I doubt it.
When the VAT dropped to 15% and later returned back to 17.5% Apple adjusted their prices to suit the new VAT levels on all their products.
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Apple TV UK pricing - £99, so $152
- Thread starter srw985
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I doubt it.
When the VAT dropped to 15% and later returned back to 17.5% Apple adjusted their prices to suit the new VAT levels on all their products.
Remember when VAT went down to 15%? They adjusted their prices accordingly.. Then when they released new products during that year, put them back to their original prices that they were (or more) at 17.5%, then when it changed back to 17.5% they put the prices up AGAIN. So Don't expect now to be any different.
This happens every time...
UK "We are being ripped off'
US "You have to add sales tax to our prices"
UK "But that is still a rip off"
Blah blah blah...
Let's compare UK and US prices of Apple products-
MacBook $999 = £849
iMac $1199 = £999
Mac Mini $699 = £649
Mac Pro $2499 = £1999
iPod Shuffle $49 = £99
iPod Nano $149 = £129
iPod Touch $229 = £189
So around 15-25% less in the UK.
Apple TV $99 = £99
Clearly does not fit! Apple TV has a mark up too large to be due to VAT etc, it is the only Apple product I have seen where there is parity between dollar and sterling. Especially insulting as dollar:sterling has been about the same for a year now, yet prices keep going up.
UK "We are being ripped off'
US "You have to add sales tax to our prices"
UK "But that is still a rip off"
Blah blah blah...
Let's compare UK and US prices of Apple products-
MacBook $999 = £849
iMac $1199 = £999
Mac Mini $699 = £649
Mac Pro $2499 = £1999
iPod Shuffle $49 = £99
iPod Nano $149 = £129
iPod Touch $229 = £189
So around 15-25% less in the UK.
Apple TV $99 = £99
Clearly does not fit! Apple TV has a mark up too large to be due to VAT etc, it is the only Apple product I have seen where there is parity between dollar and sterling. Especially insulting as dollar:sterling has been about the same for a year now, yet prices keep going up.
If this came with iPlayer compatibility and the ability to stream avi's I would have one in a heartbeat... But it doesn't so I will pass. (Yes I know I can convert to mp4, but cba 
)
I don't have any issues with the price.
)I don't have any issues with the price.
The same thing has happened with the old AppleTV which is still being sold.
US = $149 - http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB189LL/A?mco=MTg5MTc5OTY
UK = £149 - http://store.apple.com/uk/browse/home/shop_ipod/family/appletv?mco=MTM3NTc4NDk
US = $149 - http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB189LL/A?mco=MTg5MTc5OTY
UK = £149 - http://store.apple.com/uk/browse/home/shop_ipod/family/appletv?mco=MTM3NTc4NDk
I wonder if you would have been quite so philosophical had the position been reversed?
Apple build stores to take money, not for love. They have the option to build them in far cheaper places than Covent Garden but they choose the location. That one will be filled with US tourists wanting to freeload wifi anyway.
Personally I think that Apple build their UK prices to allow for currency exchange. IF we ever get back to £1 = $2 then we will be fine.
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_0_2 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8A400 Safari/6531.22.7)
What about picking one up when next in the US. Would it work?
What we really need to make it useful are apps like airvideo so we can stream anything off a mac.
What about picking one up when next in the US. Would it work?
What we really need to make it useful are apps like airvideo so we can stream anything off a mac.
have you even realised there is no such equivalent mark up on any of their other products?
If they are adding import charges and VAT to make $99 = £99 then why isnt it the same for all their other products.
And $99 is £64. Which means there's an extra £12 on top.
Which is what I said.
I see, you calculated £64 + £23, not £99 - £23.
