This was discussed somewhere else recently, I'll paste some interesting bits...
"heres the text of the chat I had with their 'customer service' person
Please wait for a site operator to respond.
You are now chatting with 'Customer Support'
Customer Support:Hi there! Welcome to the Apple Purchase Program. How may I help you?
you:so what's the deal with the program
you:how long have you been at this
Customer Support:Honestly what we are doing isn't very complex. We simply bring multiple buyers together and negotiate volume pricing. Resellers benefit by moving large quantities of machines, so they are more than happy to discount the boxes.
Customer Support:
Customer Support:Also, remember, resellers aren't allowed to advertise prices lower than Apple. That is why you never see prices change from one reseller to another.
Customer Support:The Apple Purchase Program is very new (just a few months old), however, our parent copmany has been in business since 1992... about 10 years.
you:the powerbook i want says 12 units left to order, what happens if 12 people don't sign up?
Customer Support:That is 12 people TOTAL in the order... PowerBooks, iMacs, and PowerMacs. We have never had a reservation period yet where there were remaining computers.
Customer Support:In fact, we usually get too many people.
you
h, I see, so I want an 867 15" powerbook, but the fine print says that I may be automatically upgraded, I don't want the 17" because it won't boot into os9, does the auto upgrade thing happen a lot?
Customer Support:No, it will never happen for the PowerBooks... not enough demand.
you:when is the next order reservation period ending?
Customer Support
o you mean THIS reservation period?
you:yes
Customer Support:The reservation period closes when all reservations are in. So, once the remaining slots are reserved, the reservation period closes so we can head to the reseller.
you:what resellers do you use?
Customer Support:There are just over 500 resellers that we can pull from... we use whomever gives us the biggest disounts for that purchase.
you:thanks for the info, I'll think about it
got that from the "live person" link on the site
This is a classic Gypsy Shell Game technique... ever seen it? The people are crowded around the littlep portable card table and the guy is doing the shell game... a couple of people are betting, and WINNING! Wow! Then a third guy sees you watching, and says, hey, those guys are winning... we oughta try it too...
HE bets and wins once... and then you're in there and... funny... you just lose and lose and lose...
Sucker!
All the "winners" are part of the team! They're winning all right... at YOUR expense.
Don't be stupid. Resellers sell their product at very slim margins on hardware already, usually less than 10%... there just isn't the ROOM these people are claiming for those kinds of discounts...
Be very careful.... their math just doesn't add up (and the inconsistencies alone should have you running for the hills!)
they've been around for A MONTH... yet the phone person said "a few months"...
And how much effort would you make to convince people you were for real if it meant you could score $100,000 in a month or two?
If 400 people send them the "reservation fee" that's how much they'd rake in.
Do you think it's unlikely that 400 people would "take the risk?" These forums they're "advertising" in are attended by hundreds of thousands of people... if just 1 in 1,000 go for it, they've made a bundle...
And they're all set up to keep those people waiting ("oh, we haven't gotten 100 reservations yet...") for a good month or more... essentially buying time to rake in more and more suckers... then they disappear.
1. They give themselves sweeping rights to terminate the program at any time for any reason and owe you nothing.
Quote:
Termination or Cancellation By Company
The Company may immediately cancel your order and reservation (1) if you breach these Terms, (2) if the Company is unable to verify or authenticate any information you provide to the Company, (3) if such information is inaccurate, (4) if the Company determines, in its sole discretion, that you are using the Service illegally or immorally (5) if the Company decides, in its sole discretion, to discontinue offering the Program, or (6) if the Company determines, in its sole discretion, that such cancellation is appropriate or necessary for any other permissible business or legal reason. The Company shall not be liable to you or any third party for cancellation of Service. In the event Company cancels Customer's order, the reservation fee of $250 is nonrefundable.
Conclusion: this proposition is clearly for people who are more desperate than they are careful. (Always a warning sign)
2. They ask for "proof of identification" showing you're over 18. (Is that not weird?)
Quote:
Your Obligations
You must provide Marbella Technologies your name, email address, and all contact information listed on the reservation form as well as valid identification proving that you are over 18 years of age and legally authorized to make this purchase....
So, even if they don't wind up taking your money, they have your driver's license, which I have never been asked to give in an online purchase before. (Identity theft, anyone?)
Even if this is technically legally legit (whether or not it's honest or moral), it's at the very least baaaaaad business ethic. A little bit of Enron right here in Mac heaven?[/p]
Yes, caveat emptor (buyer beware) - but the same it true for our own US government, which pulls this kinda stuff on us every day (social security, medicare and pension funds, and this multi-trillion dollar so-called "defense" budget which is really just a way to dupe taxpayers into gullibly giving their money away to Dubya's puppetmasters in the military industrial complex ...) oh, but I digress!
You can also see some interesting anomalies at the website of their parent company," Marbella Software
http://www.marbellasoftware.com. The website looks very slick and professional at first glance, but closer examination reveals some curious stuff:
1. The title of the "company" page is misspelled "copmany," which in and of itself might not be too strange, except that the same misspelling occurred in my dialogue with a "live help" representative at the Apple Purchase Program site... and the transcript of another person's live help session which was posted to this forum also contained the exact same text as my session, showing that some of the answers are cut an pasted from a master document that may well have been typed by the same person who created the text for the website, which is a little odd for a company that says (on its company page) "Marbella Software has been referred to as, "the largest cohesive team of Microsoft developers on the planet."
2. Also odd that a tech company with such claims would have a website with a domain name that was registered only in august 2002 (marbellasoftware.com). the copyright statement says 2002-2004.
3. Also in the errata department, the line breaks on their website are all choppy (breaking into a new line in randowm places), suggesting that someone took a slick template and carelessly pasted text into it - not common practice for a company that claims to be "the largest cohesive team of Microsoft developers on the planet."
4. Strangest is that such a huge organization (which its live help person says has been in business for 10 years) would not only have a 6-month-old domain name, but also have a shared office setup (if what other posters have said is true) - sounds pretty fly by night to me.
