Asurion Cell / Mobile Phone Insurance . . .
Did you know that, if you’ve dropped your iPhone in water, you might be able to save it by putting it in a plastic baggie with rice in it? That was a tip mentioned during a Twitter chat I was a part of last week. I was shocked to see just how many people commented that they’ve used or need to use this tip due to recent liquid damage. Seems most don’t have cell phone insurance.
Mobile phones have become an important part of our day-to-day lives. They’re how we stay connected and how we check to make sure our loved ones are okay. We don’t just use them as phones though. Many store their precious vacation photos, family videos, finances, documents, passwords, and more on them. Whenever my husband, daughter, or I can’t find our phones, we basically freak out until we find it. Sadly, summertime is when most phone mishaps happen!
When buying a new mobile phone, most people will sign up for a two-year service contract to get the phone at a discounted price. A factory warranty is included but this only covers hardware problems or if the item is defective. Cracked screen? Too bad. Dropped in the toilet? Bummer. Stolen? Just another case of Apple-picking. Not much you can do except suck it up and dish out 2-3 times the original amount to get a replacement. Unless you have Asurion.
Asurion operates across three continents and provides cell phone insurance. You pay a monthly premium (basic is around $5-$7) to help offset the cost if anything were to happen to your device. Under their comprehensive coverage, ‘anything’ would refer to the phone being lost, stolen, damaged, or if it malfunctions. The deductible is based on the type of phone and a replacement will generally arrive the next day.
Is insurance really necessary? Just like any other insurance, it seems like the times you don’t have it is when somthing unfortunate happens and you really needed it. I’ve been noticing more and more people walking around with phones with cracked screens or damaged casings. If you have kids you know that, if it’s not beat up somehow, phones often get misplaced or left in various places.
According to 2012 claims data from Asurion 35% of phones are lost or stolen, 57% are damaged, and 8% malfunction. Those are sobering stats when you consider how much it’d be to replace a new Samsung Galaxy S4 or iPhone 5. Whenever I even handle such phones, I treat them like fine China so as not to leave a scratch or even a smudge on them!
An even better example is one that happened a while ago. I had a friend over to cut my hair. While she was doing so, she received a call from her husband. He had accidentally left his phone somewhere at work (again) and somebody swiped it. Since it was an iPhone, he asked his wife to help track it. The rest of the afternoon was dedicated to finding the phone and trying to retrieve it. Even if they could get an address to the police, there wasn’t too much they could do to prove it was stolen.
What happened? Nothing. They were without a phone and had to get a replacement at a hefty cost. Having Asurion would have been so helpful for them at that time. They could have filed a claim before 11:00pm and gotten a new phone right away, without the headache and at a huge saving.
Before anything happens to your phone(s), you might want to check out Asurion. They have an A+ rating with the BBB and average 4.5 out of 5 stars when it comes ot their post-claim customer rating. Before researching for this post, I didn’t even know standalone cell phone insurance existed. Now that I do, it seems like the only way to go if you invest in any new phone!
This post was created in partnership with Asurion, but all thoughts are my own.
