Motorola Trials Rental Service With Moto X
Motorolla's limited offerMotorola's new 'try before you buy' service for the Moto X has finished 24 hours after launch.
After a weekend of speculation, Android Police spotted that the manufacturer launched the offer yesterday morning. Motorola offered US customers the opportunity to 'borrow' a contract-free Moto X for two weeks for $0.01. Customers could even personalise their Moto X via the Moto Maker site as if they're were buying one outright.
Once the two weeks is up, the customer can either buy the phone for or return it via a pre-printed postal label. It's not clear how many promo codes were available or used, but I'm waiting for a response from Motorola.
Renting a phone for a short period of time seems like the natural conclusion for smartphones as they become more disposable. As the price war intensifies and as the handsets become more sophisticated, it seems appropriate that manufacturers would offer customers the opportunity to rent their latest tech before they purchase it.
Smartphone rental isn't, however, a new concept. Vodafone offered a similar service in 2011 called 'Red Hot', which let Vodafone customers rent the latest piece of kit for a year or the length of their contract. The idea was to allow customers to keep on top of the yearly launches and stay ahead of the trend. But it ultimately it didn't prove to be that popular because of expensive tariffs and restrictions on what you could do with the phone.
O2 also trialled something similar in 2011, but in many cases the lease programme would end up costing much more than the actual handset, which you would eventually have to give back. There were also reports of hefty damage charges being levied on customers at the end of their lease agreement.
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