AT&T Nokia Lumia 920 free charging plate offer may have sold out in less than 6 hours
I received a press release for the Lumia 920 pre-order that started just after midnight tonight for only $99.99. I couldn't decide on a color at first so slept on it and this morning I went on and ordered a cyan 920 at the full, non-subsidized price of just $450. AT&T stated they were offering a free wireless charging plate while supplies last and apparently supplies are already OUT! I just wrote yesterday about the Nokia accessory play and it seems the accessories, combined with the low price, may be enough to get people in the store.
UPDATE: It turns out they are NOT out of the charging plates and just had a completely messed up ordering system. If you order now, even paying full price, you will find that the black charging plate is added automatically to your order. My problem is the AT&T system keeps canceling my preorders (tried 3 times now) so I have to call a special number to see if I can get them to accept my money and give me the phone I want. You would think it would be easier than this to support the Windows Phone 8 launch.
From what I could find online (trying to confirm with AT&T), the Nokia wireless charging pad looks to have a cost of around $88 $49 by itself. It was not available anywhere on the AT&T site when I placed my preorder for the 920. I called customer service and they couldn't find it in their system either and there was nothing they could do since it was a limited supply offer. I am testing out a Fatboy pillow charging solution and will now have to pull out my Energizer Qi pad and test it since I apparently missed out on the free wireless charging pad from AT&T.
You may recall that I paid $820 for a 32GB iPhone 5 and when you look at my non-subsidized price of $497 (with taxes) you see that Nokia is pricing their device very competitively to try to gain customers. At $99.99 for a 2-year contract price, I hope Nokia is getting a good carrier subsidy or else they won't make money and will have a tougher time staying competitive. Then again, they need mind share to gain market share so that may be a risk they are willing to take.