What’s up with AppleCare in Florida?
Randy pointed us to a story in the
St. Petersburg Times about
Apple’s failure to provide extended warranty coverage (i.e.
AppleCare) to “individual consumers” in Florida where
AppleCare can only be sold to businesses, non-profits
and schools/educational institutions with a valid Tax ID.
Apple says that a complicated set of FL laws - which were intended to protect FL’s senior citizen population from scams - are to blame, buta Florida Office of Insurance Regulation spokesperson says that under Chapter 634 of state statutes all Apple has to do is apply for and obtain a $500 license and meet a few financial requirements.
I’m guessing that’s a gross oversimplification of what is actually required. From what I’ve been told, extended warranties in FL are treated like “insurance” and insurance laws and regulations in FL are the toughest in the country. So I’m going to go out of a limb and say there’s a lot more to it than this article suggests. There are only about a hundred companies total that are licensed to sell extended warranties in Florida. If is was so easy… wouldn’t everyone be doing it?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
tom said 4:15PM on 6-16-2005
"If is was so easy..."
"blame, buta Florida Office"
Hey! What's going on over there?! :-)
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brian said 4:18PM on 6-24-2005
No APP in Wyoming, either. Want proof? Go to the Apple store. Click on any family (i.e. iBook) then 'select' an item. Click 'learn more' under the description for AppleCare Protection Plan. Similarly, Dell's CompleCare is not available in FL or NY.
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Scott said 6:52PM on 7-10-2005
I'm glad I saw that before I bought a new iMac, they seem willing to sell you AppleCare and then tell you they won't honour it.
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Chris K said 4:15PM on 6-16-2005
So Apple is resisting what amounts to a bit of extortion from Florida? Good. Glad to hear other companies aren't bowing to Florida trying to create a revenue stream from retailers, too.
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Jay said 4:15PM on 6-16-2005
I believe it is a little more involved than first mentioned. I live in Florida and frequently work with other statutes than 634. I am NOT an attorney, but Chapter 634.405 appears to require either a deposit of assets or a surely bond, before they could set themselves up to sell warrenties. At Apple's premium $ level in Florida(as little as 2,500 G5s), the bond would amount to $100,000. As mentioned, there is an examination to determine the ability to pay claims, which any reputable company like Apple could meet. One comment about only "100" companies meeting the standards. I have no reason to doubt it's true, but that probably includes all the auto companies and probably most of the huge consumer goods stores like Walmart. Each corporation would count as one. Walmart alone accounts for something like 10-15%(at least) of all US spending). Please correct me if anyone has better numbers, but I wouldn't be surprised if 75% of the $ spent on hard goods (not food, clothing or restaurents) in Florida could be purchased with an extended warrenty. HOWEVER, all that still doesn't explain why Apple hasn't done it. Maybe there is more to it. But Florida is not that consumer unfriendly in my experience.
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Hilton Wolman said 11:15AM on 7-29-2005
Odd. I live in Fort Lauderdale. I recently purchased Applecare for a G5 iMac without a problem, and have had both our iBook and PowerBook repaired under AppleCare extended warranty. The local CompUSA is definately still selling AppleCare.
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Jay said 4:15PM on 6-16-2005
Maybe there's a change in the existing policy? I found out about the problem in Florida after I'd purchased a G5 with Applecare in December. On another site, it was stated that the easiest way to get a refund even if you knew the warrenty would not be honored was to fill out the Applecare papers, send it in, be informed that a non-business was not covered, and then request a refund. As a result, I was in no hurry to send the papers in, but I eventually did. I can't remember how long ago it was, but it should have been enough time since then to have rejected me. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I bought the dual 2.5 with the added complication of water cooling. I've read that's very expensive to fix.
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brian said 4:18PM on 6-24-2005
I recently bought an iMac here in Orlando for my mom who lives in CA, where APP is legal. I got slightly different stories from different employees. One told me I could buy the APP here and as long as my mom registered with her CA address, all would be fine. Another told me that I could only get APP in FL if I made the purchase with a corporate credit card (or business check, I would imagine.) This one also said I could buy the comp here and my mom can get APP for it at an Apple Store in CA (or order online) after the fact. She hasn't done that yet but I'm sure that will work. If it doesn't, I'll go to my store and have them call CA and figure out among themselves how to do it. Once, someone on the phone (when I was calling about APP for the iBook I bought a couple years ago) told me that as long as I *said* I was using it for business purposes they'd honor it. My advice: whatever they tell you about your situation, get it in writing, with names and dates and everything. Otherwise, caveat emptor.
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