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Total Equipment Coverage- Worth it?

I will have to blog about my dissatisfaction for the Total Equipment Coverage plan provided by Asurion, in order to help others make a more informed decision.

The monthly Verizon billing I chose was $9 a month. That is $108/year. However, the TEC plan gives a range for a deductible if you make a claim for damages, $49-$199. This means your total replacement cost for any damages, like a screen, will be $308 for an iPhone 6s for the year. I do not believe this is competitive with Apple. (Lesson learned)

For example, if you purchase Apple Care for your new phone, it will be $129 for 2 years. The deductible for Apple is $99 on the iPhone 6s. So if you damage your phone in the first year, that is an initial cost of $163.5 (in order to compare apples to Apples).

Asurion is not the better choice for "Total Equipment Coverage".

Unsatisfied Customer,

Rob

Comments

rcschnoor

Whether or not Assurion is the better choice certainly depends. If you LOSE your phone, you will have the SAME deductible with Assurion as if you break the phone. With AppleCare, you would have to purchase a new phone at the full retail cost starting at $650 since AppleCare does not include coverage for loss/theft. (THAT is comparing apples to Apples.)

Make sure to include that in your blog.

deloused

That's very true, while insurance/extended warranty options can be beneficial in some situations, some are more effective than others. While apple charges tax in addition to the $99 fee I wouldn't think it's too significant to affect the overall price much.

One note on situations where there's a loss or theft of a device, is where the insurance provision of the total equipment coverage is better, since the deductible of $199 would apply to replace the device, whereas AppleCare does not cover loss/theft so the replacement would cost around $900 to purchase a new iPhone and AppleCare plan depending which model chosen.

Some people tend to have bad luck when it comes to damaging or losing phones multiple times it seems, so the coverage options can certainly come in handy. Personally I've never puchased AppleCare, or Insurance coverage since there's a 1 year manufacturer warranty anyway, so I take the gamble, keep a spare and try to be careful. I have broke only one over the years, and haven't lost one, and have had 2 replaced for free due to manufacturer/technical defects under the warranty. I did have an Apple product experience a defect after 2 years, and paid a non warranty repair fee at the Apple Store, so I was glad I hadn't paid for AppleCare at purchase since it would have been a waste and expired anyway, and insurance would have been more expensive.

Most phones that have a defect occur within the 1st year anyway which is covered for free, so unless damage occurs AppleCare isn't worth the investment.

Another option for just an extended warranty/replacement would be to have 'partial' instead of total equipment coverage thru Verizon with the $3/monthly extended warranty, costing $72 for 24 months, which would be cheaper than AppleCare, no warranty replacement and you can keep that coverage as long as you pay for it whereas AppleCare is only good for a max of 2 years.

Salisbury

rukrranch, a lot of your major credit cards will pick-up the 2nd year Apple Care automatically for free, now I think you may have had to purchase the iPhone with the card.

Also a lot of credit cards with provide free iPhone insurance of up to $600 with only a $25 dollar deductible provided you use the card to pay your Verizon bill.

So you may want to check out some of these options, quite easy to do with an internet search.

imc2

Like the old man used to say..."figures don't lie, but liars sho' do figure"!

(you can make the numbers say anything you want- in your favor. The decision of what is "better" comes down to what works for YOU)

leytonlady

Also, supposedly it covers "post warranty defects" but apparently that doesn't include software defects, only hardware defects. My camera app that came with my phone suddenly won't work as it thinks another app is using it (not), and they claim that it's not covered. I'm not happy at all with this supposed "total" coverage.

[Deleted User]

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