After Apple shuttered its physical stores outside of China amid the spread of the coronavirus around the world, the tech company is capping purchases of iPhones in its eCommerce shops in multiple countries to two handsets per person, Reuters reported.
In many nations, Apple’s website reportedly shows a drop-down menu that limits shoppers from purchasing more than two of the same models of the smartphone. The company last took this measure in 2007, when the iPhone first debuted, to prevent buyers from reselling the products.
A message is shown above iPhone listings telling shoppers that transactions would be capped at two iPhones per order in Singapore, mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.
Nicole Peng, who monitors the smartphone space at Canalys, indicated that the tech company is probably restricting orders to make sure scalpers don’t hoard devices and sell them again on the “grey market.”
“This happened in the past in Asia, when there was a new iPhone launch and scalpers saw an opportunity to sell to mainland China, where the new phones were harder to buy at the time,” Peng explained.
Since emerging in December in China, the coronavirus has arrived in 178 nations, killing roughly 10,000 around the world and infecting more than 240,000.
Earlier this month, Apple announced it was calling off its Today at Apple events because of COVID-19 concerns. The tech firm said at the time, “As a precautionary measure, we are temporarily pausing Today at Apple programming. Please check back for updates.”
The move impacted all locations in the United States, Canada, Mexico and Brazil. As previously noted, Apple has been bringing about new safety and health standards at its locations and has been calling off events as the COVID-19 situation grows and evolves.
The tech company had also reportedly re-opened its stores in China after it had to close them due to the coronavirus’ spread.
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