Microsoft’s Buyback Offer for Lumia 540 Barely Makes Sense

Festive season is on in India and Microsoft has extended its Smart Buyback offer to include Lumia 540 as well. The buyback offer allows perspective buyers to purchase a brand new Microsoft Lumia 540 for a reduced price of ₹7,199 when they trade in (exchange) one of their old smartphones. The phone originally costs ₹11,499 and that makes the reduced price of ₹7,199 look very attractive.

However, sometimes what we see is not entirely true. Microsoft’s official online sales partner – Snapdeal is selling a brand new Lumia 540 for ₹ 7,499 without any sort of buybacks, exchanges or special offers. Similarly, Amazon India is selling the same phone for ₹7,498. I’m not aware about the pricing at Microsoft’s Brick and Mortar stores, but if there is a significant difference, that is already unethical.

Now because Microsoft is already able to sell the Lumia 540 for as low as ₹7,500 via online channels, the buyback/exchange offer is only fetching a value of ₹300 (7500-7200) to the new buyers. Looking at the list of eligible devices for the exchange, I believe any of them can easily fetch the user more than ₹300 when selling them in at a local shop. Even if it doesn’t it is better to retain that device instead of trading it for such a low value. A customer ready to shed out ₹7200 won’t be so bothered paying extra ₹300.

That said, the Lumia 540 is a good device for the price point that it targets and additional goodies such as the ₹3000 cashback via Mobikwik over 12 months make the deal even sweeter.