Canada iPhone users shackled for 3 years
p2pnet news | Mobiles:- Apple, and firms selling Apple stuff, know Macolytes will stand still for anything.
Anything. Thanks largely to the infamous Steve Jobs reality distortion field.
For years they’ve been paying through the nose for Apple products and there’s every indication that’s the way it’ll stay.
The iPhone has become the phone, with Japan’s Softbank announcing it’ll sell the 3G version for about $215, which should be about as much anyone would want to pay for a phone of any description.
“Softbank’s two-year deal is similar to one announced a few weeks ago by AT&T Inc., which will sell the new iPhone – which runs on faster third-generation, or 3G, cellphone networks – in the United States for $199 US and $299 US. AT&T’s devices will also require customers to sign on for two years,” says the CBC, going on >>>
O2, the iPhone’s carrier in Britain, has also announced it will sell the device with an 18-month service plan.
In Australia, which is a smaller market than Canada with only 21 million people, both Vodafone PLC and SingTel Optus Pty Ltd. have said they will give customers the option of buying the iPhone without a contract.
But Rogers Communications Isays it’ll bring the iPhone to Canada on July 11 at the same prices as AT&T, “but it will require customers to sign three-year contracts.”
Three years?
Yup.
Like, we’re Canadians, eh? And we’ll do what we’re told. By Apple or anyone else.
Ask Stephen Harper.
“The company sells a number of phones with the option of one-, two- or three-year contracts, where the shorter the deal is, the more the customer pays for the device up front,” says the story.
But the iPhone will be the only device with the three-year option which, “would prevent Rogers’ customers from defecting to new entrants and taking their iPhones with them,” says the CBC, adding:
“Under Rogers’ current rules, cancelling a contract early incurs a penalty of $20 per month remaining in the deal, up to a maximum of $400.”
.
.Stumble It!
for about $215 – iPhone: $215 in Japan, June 25, 2008
CBC – Canadian iPhone buyers face long lock-ins, June 23, 2008
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June 25th, 2008 at 7:50 am
Good thing we can unlock them
June 25th, 2008 at 8:19 am
yes unlocking is easy enough, but who is willing to sign a contract just to get an iphone to unlock and resell??
June 25th, 2008 at 10:55 pm
so, $799 for the 8GB. $299 up front, $400 for the cancellation fee.
They’ll sell.
June 27th, 2008 at 6:56 am
The cancellation fee use to be a max of 200.
I think thats BS that you have to sign up for a 3-year contract. For what they wil get from costomers for those 3 years they should be giving the phones away.