Apple fans in the UAE need not despair for the country not being in the list of the handful of countries set to see the new iPhone 5s and the iPhone 5c release this Friday.
For, online retailers are promising a Day 1 delivery to those willing to shell out a hefty premium for the newest smartphones from Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL).
The Cupertino-based Apple has listed just 11 countries for the initial release of the iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c on Friday, September 20. They include US, Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Puerto Rico, Singapore and the UK, with customers there allowed to pre-order their iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c beginning last Friday (September 13).
Apple enthusiasts who don’t mind spending a small fortune can have the ‘gold’ iPhone 5s for Dh6,000 on Friday itself, if they pre-order it right now at iphone5-dubai.com. An 800 number is listed on the website, as is a local (du) mobile number.
Emirates 24|7 spoke with a gentleman named ‘Murtada’ on the local du mobile number listed on the website, and he claimed that he can still get us the 16GB gold version of the iPhone 5s if we pay up Dh6,000 for it, after they receive the first shipment.
When queried why the price was so high (as compared to the global price which is expected to be under Dh2,500), he said his firm would be incurring huge costs in shipping the devices on Day 1 (Friday) from Hong Kong, which is among the few countries where the smartphone will be available this weekend.
And if Murtada is to be believed, the device is already seeing massive interest from Apple fans in Dubai and UAE in general. “We’ll be receiving 30-35 pieces, maybe 40 on the first day,” he said. “But we already have orders of much more than that,” he said, not disclosing the total number of pre-orders received so far.
His is not the only firm luring Dubai-based iPhone fans with the pre-order bait. A number of other online and offline retailers are accepting pre-orders for Apple’s latest smartphones. Among them is SouqMobi.com, which is offering the iPhone 5s at Dh4,999 and the iPhone 5c at Dh3,999, after their respective global releases.
Another online retailer is MyGSM.me, which is offering iPhone 5s black (64GB) for Dh5,999, while the iPhone 5c (in multiple colours) is available at Dh2,600 for the 16GB variant and Dh3,200 for the 32GB variant.
Letstango.com, an online deals site, too is accepting ‘pre-orders’ from UAE consumers but does not specify the pricing and only seems to be “registering interest”. A few ads were also spotted on online classifieds site Dubizzle.com but they have been removed now.
So, are you ready to pay a premium for being the ‘exclusive few’ to flaunt Apple’s new toys for a few weeks or are you going to wait for the devices’ UAE launch? Let us know what you think in comments below.
