Ask Slashdot: Best Protection Plan For Your Phone? 225
First time accepted submitter nastav writes "Now that I'm eagerly awaiting the delivery of my new shiny iPhone 5, I'm faced with a dilemma — SquareTrade, Applecare Plus, or some other insurance option? I have used SquareTrade in the past for my iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4 (I skipped iPhone 4S). It provided Accidental Damage Handling (ADH) for the iPhone before Apple introduced its own version of ADH. I've had the opportunity to file claims with SquareTrade multiple times, and they handled it quickly and professionally each time. Now that there is a product from Apple itself, I'm not sure which one to get. They are priced similarly (~$100 for a two-year plan, $50 deductible for each ADH incident) Apple limits the number of ADH claims to two, whereas SquareTrade (AFAIK) limits the number of claims to the 'value of the product,' which translates to approx. 600 USD in coverage (or about 4 ADH claims). I've tried reading many comparison articles on the internet without definitive answers. I'm hoping that the tech-savvy folks on Slashdot would help out with a discussion on pros and cons of each, and perhaps add other options into the mix."
take the risk and Genius Bar (Score:5, Interesting)
$199 if you bring them a damaged iphone that was your fault and they will replace it on the spot.
I'll take the possible risk of paying some money over paying up front in case of an accident any day
Re:Save your money (Score:4, Interesting)
This. I've never broken a phone, even though I've never used cases or screen protectors, so while I can't be bothered to work out exactly how much I might have saved by not insuring them over the years, I'm pretty sure that even if my luck changes for the worse, I'll have to write off a fair few before I come out negative
If you need to insure it, you need a cheaper phone (Score:5, Interesting)
Insurance makes a degree of sense(as hard as insurers try to change this) when dealing with situations where risk is either inevitable(ie. your body, with all its potential for horrible and expensive mishaps, comes standard and you'll need one until you die) or a fairly large chunk of your net worth(most homeowning, say) or where your potential to hurt others potentially far exceeds your personal ability to compensate them and insurance is therefore mandated(car insurance on the consumer level, potentially various other flavors among venue operators and the like).
On cheap consumer devices, it just doesn't make much sense. The insurer has to make a profit in order to continue offering the insurance, so you know that(on average) purchasing the insurance is a bad deal compared to self-insuring, and you also know that the potential costs are bounded(ie. there is nothing that could happen to my cellphone that could possibly cost more than a new cellphone. There are plenty of diseases and/or accidents that could happen at any time that could run into an unpredictable but very large number that I don't even necessarily have a good way of estimating).
Just put the price of the insurance wherever you usually put money for storage, let the warranty handle any material defects/abnormal failures, and maybe buy a case if you are a bit of klutz. Unless you murder your phone both brutally and swiftly, you'll probably be able to get a refurb for the money you saved by not buying insurance, plus the deductable you would have paid, by the time your phone eventually does bite it. Worst case, a used or refurbed iphone 4/4S will cost peanuts if you kill your present one and really can't afford a replacement.
Given that, on average, buyers of insurance lose money, you should really only be buying it on things that are at the outer envelope of affordability; but that you must have for one reason or another.
Re:take the risk and Genius Bar (Score:4, Interesting)
The mobile phone situation in North America boggles the mind. I'm on an "unlimited" contract (voice, texts, data though throttled after 3GB) for $20/month. that includes free international calls to 100 countries, and 10 countries' mobiles.