Over the past three days, numerous MacRumors readers have noted that Apple's online store for refurbished products has been completely empty, with the store pages simply noting "Sorry there are no products available, please check back later."
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The outage affects all Mac, iPad, and iPod models, as well as clearance products, and appears to extend to Apple's online stores for every country in which direct sales are available. Individual pages for refurbished models simply list the products as "out of stock".
The reason for the complete absence of any refurbished products through Apple's online store remains unknown, and it is unclear when that status might change. But with the outage now in its third day, increasing numbers of customers hoping to take advantage of discounted pricing are finding themselves out of luck.
We've contacted Apple to inquire about the status of refurbished products, but have yet to receive a response.
Update: A number of MacRumors readers report being able to see stock in the refurbished store, while others viewing the same pages are seeing no results.
Top Rated Comments
Yeah, it's working but it's been changed since last I saw:
http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/specialdeals
...and you're spot on about everything else, concepts yet to be understood in the U.S. As a diabetic in perfect health since 12 - now 35 - I still pay $1k/mo to Blue Cross Blue Shield Excellus and still have to fight them for included coverage as they want to wear you down. I'd take the taxes that go to healthcare, education and other aspects that actually IMPROVE our way of live and make us a better country than this left/right rhetoric that is tearing us apart. God, I want to move back! Adopt me! lol
Then you add the cost of transportation ($8+ per gallon of gas), "free" healthcare, 6 weeks of vacation benefits, etc. I'd say £399 is actually "cheaper" than in the US.
Free to recipient != free of cost
Perhaps, but in all the years I have been looking at the refurb store, I have never seen it out of EVERYTHING at once. That includes Airports, Macs, AppleTVs. It seems unlikely that everything would suddenly be out when that has never happened before. More likely, there is some sort of technical error. Right now, I see nothing in the store, but when I was at an Apple store last night (Burlington, Canada), all of the regular stuff was there. So it is either a location based problem or an intermittent problem or a cookie problem.
Edit: running Safari on MBA