Apple could offer insurance, knowing full well how often accidents happen and how fragile mostly their phones are.
Insurance is for accidents; warranty is for their failures. And they have had a number of problems with pretty much every generation of product that would fall under warranty - delaminating screens (got it), broken speakers (got it), antennagate, etc.
I never mentioned anything about accidental damage, so I am not sure why you've brought it and why you're mentioning state mandated insurance. As far as I am aware, neither Apple's warranty nor Apple Care does cover accidental damage, so when compared to free 6 years consumer right to have the device operating without faults during normal usage barring any accidents, buying Apple Care makes no sense.
Yeah, now I get AppleCare+ (or whatever tier that covers accidental damage as well) on everything since the 50%-70% “repair” (i.e. replacement) cost on the slightest damage is insane. It seems you can now pay to extend the coverage indefinitely after the standard period, according to an Apple Store employee when I got a new iPad Pro recently.
Apple does offer this service, essentially. The $99 AppleCare+ offering will replace the phone or repair it (for $49/incident) within two years of purchase.
They are not selling Applecare plus in my EU home country yet, and it's not available for laptops anyway. Regular Applecare does not cover accidental damage.
They do, it's called AppleCare and you would be nuts not to get it. Just factor it in for the price of the Macbook you want before budgeting and purchasing.
Water damage isn’t covered by Apple’s warranty. You can pay extra for AppleCare+, which covers accidental damage; however, you can do the same for just about any phone, and have been able to do so for years.
The article misses the point of insurance (which AppleCare actually isn’t technically). AppleCare is an extend warranty program which includes accidental damage coverage. There is a manufacturer/ customer relationship component here that the author might be overlooking.
Those expensive but cosmetic fixes aren’t the kind of thing you use insurance for generally. If you are Apple you might be happy to keep your customers on the latest OEM accessories and machines in good repair. Profit on the plan isn’t the only reason to offer AppleCare. Keeping consumers buying the next greatest Apple device might be part of how Apple value AppleCare. Apple may be designing the coverage to be used as the author is using it in which case makes the plan less profitable than we all might imagine. However the overall customer lifetime value benefit to Apple is probably still positive.
Even more fun, AppleCare is $499 at checkout; and comes with a $299 service fee per incident.
Guess how much a cover glass repair costs without AppleCare? To cite yourself... $800.
You literally save... nothing. It's like insurance that pays out your own deductible dollar-for-dollar. Maybe you save $1, depending on where you ask. You really only save money on the second accidental crack. But not the third, because AppleCare only covers 2 accidents.
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