FAS has revealed the markup of Russian retailers on the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus

For several months, Apple has released its new generation of smartphones, including the Russian market, to the markets of various countries. So far, the opinion of many fans and opponents of Apple products comes down to the idea: "Expensive". And with different sellers, prices on the iPhone are almost the same. Well, why so - tried to explain the FAS. The regulator has been investigating pricing for Apple iPhone 6s and 6s Plus for over a year. Now the FAS staff presented a report on the work done, they write "Vedomosti".

The decision of the Federal Antimonopoly Service says that the retailer’s mark-up on these phone models at the start of sales ranged from 4 to 12.5% ​​and from 5 to 12.5%, respectively, for iPhone 6S and 6S Plus. In the same decision, the FAS found Apple Rus LLC, Apple’s Russian subsidiary, guilty of illegally controlling prices on the iPhone.

The investigation began after the regulator noticed that most of the retailers at the start of sales of the “six” in Russia established and held the same prices: from 56,989 to 56,999 rubles. Then the purchasing prices for the iPhone 6S Plus model with 128 GB of memory ranged from 73,491 to 79,790 rubles, while in retail, the phones were sold at prices ranging from 83,989 to 83,999 rubles.
')
As for the "daughter" of Apple, the FAS found the company guilty of illegal price coordination in early March 2016. As it turned out, Apple Rus recommended that retailers set certain prices for iPhone 5S, 5C, 6 and 6 Plus, 6S and 6S Plus, which was done by partner companies. The cost of Apple Rus phones managed to be coordinated immediately for 16 Russian retailers, including MTS, M.video, Beeline, Eldorado, Euroset, Ozon, Re: Store, Svyaznoy, Megafon, Yulmart, Media Markt, Citylink, Kholodilnik.ru, DNS, Know How, Technosila.

In the FAS, they note that after all the organizations named after the start of sales, the price of various iPhone models differed by no more than 10 rubles. From 2014 to 2016, over 5 million iPhones of different versions of smartphones were sold in Russia.

The regulator was able to prove the fact of price adjustment after studying the correspondence of Apple Rus managers and retailers. So, on July 22, 2015, an email with the text “This is received” was sent from an email with the domain apple.com. The letter was an application with a screenshot of this retailer's website page. On the page there was an announcement of price cuts for the iPhone 6. Plus FAS managed to study another letter, this time from the retail management to Apple. The sender of the letter complained about the pricing of competitors: “Attached is the monitoring of competitor prices. Again, the partners "play up" with prices. At the last meeting, you said that you would chop up such “pranks” at the root, because now you have in your hands a very effective “ax” in the form of supplying a new model. Are your words valid? ”

As for retailers, they claim that the iPhone is a product that is sold with a minimum markup, as a rule - up to 5%. And for this reason, various retailers can not set prices significantly lower than those of competitors. Prices differ little, and we are really talking about dozens of rubles. According to Denis Kuskov, CEO of Telecom Daily, individual retailers are likely to achieve a slightly higher margin than their competitors due to low purchase prices and corresponding agreements with manufacturers. But in general, retailers earn a little by selling these devices. Retailers told Vedomosti that the contract for the supply of Apple smartphones does not contain any pricing requirements.