Gizmodo: store credit

No iTunes Gift Cards For Your $100 'Early iPhone Owners' Store Credit

Charlie White — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 09:07:54 EDT

We bought iPhones here on Day One, and were delighted to see the offer of a $100 store credit from Apple when the company cut the price of that product by $200. But there was a rude awaking here at the Giz when we ordered up some stuff and included a $25 iTunes gift card in the mix. It turns out that Apple is not letting you use these gift cards toward a store credit. Sure, the info about this is buried deep inside the Apple Store's legal mumbo jumbo, but you'd think the company would have made the info more prominent. That's why we're telling you here. Gee thanks, Apple. Read the fine print, everyone. Caveat emptor. [Apple]

Disappearing $100 iPhone Store Credit: The Solution

Jason Chen — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 12:24:44 EDT

Putting aside any complaints about whether or not Apple should have given people that $100 gift certificate, we've been seeing reports of people getting a message that there's $0 balance left on their cards when they go and actually try and use the money. And by reports, we include myself, Jason Chen, because I ran into this problem last night. After reading up on the Apple Support Forums, it seems the solution is to apply for ANOTHER gift card (link), generate a new number, and use that one. We're not sure whether Apple's giving out the same number to multiple people or what, but this seems to work.

While you can't dump your $100 in Apple apology...

Matt Buchanan — Sun, 16 Sep 2007 09:30:29 EDT

While you can't dump your $100 in Apple apology moneys directly into your iTunes account or iTunes electronic gift certificates, you can still hit up the Apple Store (online or B&M) to buy iTunes gift cards if you're insistent on blowing your bucks on tuneage. [TUAW]

How to Claim Your $100 "Early iPhone Owner" Credit

Matt Buchanan — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 10:57:25 EDT

Apple has released the magic three steps it'll take to snag your $100 in store credit, which can be redeemed either at retail locations or the online store. According to our intern Benny, the process actually is as easy as it sounds: Fill in your phone number and your iPhone's serial number; you'll get a text message with an access code; pop in the access code and your phone number again. Bam. You have $100, which you can proceed to give right back to Apple. Update: The fine print says you have to be activated on AT&T, which is why they check your phone number. So if you're planning on jumping countries or carriers via unlocking, get your money first. Update #2: Another look at the fine print shows that the credit can not be applied to an Apple Gift Card, iTunes Store purchase or an iTunes Gift Card. [Apple]

The $100 iPhone Rebate: The What and the Why

Jason Chen — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 17:45:09 EDT

Steve Jobs and Apple announced the $100 Store Credit "rebate" for all iPhone owners that were eager enough to buy an iPhone when it first came out. The early adopters had enough faith in the company to buy early, even though it cost a good $500/$600. It's a great gesture, in theory, but let's analyze why they did this.

Third, even though we are making the right decision to lower the price of iPhone, and even though the technology road is bumpy, we need to do a better job taking care of our early iPhone customers as we aggressively go after new ones with a lower price. Our early customers trusted us, and we must live up to that trust with our actions in moments like these.

Taken at face value, it's a great gesture to the early adopters, without which the iPhone would have tanked at launch. But if we dig a little deeper, we find out that there's not much loss in the decision.

$100 doesn't go a long way in Apple land. It can get you a keyboard and 3/5 of a mouse. It can you get an iPod shuffle and almost an entire set of spare headphones. It will buy you 5/6 of a Bluetooth headset. And this is just the cheapest items. Most people will use this $100 on something more expensive, like a Mac mini or as more of an incentive to buy a MacBook Pro or an iMac. Either way, the money's going back to Apple.

While we're poking around, what's up with the sudden price drop? What other product have you seen that dropped $200, or 1/3 of its price, only two months after it was launched? Did that product do well? Was it because the product was selling so fantastically that the manufacturer needed to drop the price? Probably not.

We're not complaining about "only" being offered $100 in rebate certificates. No, not at all. We think it's a great offer and a great gesture. But whether they did this because they really care about their customers, or they did this because people complained really, really loudly, is known only to Apple.

And for those of you who bought the iPhone on a credit card with price protection, $200 in cash is better than $100 in store credit. And if you're really sneaky, maybe you can get both. Don't tell them we said anything. [Gizmodo]