Recently my husband Philip, owner of a 2017 Mini Cooper Clubman, tried to start his car and discovered the battery was dead. So he rattled around in the garage, found a battery charger, refueled the car battery, and headed to Goodyear to get a new battery.
The Goodyear guy said he couldn't fix it; something about the car has to be coded to the new battery, which he couldn't do. Since the local Mini Cooper dealer closed a few years ago, he recommended taking the car to the dealership of Mini's parent company, BMW.
So Philip went home, made an appointment for the next morning, charged the battery again (it took longer this time), and headed to the dealership. After an hour of drinking decent coffee and idly inspecting new vehicles on the lot, he got a text that said his car was ready.
Cost to replace the battery: $498.77. From what Goodyear had suggested, he didn't think he had any other options, so he paid the bill, but he sure wasn't happy about it. To be fair, the dealership, known for customer service, washed and vacuumed the car before returning it to him.
A few years ago, the battery in my aging cellphone became unwilling to hold a charge. Its readout would appear to be at 100 percent, then a few hours later it was down to around 30 percent.
So I turned to Google for solutions, which lists stuff like checking to see if I was spending too much time on battery-consuming apps or allowing the phone to be exposed to temperatures of 100 degrees or more for extended periods of time, as well as suggesting closing unused apps running in the background, updating apps that aren't optimized for my phone's version, removing unwanted widgets (which provide up-to-date information from apps at a glance on the home screen and lock screen), shutting down apps that constantly use location services, turning off background app refresh, and enabling the phone's low-power mode.
Despite taking an absurd amount of time to work through this list, the battery continued to deteriorate. So I figured I'd better try the last item on the solutions list: Replace battery.
Most modern cellphones use lithium-ion batteries, which have a rated lifetime of somewhere between 500 and 1,500 charge cycles. How do you define "dead" in terms of a battery? According to phonehow.com, you might need to replace your phone's battery if the maximum capacity reading is way below 80 percent. At this percentage, the battery will no longer deliver peak performance and will significantly drain faster than normal.
If your phone is under warranty, the manufacturer will likely replace a degraded or defective battery for free if you complain loudly enough. Otherwise, you'll have to pay to get it replaced.
At the time of my phone predicament, the warranty was long gone, and the only source of replacement I knew of was the store that manufactures my phone. The statement on its website seemed to indicate that this was the best option: "Certified repairs are performed by trusted experts who use genuine parts. Only certified repairs are backed by [the manufacturer.]"
So I made a reservation at my phone's branded home store and showed up with my weary little device. A kindly young man rapidly poked around on it and soon announced that the battery definitely needed to be replaced. The cost: $69. He also pointed out that I could trade in the phone and add a few hundred bucks to get a new phone (with a new battery, and a warranty).
That's what I did. I had no idea that I could have taken the old phone to a third-party repair provider. Aside from sticker shock, the new phone worked fine, as did its battery.
Five years later, the no-longer-new phone started to have power problems. The pandemic was causing huge backups in reservations at my certified cellphone provider, so I asked around for alternatives. Friends shared enthusiasm about a third-party repair provider with a shop about two miles from my house. Bring it in today, the guy who answered the phone there said; "I've got the right battery and you can pick it up this afternoon." Cost: $49.
All this leads to the issues raised by Perspective guest columnist Ronnie Shows on Sept. 26 regarding what's known as Right to Repair: Consumers should be able to repair, or hire anyone they want to repair, a product they purchase.
He pointed out that the power companies have over us hapless purchasers of devices is that companies claim a warranty is voided if anyone besides a licensed operator repairs a device or product.
"This is a common problem with technology devices like laptops or smartphones," Mr. Shows says. "The tech companies say to consumers: Let us overcharge you to fix something simple, because if you don't and something expensive breaks, you are on your own because you voided your warranty."
Apparently federal regulators maintain that restrictions have steered consumers into manufacturers' and sellers' repair networks or led them to replace products before the end of their useful lives. According to the Associated Press, the Federal Trade Commission's five commissioners recently unanimously adopted a policy statement supporting the right to repair that pledges increased enforcement efforts and could open the way to new regulations.
"These types of [repair] restrictions can significantly raise costs for consumers, stifle innovation, close off business opportunity for independent repair shops, create unnecessary electronic waste, delay timely repairs and undermine resiliency," FTC Chairwoman Lina Khan said. "The FTC has a range of tools it can use to root out unlawful repair restrictions, and today's policy statement would commit us to move forward on this issue with new vigor."
We're heading in the right direction; Arkansas has a medical equipment bill in the Legislature along with another bill that would apply to farm equipment.
The tech guy who attended my ancient phone never came out and said that buying a battery elsewhere could produce undesirable results. But that's what I gathered from our conversation. Now I've learned to take advantage of the free market and explore more consumer-friendly solutions without fear of destroying my devices.
Karen Martin is senior editor of Perspective.
kmartin@arkansasonline.com