Yesterday, I saw an “auction” on eBay listing all news Macs, laptops and towers alike, for HUGE savings. I checked out the “auction,” and thought it looked too good to be true.
Following the link, from eBay to http://www.applepurchaseprogram.com site provides you with not an “auction”, but a way to opt in on a group purchase of Apple hardware, by providing a US$250 “down payment” to reserve your machine. All the newest powerbooks and G4 towers were there, as well as displays, ipods, etc. The site looks very similar to the Apple Store.
Read More by clicking the link below…
Yesterday, I saw an “auction” on eBay listing all news Macs, laptops and towers alike, for HUGE savings. I checked out the “auction,” and thought it looked too good to be true.
Following the link, from eBay to http://www.applepurchaseprogram.comsite provides you with not an “auction”, but a way to opt in on a group purchase of Apple hardware, by providing a US$250 “down payment” to reserveyour machine. All the newest powerbooks and G4 towers were there, as well as displays, ipods, etc. The site looks very similar to the Apple Store.
I must have lost consciousness, because the next think I knew, I had used myAmerican Express card, through paypal, to drop $250 on a “reservation” fora new dual G4 1.42 tower, for $1598. Upon regaining full consciousness, Iemailed Jason O’Grady and the powerpage staff to ask what they thought aboutthis “deal”. While I was waiting for a response, I called the AppleCorporate, Sales, and Customer Relations divisions, and asked if they hadheard of applepurchaseprogram.com, or the parent company, MarbellaTechnologies, Inc. / Marbella Software, Inc., in Orlando Florida. Apple hadnot, nor had received any previous purchase orders from any of these namesmentioned.
After two instant message sessions with a “sales rep” from this “broker”,I was able to collect “information” from the IM sessions (provided by a linkon their site) such as that Marbella has been around since 1992, and thatthis was the 2nd order they were doing for macs. I also searched google,yahoo and MSN for any of the holding company names. All I turned up was asingle post on yahoo groups from someone who had ORDERED a machine from thisoutfit; there was nothing about receiving it. I did a whois lookup forMarbella and Applepurchaseprogram URLs. The “10-year-old” company has onlyhad a domain registered since this past August, and applepurchaseprogramhas only been reserved since 27 Jan.
I thought I was out $250.
I called applepurchaseprogram and Marbella, and was put directly into theirrespective voice mail. I left messages, of course.
Another call to Apple this morning, and I was told that Apple will not letits hardware be sold for those prices; they are even less than the developerprices, etc.
I received a response from Jason saying “This thing reeksof scam.”
After calling American Express, and finding out that since my payment throughPayPal was accepted and processed, I would have to wait until the end of mycurrent billing cycle to start an investigation. I called PayPal, explainedto them that I was unsure about the validity of this seller, even though theindividual, whose name appears on the whois listing, is PayPal (and ebay)”certified”, that I wanted a refund. I was directed to fill out a claimthrough the PayPal Buyer Dispute form. I did so.
I then received email and a phone call from the owner of record of the abovesites. After a brief and terse phone exchange, he agreed to refund my entire$250.
I was surprised.I was even more surprised when I saw my refund appear in my PayPal account, credited to my credit card, 20 minutes after the phone call.
Just a heads up: if it looks to good to be true, it MIGHT BE. I was lucky, anddid not find out if it was too good, or if it was real, the “hard way”.
CAVEAT EMPTOR.