A hot gadget put one customer in hot water when he tried to get it repaired.

Jake Durgard said he loved his 30-day-old iPhone, but he was not happy with the phone service and deactivated the necessary contract with AT&T.

Shortly afterward, Durgard said the bottom row buttons for phone, Internet, e-mail and iTunes stopped working.

He said he called several Apple stores and they told him to just bring the phone into them. However, when he brought the phone in without the SIM card, they would not help him, according to Durgard.

Durgard said that there is nothing written on the box or the warranty that stated the SIM card must be with the phone to have it fixed.

When he contacted Apple, they said they would not honor the warranty without the required two-year activated contract with AT&T.

“Every single time I called, they said they would not service my phone. I told them that I had an AT&T service account, but it’s no longer valid because I had bad service with it and all I want is my phone fixed,” said Durgard. “They tell me, ‘Sorry, you have to have a two-year active agreement in order to get any hardware replaced or fixed with the phone.’”

Durgard said the problem is in the hardware, not the software, and Apple shouldn’t need the SIM card to fix the phone.

When he took his phone into a local Apple store and refused to leave until it was fixed, he was escorted out by police.

Apple store staff acknowledged that they have had a problem with hacked phones and the company has issued a warning that unauthorized unlocking of the phone may cause permanent damage to the software that is not covered by the warranty.

He has printed several pages from Apple’s support and discussion Web page of people complaining about the same issue.

FOX 12 called and e-mail Apple, but the newsroom is still waiting for a response.

Durgard is not certain what his next move will be but he is considering joining a class action lawsuit against Apple.