Employee discount question

[heythequickness]

I tried searching this forum but could not find an answer to my question, so I'm curious if anyone knows here. A friend of mine offered to purchase the new Santa Rosa MBP for me through her employee discount. I bought a gift card worth the amount of the MBP and last night she was ready to buy it, but then it would not let her. She said something about the employee online store did not let her buy it because the Santa Rosas are new released and that employees have to wait a month. But its now July 15 and the MBP were released on the 5th of June, so it's been well over a month. Shes purchased MANY apple products at 25% off this year for many of her friends and coworkers at her other job, so I don't think she can't buy it because of something wrong with her employee discount. Anyways, I was just wondering if anyone here knew how long I we may have to wait before the Employees can purchase the new Santa Rosa MBP. Thanks!!!

- Jerome

 

[CalBoy]

Hmm...sounds to me like she hit her limit. Apple might allow employees to purchase only 1 laptop and 2 desktops (or some other low combination) in any given year. Makes sense, that way she doesn't give everyone in the world a lower priced mbp.

Doesn't she have any papers on the discount policy? Read it up. Maybe it's just a simple glitch that she can fix by telling her supervisor.

 

[heythequickness]

Maybe, I'll ask her to check up on it, if it turns out that she has hit her limit I guess I will have to go through edu discount.

I did read the following paragraph from a website I found when searching for Apple Employee Discount:

"Please understand that the more coveted Apple employee discounts are NOT available before or soon after a "hot" (newly released, say, such as the PB17 at the time of this writing) product becomes available. In such cases, the item would not even appear on the "internal" employee (online) store. It usually takes a long time, even months, while the said product becomes available in large enough quantities so as to have no backlog, after which employees can buy it using their "big" discount."

So I'm guessing maybe employees DO have to wait still? Just a though, if I can get more thoughts on this issue it would be great!


And CalBoy, thank you for your speedy response!

 

[CalBoy]

Hmmm...that paragraph implies that Apple can take as long as it wants to release the product for employee purchase. It doesn't mean one month, it can mean a few months.

In your case, since you have a backup with EDU, I'd say that if she can't get you the notebook before a certain time, then you'll have to buy it yourself. Are you familiar with OS X? If so, then just get it a week before your classes start, giving you enough time to let her employee store update. If you're new to Mac, then give yourself two weeks to learn. Most of it is pretty easy, but some stuff you'll just have to play around with.

Oh, and you're welcome

 

[heythequickness]

Thanks! I am actually very familiar with OSX because I use it at work. I think I may just wait one more week or so before I call it quits and go through edu discount. But I did just remember that when she was on the phone with me telling me that she couldn't purchase the new laptops, she did say "I can get you the OLD ones" which leads me to believe that her employee discount is still active with notebooks, just not the new ones. Hmm...I'll have to see. Thanks!

More thoughts are welcome too, thanks!

 

[Squonk]

Considering that for the regular public, the 15" MBP's have a 7-10 day lead time, I'm not surprised that the employees are "locked out" from these. Like the quote from Apple said, not until there is sufficient supply are employees allowed to purchase them. Bummer. If you can wait a few more weeks, I'd be inclined to wait on a 2.4GHz.

 

[CalBoy]

Considering that for the regular public, the 15" MBP's have a 7-10 day lead time, I'm not surprised that the employees are "locked out" from these.

I didn't have to wait 7-10 days to get mine. I bought it three days after they were updated (Friday June 8th). But, you're right in thinking that demand might still be high. I'd say that a few more weeks and employees will probably be allowed to buy them.

 

[xfiftyfour]

The new SR MBPs just haven't hit the employee store yet because the demand is too high. There is technically a limit to how many computers each employee is supposed to buy using their discount, but Apple doesn't actually keep track, so it's not that she hit a limit and they disabled it for her or anything like that.

Just going to have to keep playing the waiting game, I guess.