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stephen at melbpc.org.au
stephen at melbpc.org.au
Mon Feb 11 20:44:20 AEDT 2013
"Microsoft, Apple, Adobe summoned by Australia pricing inquiry"
Lower house committee summoned the three firms to explain why Australian
customers paid more for same products
AFP First Published: Mon, Feb 11 2013. 01 52 PM IST
<http://www.livemint.com/Industry/Microsoft-Apple-Adobe-summoned-by-
Australia-pricing-inquir.html>
Sydney: Global technology giants Microsoft, Apple and Adobe were Monday
ordered to appear before a pricing inquiry examining the often-higher
cost of tech goods in Australia compared with other economies.
The lower house committee holding the probe, which was launched last May,
said it had summoned the trio to appear at a public hearing next month to
explain why Australian customers paid more for the same products.
The committee is looking at the impacts of prices charged to Australian
consumers for IT products, it said in a statement.
Australian consumers often pay much higher prices for hardware and
software than people in other countries.
The inquiry was set up to examine claims by consumer advocacy groups of
price discrimination for Australians on technology, with music, games,
software, and gaming and computer hardware costing substantially more
than elsewhere.
According to consumer lobby group Choice, Australians pay on average 73%
more on iTunes downloads than the US, 69% more on computer products and a
staggering 232% more on PC game downloads.
Office software was on average 34% more expensive in Australia when
compared with the US, Choice said in its submission to the inquiry, with
hardware coming in at 41% more expensive.
One software package was Aus$8,665 (US$8,939) more expensive to buy in
Australia than the US a gap that Choice described as particularly
unreasonable.
For this amount, it would be cheaper to employ someone for 46 hours at
the price of $21.30 per hour and fly them to the US and back at your
expensetwice, Choice said.
Choice only did comparisons with the US, not Asia-Pacific economies.
Apple and Microsoft have both made their own submissions to the
committee, arguing that prices differed across jurisdictions due to a
range of factors including freight, local taxes and duties and foreign
exchange rates.
The Australian Information Industry Association, which represents Adobe
and other major ICT firms, has submitted to the committee that the costs
of doing business in Australia are higher than in many other countries..
--
Cheers,
Stephen
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