Mike Peterson
Apple is urging retail staffers to work remotely amid a new spike in COVID-19 cases, casting doubt on a full resumption of in-office work in 2020.
Although the Cupertino tech giant began to reopen stores in mid-June, a resurgence of coronavirus cases in some parts of the world have prompted the company to roll back the operation. More than 80 retail locations have since re-closed in the U.S.
In a memo shared with Apple retail staffers seen by Bloomberg, Apple's people and retail chief, Deirdre O'Brien, urged Apple Store employees to start working from home and added that the company would send COVID-19 test kits to directly to them.
"If your store is closed, please sign up for Retail at Home, please talk to your manager, because we really need to make sure that we shift our teams to greet our customers remotely in this time," O'Brien said.
That's reportedly because customers are seeing "significant wait times" due to an uptick in online service and product purchases. O'Brien added that "people are really dependent upon their devices, especially right now."
For Apple office employees, the company advised in an internal memo that a full return to office locations in the U.S. won't happen by the end of 2020.
Previous plans called for main office staffers to return to Apple Park in phases, the first of which occurred in mid-June.
In a memo to staffers in March, O'Brien said that reopening plans would be highly dependent on local COVID-19 conditions and that operations would be re-evaluated on a weekly basis.
The latest memo from O'Brien indicated that Apple would "begin to welcome back team members who prefer to work from the office or those with projects that require them to be in the office, while continuing to significantly limit total occupancy."
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15 Comments
I hope I get to go in my local Apple Store for my Genius Bar appointment next Monday. In case you don't know it, Apple has done a product recall on most of the Smart Battery Cases for the iPhone Xs Max. In an inexcusably stupid and tone deaf move considering the current situation, Apple is requiring that affected owners of these cases physically bring them into an Apple Store for processing. They refuse to do it over the phone, even though the replacement units will in all likelihood be shipped to you through the mail and not issued at the store. I spent nearly 2 hours on the phone with Apple Support trying to get this done by mail and the best they could do is offer send me a replacement if I paid $119 for the privilege, versus $0 for using the Apple Store, all of which were closed at the time. Apple Support is generally very good, but on this particular issue they are out of their friggin' minds. I'm worried that mindless bureaucracy is starting to set in at Apple, which unlike all the other "Apple is doomed" assertions, would truly be a step in the doomsday direction.
The program in question (which predates COVID) has always not had a phone component. As https://support.apple.com/iphone-xs-xs-max-xr-smart-battery-case-replacement notes the case has to be inspected to verify is eligible. Apple is not picking on anyone. Not all procedures lend themselves to service online as simply as in person.
California‘s “brilliant” Governor is going to tank the entire State.