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I previously reviewed iMend back in 2013 and was happy with the results, so when they asked me to carry out another review, but for a tablet, I jumped at the chance as I had a iPad Mini with a cracked screen.

A basic front glass replacement costs £59.99 with a 12-month warranty, to get it done by Apple themselves you will pay £196.44. For some context about how ridiculous the Apple pricing is, I paid £180 for the iPad brand new last December. So, it is cheaper just top buy a new iPad. There are obviously other repair options, and I have found and used local repair shops that charge around £40 but you generally get little or no warranty. However, the one time I tried it with an iPad Mini 1, the digitizer started to fail within a few months, and I ended up carrying out a 2nd repair myself.

DIY repairs are the most cost efficient alternative, and you can get a new screen for under £20. If you are very good with your hands, this might be a viable option. In my case, I forgot to re-add the smart magnets, and the lower left of the screen doesn’t stick down properly. It also took me well over an hour and was quite stressful. So, the additional £40 for iMend to fix it is justified I think.

There were some issues with the process, first of all, you have to cover the cost of postage yourself so that £60 fee can easily jump up more than 10%. A bigger issue was that when iMend came to look at the iPad they claimed the led backlighting had failed. They took photos of the issue, and no work was done before speaking with me, so I wouldn’t have incurred any additional expense if I didn’t want.

It appears the process of posting the iPad damaged it further causing the backlighting to fail. I had packaged it up very well, but I guess it is just a case of bad luck. I would suggest taking extensive photos of your device in its current condition before sending it off, so you can show evidence to iMend and hopefully use it for any insurance claim with your chosen courier, though I don’t imagine you will have much luck with a claim.

iMend were kind enough to follow through with the repair, and once we had discussed the issue it only took about 24 hours to repair, and then it was sent out using APC overnight. So if you post your device first thing Monday, and no further issues arise, you should probably have it back Wednesday or Thursday at the latest. iMed cover the cost of returns, and the iPad was packaged up very well.

The end result is a well-repaired iPad, it currently works with no issues, and the backlight works just as well as it ever did.

Overall I am very happy with the service. There are obviously some concerns about the additional damage that happened, but with the correspondence with iMend and my previous experience with them, I am confident it was due to damage during transit. iMend were also kind enough to document the entire repair process which you can via here in PDF format.

iMend offer a call out service for a fee of £15, and considering postage costs at least half that I would suggest it is well worth the fee, you avoid the risk of damaging your device, you don’t have to worry about doing a full erase/reset and you are not without your device for several days.

iMend also cover dozens of other devices too, far more than any other repair company I am aware of. You can find your device and book your repair from imend.com

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