Insurance Giant Allstate Buys Independent Phone Repair Company, Joins Right To Repair Movement (vice.com) 35
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: Allstate, one of the largest insurance companies in the United States, just made a curious purchase. Through its subsidiary SquareTrade, the insurance giant bought iCracked, one of the largest independent smartphone repair companies in the country. The acquisition means that Allstate has become one of the most powerful proponents of right to repair legislation in the United States. According to Gay Gordon-Byrne, executive director of Repair.org, which is pushing for the legislation, the company has already loaned a lobbyist to the effort in New Hampshire.
This is potentially big news for the right to repair movement, which is trying to get laws passed in 15 states this year that would make it easier for independent repair professionals to get repair tools and parts for consumer electronics. Thus far, it's been largely a grassroots effort from organizations like Repair.org and iFixit. Companies such as Apple, John Deere, Facebook, Microsoft, and trade organizations that represent huge tech companies have used their considerable political power to lobby against these bills. But Allstate's purchase of iCracked is a potential gamechanger. iCracked is a giant chain that does a lot of third party repairs. A change in the laws would benefit it, and now Allstate, as much as the average consumer. "iCracked has been a major supporter of right to repair, and we really appreciate their valuable contribution to the fight for freedom," Kyle Wiens, CEO of iFixit, told Motherboard in an email. "I'm optimistic that this partnership will elevate the visibility of the work that we're doing together."
"SquareTrade continues to work with manufacturers as well as the independent repair community," Jason Siciliano, VP and Global Creative Director of SquareTrade told me in an email. "As this issue evolves, we will maintain good relationships and continue to listen to the key players on all sides of the debate and will work towards sensible solutions whether they are led by the industry or regulators."
This is potentially big news for the right to repair movement, which is trying to get laws passed in 15 states this year that would make it easier for independent repair professionals to get repair tools and parts for consumer electronics. Thus far, it's been largely a grassroots effort from organizations like Repair.org and iFixit. Companies such as Apple, John Deere, Facebook, Microsoft, and trade organizations that represent huge tech companies have used their considerable political power to lobby against these bills. But Allstate's purchase of iCracked is a potential gamechanger. iCracked is a giant chain that does a lot of third party repairs. A change in the laws would benefit it, and now Allstate, as much as the average consumer. "iCracked has been a major supporter of right to repair, and we really appreciate their valuable contribution to the fight for freedom," Kyle Wiens, CEO of iFixit, told Motherboard in an email. "I'm optimistic that this partnership will elevate the visibility of the work that we're doing together."
"SquareTrade continues to work with manufacturers as well as the independent repair community," Jason Siciliano, VP and Global Creative Director of SquareTrade told me in an email. "As this issue evolves, we will maintain good relationships and continue to listen to the key players on all sides of the debate and will work towards sensible solutions whether they are led by the industry or regulators."
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News at 11
They are supporting themselves and as it happens they are supporting tens (or even hundreds) of millions of other people. I don't care if that is a deliberate side effect or not - the enemy of my enemy is my friend. This is big, unexpected, and very welcome news.
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Millions of people ... without anyone pointing a gun at their head, purchase devices that are not repairable.
Most would not know whether something they are buying is respairable or not. You need to be an expert to know. An independent repairer would know this, and I as an amateur, but fairly expert repairer of things, might be able to find out, but most people would only find out when they ask a repair shop if it can be repaired. Eg I once bought a Ryobi garden power tool (never again), and it was only when the ignition coil failed that I discovered that Ryobi spares are unobtainable. So it went to landfill for
I guess... (Score:5, Insightful)
...Allstate got tired of buying people entire new phones when they cracked a screen...
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Yes, but instead of Allstate paying $800 for a new phone which comes out of the warranty profit, they'll pay maybe $100 which will cover in-house repair and shipping.
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They probably replace a lot of phones through theft insurance bundled with other products like renter's insurance, home owner's insurance, auto insurance.
Theft from my vehicle is covered under my auto insurance, and I've known people who had laptops and phones stolen out of a car that they claimed on renter's insurance.
Right now, if the phone is recovered from the police with minor damage, it is still a total loss. If there was a Right to Repair, then most of those would in fact be fixable. Also, even if th
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Re:Hmmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Whether it's by warranty claims or insurance claims, it's cheaper for Allstate to repair a customer's phone than replace it outright. How is this move anything but a good thing for consumers?
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No, nobody forces phone repair companies to fix the phones of people who can't pay for free. And so far nobody prevents competing phone repair companies from forming. Economics may be safe, for now.
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Who cares what Allstate saves or charges? If their lobbying helps in enshrining the right to repair in law, everybody gets better and cheaper access to the materials necessary to repair the products.
Right to Repair bills typically do things like prevent companies from restricting access to repair documentation and replacement parts to "authorized" repair centres, allowing consumers and independent repair shops to get the information and parts needed to repair products.
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It puts Allstate on the same team as the people who didn't but their extended warranty, and just want to fix it themselves.
Those are the people that it helps.
It makes perfect sense (Score:5, Insightful)
Allstate is regularly on the hook for the costs of auto repair. The right to repair would lower those costs significantly.
Re:It makes perfect sense (Score:4, Interesting)
Not just auto repair, they also insure electronics, jewelry etc. wouldn't surprise me if they had a stake in all those phone warranty scams.
gadgets are cheap, car electronics are not (Score:2, Interesting)
They might... but I think its mainly a backdoor to auto or other heavier equipment repair. With makers like tesla not providing any repair info and other manufacturers pushing that route, the writing is on the wall. Much easier to get the public stoked about gadgets and gain some good will.
Only 2 shops in an area being able to replace/reset blown airbags in a new vehicle causing Allstate to total the car isn't much of a motivator since the claimants still get paid.
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They don't have to provide info, they only have to be forced to refrain from taking steps to stop people from repairing.
The nerds can figure out the details when parts are available. Understanding the machines is not the bottleneck.
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When the costs go down, the insurance premiums go down.
When premiums go down, total cashflow goes down.
When total Cashflow goes down, your "float" goes down.
Without "Float" cash, you can't make money investing, which is the primary cashflow generator for an insurance company.
When you don't make bank, you are not in business.
This is not about repairability. This is about market volatility.
Say for example, Ford is allowed to release a self-driving car that is a total blackbox. It's got an electric motor and
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Keep in mind that even with multiple competing vendors, an insurance company still enjoys a considerable advantage in the ability to negotiate discounts for volume. Perhaps Allstate feels they can win there, especially if they buy in to repair organizations.
Where there is only one choice, their ability to avoid being bled dry is limited.
We're in Good Hands (Score:5, Interesting)
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I agree it is good news, but nothing in the reports says what they paid for it. So it doesn't really say much about the strength of their intent.
Not far Enough (Score:3)
would make it easier for independent repair professionals to get repair tools and parts for consumer electronics
(My bold)
That's not enough, although it's a start. These parts need to be available to consumers too.
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If you highlighted the word independent instead of professional, it might have been more obvious how it affects the parts market for consumers.