Great Experience with AT&T Phone/Device Insurance

I see a lot of posts here asserting that AT&T Mobile Insurance is not worth the money, or provides poor service.

Here is my experience after paying $6.99 premiums for 14 months.   

After 14 months, my iPhone 6 Plus 128GB began malfunctioning.  The Apple Genius declared it a “logic board failure”.  I could buy the same model from Apple on the spot for $325.  I said I would think about it and went downstairs to the AT&T Store.

AT&T guy says “do you have our insurance?”. Yes. "The insurance covers malfunctions to out of warranty phones.”  

I made a successful claim without talking to anyone at asurion.  It all starts here:
http://phoneclaim.com/html/att/index.html

Notes:
1.  The normal deductible is $199 for a claim.  Since I went over 12 months without a claim, they cut that in half ($99 deductible).

2.  I had to download an affidavit form and fill it out to assure I wasn’t lying.  I then had to scan in the filled out form and upload to asurion along with a scan of my drivers license (or other ID).  That was the most painful part of the whole thing.

3.  They adjudicated the claim (meaning someone looked over my affidavit and checked to see if the phone actually exists in AT&T’s database along with my name linked to it.)

4. A few hours later I get an email from asurion telling me the claim is ready to be completed.

5. Log in to asurion.  Open my claim.  They tell me the bad news “we can’t get a replacement for your exact phone (iPhone 6 Plus 128GB Gold).  This is what we have (iPhone 6S Plus).”  I accepted taking a different (newer) model (I scored a free upgrade to 6S!!).

6. Got an email from AT&T stating my refurbished iPhone 6S Plus 128GB Gold phone would be sent by Fedex by noon tomorrow.  This is a refurbished unit, so don’t expect a pristine Apple open box experience.

7. Procedure to completely divorce your from your iPhone: Turn off Find My Phone, disable iMessages, backup to iCloud, import phone photos to computer,  full backup in iTunes (takes a long time but later you get all apps back in proper position and data from some apps), login to iCloud to delete your phone from “My devices”, Restore the phone, transfer the Chip to new phone.

8. Ship off old phone (within a week) — woohoo! you just scored a full set of iPhone accessories!  Great for when you sell your phone on eBay someday.

Awesome insurance!  There is a limit on the number of claims I can make with AT&T Mobile Insurance (2) per year.  I am thinking of signing up for the “AT&T Multi-Device Protection Pack.”  For $29.99 per month I could cover 3 phones on my plan, or 2 phones and my MacBook Pro 15 w/Retina Display.  So,  if my expensive laptop goes bad, I could get it replaced by asurion.  Hmm..