On Nov 28, 2005, at 9:25 AM, Nathaniel Lindley wrote:
Our district is reviewing our policy of purchasing Applecare on all
Apple computer purchases. Are we overspending? Ran some numbers and
if we purchased 1000 iBooks and didn't buy Applecare but instead added
a 10% charge on the purchase for repair use, we would save approx.
$88,000. There is a lot to be said to the convenience and speed of
Apple's warranty repairs though. Apple service has almost always been
very satisfactory when repairs were needed.
I'm just curious to hear what other districts are doing.
We just stopped purchasing AppleCare plans, but we use almost
entirely desktops and we're self-servicing so we only have to pay for
parts. Regardless, self-servicing isn't as valuable for portables
because the piecemeal prices for major parts are absurd compared to
the flat price for a mail-in repair. "No AppleCare" doesn't mean
"self-servicing" though. You can still get repairs from Apple, and it
should take the same amount of time regardless of whether the
computer is in warranty; the only difference is you have to pay.
Administrative hassles like PO approval could slow things down before
the repair actually begins, unless you've got a purchasing card you
can use.
AppleCare works out to be pretty expensive on mass purchases. It's
like any other insurance. Someone's making money off it, so if you've
got enough time/items for probability to matter you should save money
paying as you go. A flat-rate repair for an iBook is about $300.
Individual ed. pricing for iBook AppleCare is about $200, though I
assume you get a better deal. Even at $100/unit you'd need one third
of your iBooks to require a repair _after the first year_ to break
even. It's important to remember that you get a 1-year warranty just
by purchasing the computer.
Also, AppleCare doesn't cover accidental damage. If a substantial
number of your repairs will be due to drops, liquid spills, etc then
you get even less benefit.
You can't really predict future reliability, but I'd count up your
past repairs, minus ones in the first year of ownership and those you
had to pay for due to accidental damage, and just run the numbers.
Apple's flat-rate repair charge makes it pretty easy to do this.
Matt
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