Asurion

As savvy customers have learned that replacing a lost, stolen or broken iPhone at unsubsidized prices can run as high as $749, many customers choose to protect their investment with an iPhone insurance policy or extended warranty. In the past, we've warned our readers many times about buying overpriced iPhone insurance and extended warranty coverage from their wireless provider. The options offered by AT&T (AT&T Mobile Protect) and Verizon (Verizon Total Equipment Coverage), which are provided by a third party company named Asurion, were traditionally overpriced and offered poor value compared to independent iPhone insurance and warranty providers.

As the iPhone 4S arrives in customers hands today, we thought it was time for an update. For one thing, the information we provided previously is out of date. As independent providers such as Worth Avenue Group and SquareTrade have grown rapidly over the past few years, and as these companies have continued to receive excellent approval ratings from customers and consumer advocacy agencies such as the Better Business Bureau (BBB), the major providers have taken notice and made their coverage options more competitive. Apple has even gotten in on the game with their new AppleCare+, which adds accidental damage protection to existing AppleCare coverage.

If you're a regular iPhoneFAQ reader, this won't be the first time you've heard us advise you against buying iPhone or other mobile phone insurance through your wireless provider. When AT&T began offering iPhone insurance, we demonstrated how overpriced and undervalued their policy offerings were, hopefully saving many of you a great deal of money and frustration. Since the Verizon iPhone was announced, we've been waiting to find out what Verizon was going to step up to the plate with on the insurance front, hoping we'd be impressed. Unsurprisingly enough, we're not.

Hoping for anything else was sort of pointless given that Verizon and AT&T both offer insurance through the same third party company, Asurion. While the coverage that Asurion offers is excellent, the pricing is anything but. So, even though the same wizard is behind the curtain at both AT&T and Verizon and not ignoring the fact that replacement costs to the consumer are roughly $50 higher with the CDMA iPhone, we were hoping we'd see Verizon pushing aggressive pricing for insurance to give AT&T iPhone owners more reasons to switch.

Though it hasn't yet been announced by Verizon, details of insurance options that will be available to Verizon iPhone owners are now available through Asurion's web site. Asurion is the third-party company that backs the mobile phone insurance Verizon combines with it's extended device warranty and markets to customers as Verizon TEC (Total Equipment Coverage). Although Verizon customers that own smartphones similar in price to the Verizon iPhone insure and protect their devices for $7.99 a month, at $10.99 a month, iPhone owners aren't so lucky.

That is, if you consider $7.99 per month for insurance that comes with high deductibles "lucky" in the first place. From a deductible perspective, things are even worse for Verizon iPhone owners than they are when considering the monthly fee hike. Should you opt for Verizon / Asurion's TEC coverage on your Verizon iPhone, expect to pay a whopping $199 deductible in the event that you do need to file a claim.