Vodafone's bad handling on the sale of the iPhone 3GS

Vodafone has received criticism from the poor way they’re handling the launch of the iPhone 3GS in New Zealand.

The first mistake they made was the arrogant dismissal of better iPhone price plans across the Tasman when they announced their own plans yesterday. Vodafone spokesperson; Paul Brislen commented that Australia’s better-valued plans were not comparable to theirs which are “fabulous”.

They continued their deluded statement of great plans on Twitter where they replied to a user who complained about their iPhone plans ending with the sentence in bold:
‘Good luck getting more than that.’

That remark was re-broadcast to other Twitter users with the comeback:
‘Must be great having no competition.’

Things began to take a turn for the worse when Kiwis not wishing to subscribe to the expensive plans and choosing to purchase the iPhone without a contract were told on the Vodafone website that they could only do so online and couldn’t walk into a store to get one. This frustrated many, including members of tech forum Geekzone who questioned Vodafone’s archaic decision. This then led to a spiral of poorly constructed public relations spinning which ended up backfiring on them.

Paul explained that too many iPhones were bought without plans and shipped overseas perhaps in attempts to turn a profit. This reason does not hold weight as New Zealand sells contract-less iPhones at a price much higher than what other countries are charging for. He then proceeded to call these people pirates which insinuates that they’re criminals.

Paul then further elaborated that the iPhones sold in New Zealand are very valuable as they’re they only phones in the world (that he knows of) which are unlocked. This is also ridiculous as many Geekzone posters citied the different countries that prohibit phone locking and sold unlocked iPhones, many giving Australia as an example and further explaining that they’re cheaper there as well.

Paul then posted a link that lists the different countries that sold iPhones and their carrier lock status thereby immediately contradicting his previous statement about having limited knowledge of which other countries sold unlocked iPhones and that New Zealand was the only place that sold them. In his attempts to prove that Australia locked their iPhones Paul not only was caught being dishonest, he also failed in reading the column to the right of the “Locked to Carrier” one which read “Carrier offers authorized unlocking”, basically meaning that you could get unlocked iPhones across the Tasman.

The sheer audacity of Vodafone’s ignorance in considering global markets, the lack of unwillingness to listen to the needs of us Kiwis and the brazen bravado of weak excuses and allegations is truly shocking.

Many who are disgusted at Vodafone’s attitude have express their thoughts about moving to Telecom and the yet to be launched 2degrees network in hopes that they will carry the iPhone in the near future while others have resorted to other options such as parallel importers, online auctions or even finding loopholes in Vodafone’s red tape to get Apple’s new smartphone. In our current digital age it is not difficult to use the internet as a resource to obtain anything, most of the times at a cheaper price. This frees us from being badly treated by companies who would take us for fools and sends out the message that we won’t stand for being taken for a ride anymore

The full story of the Vodafone circus can be found here.