Brazilian judge orders Apple to pay $1,081 to a customer who bought an iPhone and complained it didn’t come with an adapter needed to charge
- A judge in Goiania, Brazil on Monday ordered Apple to pay a customer $1,081 for mental damage caused by buying an iPhone without a charger
- Judge Vanderlei Caires Pinheiro of the 6th Special Civil Court of Goiania finds Apple guilty of “abuse and illegal business practices”
- Apple will also be required to provide customers with new charging adapters
- The company stopped supplying charging adapters and headphones for its iPhone 12 launch in October 2020
- According to Apple, the move is to protect the environment from carbon emissions and waste
A Brazilian judge has directed Apple to pay customers for damages caused by buying iPhones without power adapters.
Judge Vanderlei Caires Pinheiro of the sixth special civil court in Goiania ruled Monday that the technology company must pay consumers 5,000 Brazilian reals, or $1,081.
Apple also has to provide customers with new chargers.
DailyMail.com reached out to Apple for comment.
Caires Pinheiro wrote that Apple was forced into a bundling sale where “consumers buy a second product made exclusively by it, and without the main product, it would not be able to achieve the purpose it was made (and) intended for”.
Apple has 10 days to comply with the judge’s order. Failure to do so will result in a daily fine of R$ 100 or USD 21.63 until the issue is resolved.
A Brazilian court in Brazil on Monday ordered Apple to pay a customer $1,081 for moral damages the company suffered from buying an iPhone without a charger adapter. Judge Vanderlei Caires Pinheiro of the 6th Special Civil Court of Goiania found that Apple’s forcing consumers to buy adapters at the same time as their phones was an “abuse and illegal business practice”
With the October 2020 release of the iPhone 12 and other follow-up models, Apple will no longer include charging adapters with the devices it sells
Apple does provide Lightning cables in iPhone 12 devices and other subsequent models, but not charging adapters, since October 2020 the company announced it would stop including adapters and headphones as part of its efforts to reduce waste and carbon emissions
Apple announced in October 2020 that it would stop including adapters and headphones in its devices ahead of the release of the iPhone 12 models, as part of its plan to save the planet by reducing waste and carbon emissions.
The company argues that the phones do come with a Lightning cable that functions as an adapter sold by other phone accessory makers.
However, Judge Caires Pinheiro rejected Apple’s position.
Apple was fined $2.2 million by the São Paulo consumer protection agency in March for selling iPhones without the adapters needed to charge them
The São Paulo consumer protection agency fined Apple $2.2 million in March for selling iPhones without chargers.
Since the move, Apple is thought to have sold 190 million iPhones worldwide, which has been praised by environmentalists.
The total benefit from removing chargers and headphones and reducing shipping costs could be as high as $6.5 billion, with an estimated $293 million from accessories sales.
Caires Pinheiro said: “Such a measure aimed at reducing environmental impact is inappropriate because, in all evidence, the defendant continues to manufacture this essential accessory, but now sells it separately.”
