It appears Apple’s vaunted supply chain may have some kinks in it — at least for Australian users. After pre-ordering the iPhone 4S on Oct. 7, Apple fans in that country may have to wait two weeks for delivery, reports said Friday. Seems Apple gave U.S. and European iPhone 4S pre-orders delivery priority.
Even though Australian consumers are able to walk into a retail location and buy an iPhone 4S, those who took the trouble to pre-order their device, presuming they would be at the head of the line for deliveries, received instead a rude awakening. While American and European pre-orders had an Oct. 14 delivery date, Australian pre-orders have an Oct. 14 shipping date.
It doesn’t make much sense geographically, either. Australia, in the Southern Hemisphere is physically closer to the China-based Foxconn, Apple’s iPhone supplier. Yet U.S. and European customers have faster deliver times. It must seem like salt added to the wound, seeing that Aussies pay a premium for the iPhone.
At least they are not in New Zealand’s position. Kiwis who pre-ordered the iPhone 4S won’t get the handset until around Christmas, reports say.
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
