Hi,
what I can not understand: Why are people here on the board claiming they are owed thousands (if not more) of dollar and they have "nowhere to go"?
And on the other extreme, there is the whole lawsuit discussion.
Now the first thing I would do is go to my lawyer. And let them write a letter to Apple. No email, a letter. Pay a few bucks extra to get a receipt sent back to me that the letter was delivered successfully. That is a nice, friendly formal letter with my law firms letterhead pointing out the situation, that it breaches the contract and that you expect them to respond within x amount of days. With x being the legally typical response time that your lawyer will tell you (guess that will be around 10 workdays).
It's a formal and still pretty friendly ultimatum and in my experience it is the first step of three leading to a lawsuit. It is a clear signal to the other party drawing a line in the sand. After the first ultimatum went by and you didn't get an answer, step two is a harsher letter indicating a second ultimatum and announce a lawsuit. Formal, legal language, boring, no threats, just facts. Note if they answer and even if they push it out, you are back to step one, at least for the moment. Your lawyer should know everything about that dance.
Many of you seem to think this can be done by email, although we all know from our own experience how easily you can overload a system with email and how non-traceable it is in case.
Long story short: When I have a real complaint situation like this one I fall back to traditional, trackable classic communication method that I can later present in a potential court case. The other party knows that and I guarantee you they will respond if you have a claim.
Apple is just a big cooperation and they pick their battles. They will not pick a battle with someone who has a justified claim. But the key is they have to understand you are up for that battle and an email DOES NOT do that.
That letter from your lawyer should cost you almost nothing, you can keep it friendly and nobody will ever hate you for that at apple.
Note that this is no legal advise.
Note that I don't like what Apple is doing, at all. The communication is lousy. They act as they are completely overwhelmed by something. Hmm. Wait... maybe they are?
Now you can go on and on that this is not an excuse and I agree. However, it does not untie you from doing things right on your end and emails to itunes is NOT doing things right if you chase 1k or more!!!!
Oh, and if push comes to shove? You don't get an answer? 1k or more, well, say 5k or more and you have all the grounds and a good reason for a lawsuit, one that sounds pretty straightforward to me. There is nothing wrong doing that, no need for class action or something. I don't believe at all in any of the conspiracy fantasies, I do believe in difficulties of rapid scaling of organizations and would book such a lawsuit as an extended reminder message, costly for the other side. And they probably will do the same.
hth,
Markus
