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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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Apple is now requiring that customers in the United States verify that they're active students, teachers, or staff members at an educational institution in order to access education discounts on products.

appleeducation.jpg

Previously, little verification was needed for customers to purchase products through Apple's education store in the United States. Apple's education stores offer models of the iPad and Mac at reduced price points, making them more affordable to students, teachers, and staff who will use them for education purposes.

As the store was accessible to all, some customers may have used it even if they weren't an education customer, which likely led Apple to implement tighter rules for its U.S. store.

As spotted on Reddit, Apple in the United States now requires that current students, teachers, and staff members verify their eligibility for education discounts through UNiDAYS. UNiDAYS is a website specialized in providing education customers with discounts for products and services by confirming their enrollment in an educational institution.

Apple had previously implemented the same approach to its education store in other countries, such as India and the United Kingdom. At the time of writing, Apple's Canadian education store remains open, with customers able to purchase discounted products without the need to verify eligibility through UNiDAYS.

Article Link: Apple's US Education Store Now Requires Institution Verification to Buy Discounted Products
 
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Solomani

macrumors 601
Sep 25, 2012
4,785
10,477
Slapfish, North Carolina
"Apple is now making it more difficult for customers in the United States to access its education discounts..."


Poor choice of words. Really, Apple is making things more difficult? How about simply stating that Apple is doing what it should have been doing in the first place: vetting and qualifying people who are qualified to get an Educator/Student discount?

Apple's only fault here is that they made it too easy for too long.

The wording from this MR article implies that Apple is WRONG (aka the bad guy) for making this change.... in reality this change is something that is making things right.
 

samifathi

macrumors member
Feb 9, 2021
68
376
"Apple is now making it more difficult for customers in the United States to access its education discounts..."


Poor choice of words. Really, Apple is making things more difficult? How about simply stating that Apple is doing what it should have been doing in the first place: vetting and qualifying people who are qualified to get an Educator/Student discount?

Apple's only fault here is that they made it too easy for too long.

The wording from this MR article implies that Apple is WRONG (aka the bad guy) for making this change.... in reality this change is something that is making things right.
Agreed. We've updated the start.
 

icymountain

macrumors 6502a
Dec 12, 2006
503
540
"Apple is now making it more difficult for customers in the United States to access its education discounts..."


Poor choice of words. Really, Apple is making things more difficult? How about simply stating that Apple is doing what it should have been doing in the first place: vetting and qualifying people who are qualified to get an Educator/Student discount?

I think the choice of words is not poor as it looks.

Speaking based on personal experience, from a country where this system was implemented, and after purchasing with the education discount, based on my status as staff member of a university: it took me quite a bit of time to get UniDAYS to approve me, just because they would not admit my email address was that of an education institution; after (not so fun) investigation it turned out that there were several aliases of this address and only one worked... The system would just deny and not provide much a clue about the reason, and of course, as always with such systems, there was nobody to talk to in order to get help troubleshooting. And of course, since deciding who is eligible or not is UniDAYS's task, no help should be expected from the Apple Store itself.

So, yes, it is very reasonable to expect some check to be done to make sure that not everyone purchases on the education store based on fake credentials, but the procedure to check it indeed does make it harder to legit purchasers to actually get the education price.
 

Kebabselector

macrumors 68030
May 25, 2007
2,986
1,635
Birmingham, UK
been this way in the UK forever, previously via IP address range and more recently via institutional membership or member of unidays. I think its fair that only education people can get the discount. suck it.
You could modify the URL to get around the IP, but they rightly blocked it when they switched to UniDays.
 
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McScooby

macrumors 65816
Oct 15, 2005
1,238
777
The Paps of Glenn Close, Scotland.
been this way in the UK forever, previously via IP address range and more recently via institutional membership or member of unidays. I think its fair that only education people can get the discount. suck it.
Don't know about forever, has it maybe just been 4 years or so? The IP thing was for higher edu before as they got a bigger discount and had to buy via the Apple University specific site, whereas anyone could get the discount (provided they agreed to the criteria) on the main edu & students site.
The bawache now is although technically you can still get a edu discount as parents buying for their kids, you're locked out of PayPal etc. as transaction done over the phone.
The other studential stuff is dealt with by 3rd parties.
Can't say I was impressed by the change in the UK, that and bumping the price of memory and ram and decreasing refurb %, bigger Apple get the tighter they get.
 
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BreakYurAnkles

Suspended
Oct 17, 2021
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I can’t tell you how many times I would read online that people would just buy through the education store for the discount despite not being involved in education, so this seems reasonable to me.
my justification has always been that I have nieces and nephews that are in elementary k-12.

I often educate them on how to get discounts.

So the purchase is for their education.
 
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swingerofbirch

macrumors 68040
My opinions on education discounts have changed over time.

In Apple's case, I don't think it's a big deal because the price differences aren't huge, but I've noticed healthcare providers giving discounts to students as well.

I'm not sure why they should prioritize one form of investment over another. If a person is starting a small business, it's just a different type of investment than education. Both are financial investments in something you are building.

In some countries outside the US, it makes even less sense, as people not only don't have to pay to attend college but are paid to attend high school and college (only familiar with Sweden in that regard where you get a salary to attend high school and college, but I imagine it's the same in other countries).

It makes me wonder if education discounts are more of a way for companies to attract a young, valuable demographic.
 

dr_lha

macrumors 68000
Oct 8, 2003
1,633
176
BTW regarding educational discounts. I've been in academia for a long time, and I've almost never used the educational discounts. Most often you can get similar discounts by just buying from Amazon or other retailers (never Apple of course). For example, last year I bought an iPad Air and saved $80 on RRP from Amazon. This Unidays thing looks like a pain, I'm not rushing to sign up for it.
 

neuropsychguy

macrumors 68020
Sep 29, 2008
2,327
5,459
BTW regarding educational discounts. I've been in academia for a long time, and I've almost never used the educational discounts. Most often you can get similar discounts by just buying from Amazon or other retailers (never Apple of course). For example, last year I bought an iPad Air and saved $80 on RRP from Amazon. This Unidays thing looks like a pain, I'm not rushing to sign up for it.
It depends on what you are buying. iPads can often be purchased for cheaper than the educational discount. Build to order Macs are rarely better prices elsewhere than the educational discount. Even standard configuration Macs are not always better prices than Apple’s educational pricing.
 
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CJM

macrumors 68000
May 7, 2005
1,532
1,053
U.K.
Been the case for a while in the UK. Not that the education discount is as good as it used to be anyway. If Apple actually did sales, I wouldn’t feel so bummed out every time I bought one of their products for RRP.
 

NightFox

macrumors 68040
May 10, 2005
3,233
4,452
Shropshire, UK
been this way in the UK forever, previously via IP address range and more recently via institutional membership or member of unidays. I think its fair that only education people can get the discount. suck it.
When I bought my trashcan Mac Pro from the UK Apple Store back in 2013 there was no such controls, though I did get a call from Apple before they processed my order questioning me about my planned usage, which was a very thinly veiled attempt at assessing my eligibility (I was using it to teach video editing, freelance). Apple were happy with this justification, but these days without an ac.uk email address (either for Apple or for UniDays verification), I'm not sure I'd qualify.
 

Populus

macrumors 601
Aug 24, 2012
4,494
6,495
Spain, Europe
I have a question: does this apply only to online purchases? Or now you’re required to register on UniDays to make a purchase on the physical Apple Store as well?

Until now, they usually checked my documentation in front of me, in the Store, and they applied the discount. It is way easier this way, because like @icymountain said above, UniDays doesn’t work, let’s say, flawlessly, and I don’t like to send my documentation online.
 
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