Phones and cars are not the same though. Cars have mechanical parts that wear out. On a phone the only part that wears out, really, is the battery. ...and that is likely brand new. A car is relatively expensive too. A phone is relatively inexpensive. Again, if the refurb phone, upon inspection, is indistinguishable from a brand new device in form and function and carries the same warranty there's just no point in giving it any thought IMO.
from a dark Note 4??????
And you're still missing the point. He paid for a
new Note 4 only 3 weeks ago, and through no fault of his own, he's being given a
used Note 4. The
least they can do is give some kind of refund/discount to him since he's not getting a brand new replacement. If it was months down the road, sure. If he dropped it, forgot it in his pocket and it got washed, whatever, sure. But the device itself had some kind of manufacturing issue that caused it to fail within 3 weeks. He should have gotten a
new phone to replace it.
And sure, only the battery normally wears out in a phone, but if it were just the battery in his former phone, they would have replaced it and he'd still have his new phone.