Quote:
Originally Posted by ficbot
My Canadian parents got an iPad for my stepfather's birthday. He didn't open it until they were already in Florida for the winter, and now he can't get it registered due to geographical restrictions. They kept getting error messages when they put in their Canadian address and credit card info.
Apparently they even took it to an Apple store, spent over an hour at the genius bar with the store manager and finally heard from someone at Apple Corporate with the final verdict: they cannot register an iTunes account to their Canadian credit card unless they (and the iPad) and physically located in Canada while they do it.
They have asked me to bring the iPad back with me after my visit, and they are giving me their credit card info so I can do it here for them and then send the iPad back with the next person to visit. It doesn't seem like their is any other way around it! I think this is ridiculous. I just cannot believe they are the first people to ever find themselves receiving an iPad while they are not at home. I can't believe there is no way around this. But the word from Apple HQ is clear---you must be physically located in the country of your credit card information during your iTunes registration, or it won't work!
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Easiest workaround:
You can register an US account with any valid US address.
Without entering any credit card infos.
If you want to purchase within this US account, you can use gift cards.
You get those gift cards with only minor uplift via eBay and various webstores.
I'm doing this for years to purchase US content here in Germany. Given the exchange rate, even with the uplift for the gift cards, it's about the same amount, it's usually an earlier release and I've got the English original.
Apple easily could block this. For example, I don't use VPN on my AppleTV. But this seriously would harm their business. Imagine US residents on vacation in Europe...
I've read somewhere, 75% of the US gift cards are sold/used outside of the US.
Later on, he easily can add a 2nd account for his actual Canadian address.
You permanently can switch between numerous accounts.
I'm constantly using a German account and a US one.