Shoot I would welcome the chance to pay early upgrade price 399/499. I bought my 3G on launch day and they are only allowing me to purchase one at full price 599/699, which is probably not going to happen.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
AT&T punishing fanboys with iPhone 3G S Upgrade Pricing
- Thread starter m021478
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
- Status
The best way would be to Start s new line of service and after 30 day cancel and pay the ETF that would cost you $199+&70+&175=$444 the $70 for the service is not so bad you can use the phone. But Next year you will be able to but an Iphone @ the subsidized price. If you cancel you existing line you will lose your phone # and not buy a Iphone for 90 days. If you do a upgrade and pay the 200 + 200 for the phone you will still have a contract next year and have to pay 200 again. You can also convert your line to a family plan pay $39.00 and get a second phone for a cost $413.lots of options.
You and wife must have never had a cellphone plan before.
Because if you did you'd know thats how it works with every cellphone provider and every cellphone you want to upgrade to.
You cant upgrade your phone any time you feel like it for the promotional price unless you're up for a renewal.
Because if you did you'd know thats how it works with every cellphone provider and every cellphone you want to upgrade to.
You cant upgrade your phone any time you feel like it for the promotional price unless you're up for a renewal.
My God
if I see one more of these threads I am going to Scream
So lets see you signed June 15th, 2008 a 2 Year Contract maybe you were playing with the Iphone during that part! but they are only making you wait till the 17th to order. Which is just over one year. So your crying about this give me a fricking break! Maybe you can sign that Twitter petition for 6 whole days. BTW if you would have really talked though it with your sales rep he probably would have had it waved. Maybe you could have told him you signed the twitter thing that would had made him wet his panties!
if I see one more of these threads I am going to Scream
So lets see you signed June 15th, 2008 a 2 Year Contract maybe you were playing with the Iphone during that part! but they are only making you wait till the 17th to order. Which is just over one year. So your crying about this give me a fricking break! Maybe you can sign that Twitter petition for 6 whole days. BTW if you would have really talked though it with your sales rep he probably would have had it waved. Maybe you could have told him you signed the twitter thing that would had made him wet his panties! 
I think it people being greedy.. they want to make $200 off there 3G but what they dont understand is if everyone got the $200 price then iPhones would be worth $100 bucks.. There is no way ATT is gonna let you make money off there product and then get a cheaper price then selling it for more unless you wait out your contract..
if I see one more of these threads I am going to Scream
See this is why I made the suggestion to merge all these threads to one but got flamed for asking/suggesting
AT&T doesn't owe him anything, but at the same time this situation will cause millions of current 3G owners to skip a generation of phone. I haven't done the math, but I wonder if Apple loses from this scenario. Some 3G owners may change providers when their current contract expires, which in many cases will be less than one year.
If AT&T offered upgrade assurance as some providers, they would lock in millions of 3G owners for an additional two years, as opposed to those millions of contracts that will be expiring within one year. Many of those people are unhappy and will seek out other smart phone and providers.
Yes, AT&T is legally right, but I'm not sure if this was the best approach for both AT&T and Apple.
If AT&T offered upgrade assurance as some providers, they would lock in millions of 3G owners for an additional two years, as opposed to those millions of contracts that will be expiring within one year. Many of those people are unhappy and will seek out other smart phone and providers.
Yes, AT&T is legally right, but I'm not sure if this was the best approach for both AT&T and Apple.
Wirelessly posted (iPhone: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5H11 Safari/525.20)
I don't qualify for the upgrade for another year but I've had 2 suspended lines on my account and both qualify for the low price. I just went to my Att store and restored one line so I can purchase the new one and just replace the sim card from my current 3G to the S model and so I will keep my main number and then turn around and suspend the line I used for the upgrade. The guy at the recomended that to me. So I preordered the S phone on Apples website to have it delivered so I don't have to worry about lines and all the fuss. Plus it's guaranteed to deliver the 19th anyways. So this can work for people with suspended lines or just open up a new phone on ur account and then after you get the phone, cancel that line and it won't cost u anything.
I don't qualify for the upgrade for another year but I've had 2 suspended lines on my account and both qualify for the low price. I just went to my Att store and restored one line so I can purchase the new one and just replace the sim card from my current 3G to the S model and so I will keep my main number and then turn around and suspend the line I used for the upgrade. The guy at the recomended that to me. So I preordered the S phone on Apples website to have it delivered so I don't have to worry about lines and all the fuss. Plus it's guaranteed to deliver the 19th anyways. So this can work for people with suspended lines or just open up a new phone on ur account and then after you get the phone, cancel that line and it won't cost u anything.
This is the standard practice for subsidies with EVERY cell phone provider for EVERY subsidized cell phone. If people change to another carrier, the same exact thing will happen every year...
stockcerts said:
I can assure you that AT&T and Apple have done the math. They know how profits could be affected and are acting in the way that makes the most sense based on their analysis.
I really have run out of energy to address these threads, but I'm posting here because this one may go down as one of the most ridiculous considering NN OP has to only wait one month to get a subsidized price, and I don't want to be left out.
Its threads like these that make we wish profanity was allowed on MacRumors.
Its threads like these that make we wish profanity was allowed on MacRumors.
I think it's more than just the math and immediate dollars, it's also the corporate image. I think oil companies are a good example of this.
