Apple Glitch Leaves iPhone Users in Limbo

A warning to anyone planning to buy a new iPhone.

Call me old fashioned, but I remember a day when you'd buy an iPhone and you'd leave the store with your new phone updated with all of your existing data.  Your calendars, your photos, your videos, your emails and texts...it used to be standard practice to be able to have them all transferred onto your new phone.  Whether you were personally transferring your data, or the retailer provided the service as a courtesy, you could expect that your old data would find its way onto your new phone hassle free.

Apparently those days are over.  It is too much to expect.

Before laying over $1,000 down for my brand new iPhone Xs, I backed up my iPhone 8 Plus into my iTunes.  While doing that, I updated the software on the iPhone 8 to the latest and greatest version:  12.3.2.  Doing this Apple recommended update has caused me more headaches than you can imagine.  Updating my phone is going to prevent me from fully utilizing my brand new phone until further notice.

The reason?  Because my brand new iPhone Xs is only capable of updating to a 12.3.1, the phones are incompatible to exchange my personal data.  The most outrageous part is that Apple is telling me with a straight face that there is nothing they can do about it.  I had multiple Apple Customer Service reps tell me (without an ounce of remorse in their voice) that there was no way to restore a backup between these two phones until they release a new update of the software.  I just have to wait.

Both the store that sold it to me and Apple suggested that this wasn't a very big deal because technically the new phone is still operational.  They seem to be forgetting the most important part of the iPhone...the "I".  Sure, I have a phone.  But the "I" part is missing until Apple can get their act together.