Anyway, you do know that the term "Apple Tax" was invented and heavily promoted by Microsoft marketing guys, right? "Microsoft Tax" was used as the term where people who wanted to buy a PC to run Linux couldn't buy any computer without Windows, so they had to pay for a Microsoft product that they didn't actually want, due to Microsoft's abuse of its market power. So "Microsoft Tax" was used for having to pay Microsoft without getting any value for it. Call it "Apple profit", but not "Apple Tax". It is not a "tax". You don't have to pay it unless you want to buy an Apple product.
I wonder how many more units they would sell if they had comparative pricing, plus how much more respect they would earn from UK consumers.
If this is a "hobby" product then the price should really be the same to try an encourage more sales, it doesn't take rocket science for anyone to realise $99 doesn't equal £99 it just pisses people off.
Will Apple ever take note..I really wish they would.
If this is a "hobby" product then the price should really be the same to try an encourage more sales, it doesn't take rocket science for anyone to realise $99 doesn't equal £99 it just pisses people off.
Will Apple ever take note..I really wish they would.
Apple did reduce the UK price as well, I think the old model was around £150? Maybe bit more. They just didn't reduce the price enough to keep it inline with the US.
As far as I remember, the price dropped from $299 to $229 in the US in 2008 and there were a lot of complaints around here because there was no price drop in the UK.
I'm a UK resident off for a holiday in the USA in a couple of weeks.
If i buy the US version of Apple TV at a wonderfull $99, will it work in the UK or does it have some reigon coding that will stop me.
I've done this with iPods before but obvisouly this is a different beast.
If i buy the US version of Apple TV at a wonderfull $99, will it work in the UK or does it have some reigon coding that will stop me.
I've done this with iPods before but obvisouly this is a different beast.
It's a standard figure of 8 lead, you might have a spare around the house otherwise get one from Maplin.
... they screwed us over twice?! Dropped US price not UK in 2008 and is still pricing new Apple TV too high compared to UK?!The price of the MacBook has gone up by £100 since I bought mine a year ago, and it was nearly £100 less a year before that. Apple need to take care not to price themselves out of the UK/EU market. People will only buy better products if their increased worth is proportionate to their higher price!
Remember that the GBP has lost 25% of its value against the USD since the beginning of the credit crunch, which explains the MacBook difference.
This TV thing however is simple price gouging. It's fine if they want to do that, I'll just vote with my wallet.
Yeah I don't think I would want Apple TV even at an appropriate price, but still annoyed!
I understand that sterling has weakened, but MacBook price has gone from £699 to £849. Plus the US price dropped by $100 at one point. If Apple price too high they won't sell as many Macs. I haven't noticed an increase in Dell, HP, Acer etc. Besides, Apple products are made in China and sterling:yuan has been stable for 18 months.
I wish they were selling it today, I have to go back to ****** London tomorrow
$110 (with sales tax, roughly) vs £99 would've been so good. 'ho hum, guess I'll be getting it from the uk
$110 (with sales tax, roughly) vs £99 would've been so good. 'ho hum, guess I'll be getting it from the uk
Commodities are still priced in USD though, which affects the manufacturing costs, and there is also always a lag between currency swings and changes in factory gate prices as existing manufacturing contracts have to complete before they are renegotiated to take the swing into account. The GBPUSD rate is far more important than GBPCNY when working these things out.
Mind you, saying that the GBP has lost around 30% against the CNY since mid-2008, which isn't much further back than the 18 months you're talking about.
Obviously USD to more important, but my point is that sterling hasn't collapsed against the dollar OR the yuan, both of which will have an impact on prices since Apple moved production to China. Ok, clearly I didn't go back far enough on yuan, but that change is by no means a disaster.
At the end of the day Apple seems to be blindly pushing up prices, justified by currency fluctuations without realising that they are going to price themselves out of the market. There has not been a big change in the prices of PCs by any of the big players. Dell put up prices by around 10%, and HP made a point of keeping prices the same. In fact the whole technology market has been quite steady, give or take 10%. How can everyone maintain fairly steady prices except Apple, with some products going up 25-30%, especially given its substantial margins?