Discount? What discount?
November 1st, 2006 by ktula
One of the advantages of working in a large corporation is the discounts one gets on products and services. The firm that i am working for has negotiated discounts with several wireless providers, including Cingular. From the Cingular web page created exclusively to describe its discount program for the employees of this firm:
- 50% off Phones
- More than 20% off Service Plans
- $25 off new orders
- 30-day, Risk-Free Trial
- and more…
It seems like a really really great deal right? Or is it?
To see how good of a corporate discount Cingular is offering, i select the Sony Ericsson W810i phone on both the corporate site and the normal consumer site.
Corporate price:
Personal price:
Both prices require a new activation and a 2-year contract. So after a 50% “Company Discount” and a $70.01 “Web discount”, the final corporate price comes up to be exactly the same as the one for a non-business consumer - $149.99. Notice Cingular is taking a 50% “Company Discount” off an inflated “Base Price” of $439.99, instead of $349.99 as seen by a non-business consumer.
According to Cingular, “Base Price” is the standard business customer price for a Cingular device and does not reflect any promotions or discounts currently in effect. In another word, the “Base Price” is how much one will have to pay Cingular to get the same phone without any contract or new activation. The last time i checked, while i was at a Cingular store more than 2 months ago, the retail price for the Sony Ericsson W810i was $349.99. So why is Cingular using a “Base Price” of $439.99 instead of $349.99 for its corporate customers and why is the “standard business price” significantly more than the retail consumer price? If one is to use the actual retail price as the “Base Price”, then the corporate price comes up to be $104.99 instead of $149.99.
At the “About Us” page for Cingular, one of the five values that guides Cingular is Integrity. Cingular describes its Integrity as: We operate with unyielding integrity, obeying all laws and adhering to a stringent code of business conduct. We will not tolerate unethical business conduct by our team members..
Is it ethical to use an inflated “Base Price” as a starting point of discount for its corporate customers?
Cingular is definitely “raising the bar”, that is, in raising its pricing scheme for the corporate customers.
If you still want to get a good deal out of your corporate discount, get the phone elsewhere. Currently, the Sony Ericsson W810i is literally free at amazon.com, and after the $70 mail-in rebate, you actually come up on top with $20, minus any local tax that you may have to pay. After getting the phone, contact Cingular and have them apply the 20% or so corporate discount to your monthly service plan.
John
Says
Yeah, I noticed that too when I was doing comparison shopping when I was switching from CingularATT SIM registration to Cingular SIM registration. It is pretty awful. But not all phones are like that. A very few cheap phones actually come out cheaper at the corporate site, but usually by about $20. In those cases, those phones are not cheaper because of the discount, but rather the special offer of additional instant rebate.
Additionally, if you continue to monitor their site, sometimes the corporate site will provide a cheaper phone for the higher end models, but they will be out of stock when you try to add it to your cart. But if you go to the regular consumer site, that exact same phone is still in stock! Now explain that one to me.
I was going to blog about this unfair practice, which I thought might be prosecutable by the FTC, but I ended up forgetting about it and blogging about something else. And because of that, I decided to wait for months until I can get my hands on a low end model that is cheaper by $20. Because all I really wanted was the Cingular SIM card for the Cingular plan and nothing more.
Raising the bar… What a joke.
Nov 1st, 2006 at 14:35