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I really like Tesco’s 6-month payment options

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I came across this Tesco ad in today’s Times. The retailer is offering a Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 for £398 — but you pay for it over 6 months. That equates to a highly reasonable £66 per month.

I haven’t checked to see what else the company’s offering but it does occur to me that this is an eminently sensible way in which to buy technology.

It you don’t like paying for things in big chunks (eg spunking £400 on a tablet for example) the only other major alternative is to take it with a highly restrictive 24-month contract. That or put it on a credit card — but then that is rather ‘expensive’ psychologically.

I reckon a lot of people would like to buy their iPhones and iPads this way. I wouldn’t mind buying a Google Nexus 7 tablet this way either. At £159 that would be £26.50 a month for 6 months. I would genuinely have two from you right now if that was possible. It’s all about how it looks, how it feels.

Us consumers are silly.

What about you? What do you think?

This could be a smart way for a big retailer like Tesco to get some good custom.

7 COMMENTS

  1. This might work in the UK, but here in Israel they have no chance…

    Assuming I get the device broken or stolen – I will be pissed off to continue paying for it – even though I know I should. People here would simply decide to stop paying or just curse the reseller.

  2. This has been one of the modes for buying such things as phones and, well, just about everything I can think of, here in Finland for certainly the last six years. They take the lump sum and break up into 6, 12, 18 or 24 parts, occasionally you can pick the number of months from a range of 2 to 10. It’s yours at the end. No interest charged. In my student days I got our big chest freezer like this.

  3. I think the £159 model is only available from Google. If you’re getting your Nexus with your cornflakes then you’re looking at the £199 16Gb model.

  4. I just bought the note, was £318 with£ 50 pound cashback so really only 270. 53 quid a month interest free! Can’t complain, took 10 mins to set up the contract 😀

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