Apple fans eager to get their hands on the new iPhone 5 will be better off waiting for the device to be officially launched in SA - an imminent occasion - rather than purchase it through unofficial resellers at inflated prices and without Apple's official warranty.
This warning comes from Core Group, value-added distributor for Apple in SA, on the back of a smartphone consumer rush ahead of the official local release of Apple's sixth-generation smartphone.
iPhone 5s have started streaming into the country via a number of grey channels that are selling the device at an entry-level price of between R11 000 and R12 000. Among others, The Notebook Company, TikTok Distribution, iGear, Smokoo.com and CA Cell are advertising the phone, which goes for about R11 900 for the 16GB range, to about R14 000 for the 64GB version.
Precarious purchase
Core Group executive director RJ van Spaandonk says buying the iPhone 5 from any source other than the only three official South African distributors - Vodacom, MTN and Cell C - is dodgy.
Apart from the inflated prices, says Van Spaandonk, devices brought into the country (probably via people paid to queue at stores overseas and bring them to SA) do not have an Apple warranty and are probably not approved by the Independent Communications Authority of SA.
While this practice of grey imports is legal, he says - products must be conspicuously marked with a disclosure that they were not bought via an official distributor and as such the customer cannot be entitled to a warranty.
Barry le Roux, founder of high-end consumer electronics company TikTok Distribution, which has received its first shipment and supplied pre-order clients with iPhone 5s already, says the company offers a 12-month "complete warranty" on all products sold.
"Our warranty covers the consumer for 12 months against manufacturer defects in materials and/or workmanship. Standard exclusions apply, such as accidental damage, misuse, improper care, abuse or unauthorised modifications/tampering."
But Van Spaandonk says returns are often rejected by the seller as having been damaged by the customer. "What we have seen most often is that when a customer goes to them and says their iPad or iPhone is faulty, the reseller tells them they dropped it. Everyone at some point or another will drop their device and getting scratches on it is inevitable."
Reasonable pricing
Le Roux admits the iPhone 5s price tag is currently "heavily inflated". He says this is due to the supply/demand imbalance in the market. He says prices will "definitely start to soften" within the next three to four weeks, however. "We expect pricing to come down by about 10% to 15%."
Van Spaandonk says, relative to an entry-level iPhone 4S that costs R7 999 through Cell C (the only operator currently offering the phone on a cash price), a price tag in the region of R8 500 for the new iPhone would be more reasonable.
He says R11 000 is too much to pay, and South Africans are far better off waiting and dealing with regular channels - in this case carriers - when the product is officially launched.
World Wide Worx MD Arthur Goldstuck says the iPhone 5 will "almost certainly" be launched in SA by the end of the month, just in time for the holiday season.
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