★ Why Apple Requires a Cellular Account Through a Big Three Carrier to Lease an iPhone

Following up from last week, when I asked : When you lease an iPhone through Apple Upgrade, you need a cellular account on one of the big three U.S. carriers: AT&T, T-Mobile, or Verizon. That kind of stinks, and I’m not quite sure I understand why. You’re leasing the iPhone through Apple and Klarna, not the carrier, so I don’t know why Apple cares. If you know why, shoot me a message and explain it. Is it just a simplistic credit-risk evaluation, where prepaid plan-holders and MVNO users in general are viewed suspiciously? I got a slew of messages about this. Credit-risk assessment is seemingly part of it. There’s a lot of fraud in iPhone purchases specifically and cell phone service generally. The big three carriers do a significant amount of risk assessment before letting you open a new postpaid account; that you have an active account with one of them is a signal that you’re not trying to lease an iPhone using phony credentials in order to sell it. But the bigger reason is the complex nature of the contracts between Apple and each of the big three carriers. A reader who worked on the carrier team at Apple for a long time (but left a few years ago) wrote: In response to your question on why Apple would only offer iPhone on the “Big 3” for the new Upgrade Program: Every year, the Carrier Teams at Apple negotiate a deal/program (hundreds of millions of dollars) with each of those Big 3. In return for those dollars, Apple will make concessions exactly like this (or similar.) This is also why, for example, their logos appear more

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