Apple will begin rolling out an iPhone trade-in program in China in the near future. The option may become available in stores as soon as March 31st, allowing Chinese users to take advantage of the program that has helped boost iPhone sales in several countries already, including the United States, Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, and the Netherlands.
Chinese retail employees will determine the condition of the phone being traded in, and offer Apple Store credit to customers, Bloomberg reports. Devices that are traded in will be sold to Foxconn by Apple. The manufacturing partner will then make any necessary repairs and resell them through its own online outlets:
Under the China program, retail staff at Apple outlets will assess an iPhone’s condition before offering store credit for those originally bought in Greater China, the person said. Foxconn will buy the phone directly without Apple ever taking ownership, according to the person. Foxconn will repair the devices if needed and then sell them through its e-commerce sites eFeihu and FLNet, and through Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.’s Taobao online store, one person said. Foxconn also is in talks to sell the iPhones through physical stores and may take the trade-in program online in the future, the person said.
While Apple is soon launching an Android trade-in program that lets users switching from competing handsets earn money toward their new iPhone by handing over their old device, the China trade-in offer will apply to iPhones only for the time being.
Following China, only a few major markets with Apple Stores, such as Turkey and Brazil, will be left without in-house iPhone trade-in options. Apple’s new retail chief has been focusing on improving the company’s presence in China, with several new Apple Stores opening within the country in recent months.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
And the Chinese will find every possible way to game the system…
This isn’t anything new given that resellers for Apple have been running trade in programmes for quite some time – particularly around the launch of a new iPhone they’ll do trade in’s with the traded in phone to get reconditioned and resold through the one day sales websites. For me I traded in my Lumia 830 (a major purchase regret) and bought an iPhone 6 128GB. I offloaded a lemon and Apple made a sale – both of us came out better off.
Apple trade-in program is not the best place to sell your used iPhone, at least in the United States. There are places like Gazelle.com or CellCashier.com that will offer a much better quote for your used iPhone.