"Pre-registered" AppleCare --- to whom is it registered?
When I log into my Apple ID on Apple's site here, https://selfsolve.apple.com/GetAgreements.do, I am able to view a complete list of all of my AppleCare registrations. This is very convenient for organizational purposes.
We recently purchased about 20 or so MacBook Airs of a custom configuration from Apple, and they all came "pre-registered." Using Apple's MacBook lookup by serial number here, https://selfsolve.apple.com/agreementWarrantyDynamic.do, I am indeed able to see that the item itself is covered by AppleCare, but there appears to be no name or Apple ID associated with it.
I want these pre-registered AppleCare registrations to appear under my Apple ID for all of my other registrations that didn't come pre-registered (which I needed to register by typing in the AppleCare registration number myself), so that both manually and automatically registered machines appear is one single unified list.
At the end of the day, everything that we need covered is covered. I can see that these pre-registered machines are covered. But how can I retroactively associate the AppleCare registration with an Apple ID of my choosing, or rather, how can I find out to whom the AppleCare is registered?
Yes, I understand that AppleCare is by serial number of the item and that we are covered. But for our own record keeping purposes, it is 10000x easier to simply log in here https://selfsolve.apple.com/GetAgreements.do and see a nice, comprehensive list of all AppleCare agreements. As it is now, we have a rift --- only ones we entered manually appear here. The automatically "pre-registered" ones we have to track elsewhere (right now it's just going into our internal wiki). But this rift, having two instances of the exact same type of information, is very inconvenient.
Solution 1:
Technically, AppleCare plans get registered individually to each equipment record in Apple's database. Similarly, a customer record gets registered to each equipment record and when you log in to Apple's web site, your customer record is polled to determine which equipment records should be presented to you. AppleCare transfers with the hardware, so registering it to a person (or com pay record) would be harder to implement and manage.
You can work through the process by following this guide:
- How to manage your AppleCare agreements - http://support.apple.com/kb/HE50
My experience is this isn't worth your time and that for 20+ machines, you'll want to keep internal records and not rely on Apple's externally facing registration portal. It allows anyone to register a Mac and if someone else mistypes their serial number (and types in your valid serial number), the registration presented at your account for tracking computers could lack that device. It's still covered and internally Apple knows who they sold it to no matter who tries to register that serial number and what Apple ID they use to do so. I just wouldn't want to trust that portal to keep my list in one place.
Apple has business teams in all retail stores and they might be your best way to get detailed instructions and assistance on how to correct any errors in registration and assist you in getting the AppleCare records straight if they don't match your records. The portal for end users doesn't have the tools to make it easy to manage large numbers of computers.
You will also want to look into a self-servicing account and although you might be a little shy of the 50 devices needed, I've seen many organizations set these accounts up with 20 to 30 macs on one order.
- http://www.apple.com/support/programs/ssa/
That program has many benefits other than just the tools to bulk upload and manage AppleCare plans and registration but it's well worth it solely for the purpose you described above. The end user portal at https://selfsolve.apple.com is designed for consumers and ease of re-registering a used / unregistered Mac from a consumer standpoint - not a business that may have several purchases of 20 machines, some with and some without AppleCare so you'll want to look into software designed for business needs (like JAMF's Casper, Apple's JointVenture and SSA Program) and reach out to Apple's Business Staff to keep abreast to changes they may make to the tools going forward if it doesn't make sense to invest in tools like Casper, JV or SSA.