a new key mechanism, very different from the “scissor” one that equips most laptops on the market today.

Several million dollars will be payable by Apple to the plaintiffs, who met in the United States in the form of a class action (group action in the language of Molière). Unfortunately, as you will have understood, nothing for France: only American residents will be entitled to compensation. And even ; the interested parties must be able to prove that they have tried to have their Mac repaired before – otherwise they will be able to say goodbye to the promised sum. The amount is around one hundred and twenty-five dollars per person, all the same.

Do not panic: a solution exists

What to do, then, if your MacBook Air or your MacBook Pro is also a victim of this miserable keyboard? The good news is that an alternative has been found for the French market. All you have to do is go to the Apple Store or to an authorized partner of the Apple firm to benefit from a replacement in good and due form, completely free of charge.

Only downside, and not the least: the duration of the operation can be long, very long. So when we tried to win our case, we were offered a three-week delay before we could get our 15-inch MacBook Pro back. A period of time during which the Genius Bar does not agree to provide any troubleshooting equipment! If you only have one machine at your disposal, plan a loan or a rental. But at your expense…

Errors are not uncommon, even at number 1

This case of manufacturing defect is far from being a first at Apple. Indeed, the company having reached three trillion dollars in capitalization has already experienced serious fail in the past. One can cite in particular the case of battery gatewhich led Cupertino to be reprimanded with a hefty fine.

MacOS updates are also regularly full of bugs of all kinds, when it is not cybersecurity experts who reveal serious flaws that can endanger users’ personal data. But most of the time, the associated fixes are not long in being deployed.