APPLE

I Can’t Believe Apple Is This Dumb

But they are

DALL-E 2 image by author

One of my sisters is celebrating her 80th birthday soon. She and I regularly swap recommendations for TV movies and series we’ve enjoyed, but she has not signed up for any of the Apple shows I enjoy.

I thought I’d fix that for her birthday, so I sent her an emailed Apple gift certificate to cover a years worth of Apple TV+.

Easy-peasy, right?

Nope. My sister is a bit of a technophobe. She has an Apple phone, but can’t do much with it beyond calls and texts. You need at least email setup to redeem an Apple gift card into your account so that it can be used to subscribe to Apple TV+.

Now setting up email is not hard. All you usually need to do is know your email address and your password; Apple takes care of the rest. Then you open the email, click on “Redeem”, and the gift card gets put in your account. You can then use that money to pay for almost anything Apple sells, including TV+.

But, even with the help of her son, my sister couldn’t do it. I could tell her to call Apple — they would help for free and are very patient, but she’s now cranky and frustrated. She said thanks, but no thanks.

Why doesn’t Apple make this easier? Why can’t I just tell Apple I want to pay for her…