Microsoft tempts businesses with new Surface warranty, trade-in programs

In an effort to accelerate enterprise adoption of Windows 10 and Surface Pro 4, Microsoft is enhancing its Surface Enterprise program. The company is launching two new programs aimed at making its tablet more appealing to enterprise users. Beginning early in 2016, Microsoft Complete for Enterprise – a new enterprise warranty and service offering will be available to Surface customers via commercial resellers. The new enterprise warranty offering includes four elements: ability to pool warranty claims by company versus individual devices; allowing for warranty claims against non-bootable devices; next day air in the U.S. for fastest possible device replacement, and a similar rapid replace processing for markets outside the U.S.; and an on-boarding center to ensure a premium experience within the first 30 days for both IT and end users. [caption id=“attachment_502199” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  AFP[/caption] The company is also launching the Business Device Trade-in Program. With 24 hour quotes, prepaid shipping labels and secure data wipe, business customers can trade their used business laptops, tablets, and phones for credit towards the purchase of new Surface devices. This offer will be available in the coming weeks to business customers in the U.S. and Canada, as well as Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. In the coming weeks the offer will also be available in Australia, France, Germany and the UK.   In addition, Microsoft now has more than 5,000 resellers on board across the 30 global markets. In July, the company committed to expanding its sales channel “moving from hundreds of resellers to thousands.” The company also shared: “In a few short months Windows 10 is off to a tremendous start with more than 110 million devices already running Windows 10, and eight million business PCs already running Windows 10.”