Price Drop Europe but not in The UK

[JBourne]

the base model in Holland and other Euro country's dropped €100 which makes the standard model €999

But same model in the UK remains £699

and the mid range is €50 cheaper in Holland and other euro country's

does anyone have an explanation for this?

thank you

 

[Littlehoof]

fingers crossed

hope we get a price drop here on Oz also! ... given how much our AU$ has gone up against the US$ in the last year or so its getting to where its too painful to shop in the aussie apple store :S better to take a holiday over in the US and buy it while you're there lol. Don't know yet tho becoz our store is still down

 

[Greasybaz]

Its just a correction for exchange rates. The base mbp is 1799 euros which by my little vista exchange rate calculator is £1356 compared to the UK price which is £1299. VAT is higher in over there than in the UK which accounts for most of the difference. If you knock of the VAT on both you'll find the new Euro price is currently £34.25 higher than UK before VAT. Why did I work that out? I must be bored.

 

[Greasybaz]

OK sorry. I'm just getting excitable about getting a new mbp. For the baseline macbook you're looking at £38.04 (50.49 euros) more in Euroland before VAT following the price change. So i still say its just to bring prices more in line with the rest of the world. How do you get the euro key to work anyway?

 

[netdog]

Hosed again.

 

[JBourne]

If you look at like this

the price drop in EU country;s gives you a free remote and Dvi cable.

anyone agree?

 

[JBourne]

anyone found out why?

 

[JBourne]

any suggestions?

 

[PowerFullMac]

Because Apple is greedy. They do the same with prices in the US, if you convert the US prices to pounds, you will see how much of a rip-off Apple stuff is in the UK.

 

[tremendous]

I wouldn't put it down to greed...

The bottom Macbook in the US is $1099. At todays exchange rate that is £552. A Macbook from the UK store is £699. However, that is inclusive of VAT. Without VAT (which Apple has no say over) it is £594. If I am correct, Sales Tax (depending on location/state) is added on top of the price. So the real difference is £42 BEFORE sales tax is even added. If you were in Kentucky, for example, and had to pay 6% sales tax, it would take the price to £585. Yes, cheaper than the UK - but then they only pay 6% vs 17.5 in the UK!

Considering how poorly the US$ is doing at the moment, this isn't a massive amount.

 

[robbieduncan]

The USD has been doing very badly against the EUR. But less badly against GBP. So this is a correction for that. If you want the same price drops as Euroland start campaigning to join the Euro...

 

[Queso]

The USD has been doing very badly against the EUR. But less badly against GBP. So this is a correction for that. If you want the same price drops as Euroland start campaigning to join the Euro...

Thank you. Anyone paying attention will have seen that since the start of the US sub-prime crisis the US Dollar has tanked, dragging the banking industry dependent British Pound down with it. And as that money has to go somewhere people have been buying billions upon billions of Euros, since the Eurozone is far less vulnerable to the effects of the credit crunch than either the UK or USA. This has pushed the value of the Euro up to record highs against both Pound and Dollar, and because the Chinese Yuan is linked to the value of the US Dollar it means every product manufactured in China now costs significantly less in Euros than it did this time last year. Apple have therefore corrected their Eurozone pricing to take this into account.

 

[robbieduncan]

Just incase anyone wants something to back this up there is this story published this morning.

Edit to add:

Also check out the graphs (most instructive if zoom is set to Max);

USD value in EUR
USD value in GBP