Ask HN: How to get Apple hardware to remote employees?

3 points·dabeeeenster··4 comments

We need to send Apple laptops to some remote-only employees in regions Apple doesn’t cover (e.g. Bolivia). Has anyone dealt with this and how did you solve it?

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We are fighting through this at the moment, trying to get equipment to new hires in India. There are plenty of authorized resellers there, but for reasons I don’t understand getting wire transfers to them reliably has been not possible. In theory here’s the ideal workflow. This assumes you have an Apple Business Manager account set up.

1) Get reseller ID from the reseller.

2) Add that reseller ID to your Apple Business Account.

3) Ensure that your Apple Business Account is set to auto-assign systems to your MDM.

4) Provide your Apple Business account ID to the reseller when ordering and instruct them to register the purchase with your account. Have them ship the equipment to your employee.

If all of this happens correctly, the machine will register itself with your MDM upon first connection to Wi-Fi during the initial setup wizard, and will configure itself according to your MDM.

Is your issue receiving technical support from Apple in case of a problem, or is your issue physically getting the laptops to Bolivia? I assume Bolivia has post offices and methods of shipment available where you can ship them your laptops, even if it's a little riskier and more inconvenient.

Is it absolutely necessary that they use an apple laptop? Maybe it'd be easier to just send them a PC. If Apple doesn't serve their region, then what's the plan in the inevitable case that the laptop breaks? Ship it to an apple store internationally?

There are Authorized Apple Resellers in almost every country. Either send them to one of those, or buy them a ticket to a nearby country and they bring it back in their carry on.

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