This is not a case of AT&T trying to gauge their customers for more than the iPhone is worth. The iPhone's real price is $600/$700. If they let people upgrade halfway through their contract they're losing $200 on every iPhone they sell.
Worse than than, if they did that everyone on every carrier in the world would want a $200 discount on their iPhone as well.
Do people complain that they should be able to upgrade their cars for cheap whenever a new model comes out? Should car companies take a loss on every car they sell to make their customers happy? It's exactly the same thing.
Also, in most European countries people buy their phones full price. That means they pay $600/$700 for their iPhones. If AT&T let their customers upgrade early for $200/$300 everybody else who paid full price for the iPhone would be seriously mad for not having a discount as well. How's that for happy costumers?
And then add to that the Blackberry users, the Nokia users, all the other smartphone users, all of them who have the same subsidies as the iPhone users, who would want to be able to upgrade early as well. Either AT&T could take even more of a loss on all their subsidies or they would have a lot of angry customers.
How's that for corporate image?
The final word on iPhone pricing and why you're not getting ripped off
I've seen quite a few posts here over the past couple of days complaining about prices of the iPhone and accessories, so I decided to write up a handy FAQ that answers those questions:
Question: Why is AT&T charging loyal customers like me more for a new iPhone than they're charging Joe Blow who just signed a contract?
Answer: Because a new customer is more valuable than a current customer. If you bought an iPhone last July and signed a two-year contract, you still have a year left on your contract. AT&T will make the same amount from you for the next year regardless of whether they subsidize your purchase of a new iPhone, so they have little incentive to do so. On the other hand, AT&T is currently getting no money from a non-customer, so it makes more sense to provide incentives to new customers to bring in new revenue. As your contract gets closer to its expiration date, the more sense it makes for AT&T to subsidize your iPhone upgrade in order to retain your business which they are about to lose.
Question: Why does the iPod Touch cost so much less than an iPhone with no contract? The GPS and phone components can't cost that much more to produce.
Answer: The R&D costs for a phone is higher than an iPod which explains some of the cost difference. The rest is simply due to market forces; an iPhone costs what it does because it's the maximum amount Apple can charge and still sell enough units to be profitable. Supply and demand.
Question: Why does Apple charge $30 for a dock/headphones/insert any other accessory here? They totally ripped me off.
Answer: You can't be ripped off when buying elastic goods. Elastic goods are goods whose prices are very sensitive to changes in supply and demand. Typically the less essential a good is, the more elastic it is. Apple-branded accessories are certainly non-essential, so the price is right at the point where supply meets demand. If demand suddenly dropped, so would the price. If the price suddenly dropped, demand would go up. Compare this to an essential good like heart surgery; price fluctuations have little influence on demand, since people wouldn't suddenly run out to get heart surgery if prices were reduced, and the same number of people would still need heart surgery if prices were raised.
I have low expectations that this will actually help the situation, but it made me feel better to type it out and have it all in one place.
I've seen quite a few posts here over the past couple of days complaining about prices of the iPhone and accessories, so I decided to write up a handy FAQ that answers those questions:
Question: Why is AT&T charging loyal customers like me more for a new iPhone than they're charging Joe Blow who just signed a contract?
Answer: Because a new customer is more valuable than a current customer. If you bought an iPhone last July and signed a two-year contract, you still have a year left on your contract. AT&T will make the same amount from you for the next year regardless of whether they subsidize your purchase of a new iPhone, so they have little incentive to do so. On the other hand, AT&T is currently getting no money from a non-customer, so it makes more sense to provide incentives to new customers to bring in new revenue. As your contract gets closer to its expiration date, the more sense it makes for AT&T to subsidize your iPhone upgrade in order to retain your business which they are about to lose.
Question: Why does the iPod Touch cost so much less than an iPhone with no contract? The GPS and phone components can't cost that much more to produce.
Answer: The R&D costs for a phone is higher than an iPod which explains some of the cost difference. The rest is simply due to market forces; an iPhone costs what it does because it's the maximum amount Apple can charge and still sell enough units to be profitable. Supply and demand.
Question: Why does Apple charge $30 for a dock/headphones/insert any other accessory here? They totally ripped me off.
Answer: You can't be ripped off when buying elastic goods. Elastic goods are goods whose prices are very sensitive to changes in supply and demand. Typically the less essential a good is, the more elastic it is. Apple-branded accessories are certainly non-essential, so the price is right at the point where supply meets demand. If demand suddenly dropped, so would the price. If the price suddenly dropped, demand would go up. Compare this to an essential good like heart surgery; price fluctuations have little influence on demand, since people wouldn't suddenly run out to get heart surgery if prices were reduced, and the same number of people would still need heart surgery if prices were raised.
I have low expectations that this will actually help the situation, but it made me feel better to type it out and have it all in one place.
If it's worth $200 to buy it on release day, then buy it. Otherwise, I'm not feeling any sympathy for you needing to wait a month to buy it. It's only a month.
Dang i bet this guy feels like a dumba$$... haha but if it makes you feel any better..... im going through the same situation ....but i didnt make a whining thread about it..(that move was kinda dumb).... but i did know before hand this was going to happen.... srry buddy.... keep whining for one more month.......
Yes it will work because it did for me. Plus I sold my current iPhone on craigslist for $325 so I'm getting it for free. My S model will be here on the 19th and it is already paid for. It's called the loop hole. DAMN THE MAN
- Status