Quote:
Originally Posted by nursemm05
actually that is not totally correct. At best buy AND at sprint if you are eligible for the upgrade discount you get that. this is an additional rebate offered by sprint. This has nothing to do with your upgrade discount which is taken off at the register.
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It's a little hard to compare BB and Sprint, now that I'm looking at their prices in my zip code. According to the online info at Best Buy, the original phone is $400, but that's when you buy it with a new contract (or upgrade), then on top of this you get an additional $100 "instant savings." At Sprint, the "regular price" (presumably what you'd pay without contract renewal), is $580, then there's a $180 "instant savings" which is presumably what they give you for your contract renewal (or new contract), making it the same $400 as the BB price, then finally you get $100 but in a mail-in rebate.
So essentially it is the same - $400 base (with new contract or renewal) and then an additional $100 which BB gives you instantly but Sprint makes you send in a form for and wait 8 weeks. For whatever reason, Sprint decided to provide the discount for Best Buy up front. Could be something Best Buy demanded, or could be they just agreed that BB's clientelle wouldn't pay $400 for a phone out of pocket, who knows. To be honest I think it's partially Sprint's own fault that this confusion, but they may have decided for BB they had no choice as they don't have the money to have Sprint stores in many of the locations that BB stores are in. But it seems like they are also "punishing" people who buy phones through their own stores or website by making them wait for this money. They are probably hoping that a decent segment of the purchasers will just forget to mail it in or will misplace it and then forget, etc. This is a big part of how the whole mail-in-rebate thing is constructed and to me it verges on the scammy side.
Anyway, I think basically the person who posted initially was trying to get an additional $100 off as a mail-in rebate from Sprint in ADDITION to the $100 that they already got off the phone from BB. One could argue that it's justified because Sprint is getting to bilk others out of the supposed rebate (hoping they'll forget to send the form in in time), but ethically that doesn't come out right, that's all I wanted to say. People need to make their own judgements about this stuff, but I also find it a bit odd to be discussing HOW to do it mos effectively so openly since it's I'm sure technically unethical if not "illegal."