Following a mini competition between the four Apple suppliers selected under the current SUPC framework, XMA has been chosen as the University's appointed supplier for all Apple equipment and services. The deal provides:
AppleCare available as paid for warranty upgrade
It is very important that the University complies with the SUPC framework and only procures via XMA. Procuring from other suppliers puts a large risk on the University.
The official announcement about XMA was sent as part of a UAS Finance Communications email of 2 August 2016 (login required).
"The Purchasing team is committed to delivering value for money purchasing options for the University. The latest initiative is on Apple products (iPhones, Macbooks, iPads etc). Market analysis conducted by the Purchasing team, in collaboration with IT Services, shows that XMA offer the best overall agreement. XMA are part of Westcoast the largest Apple distributor in Europe. All repairs are carried out with brand new stock ordered from Apple’s repair centre and they offer Applecare warranty on iPhone SE,6,6S & 6S Plus. Additionally XMA will offer a trade-in recycle programme for any old Apple hardware. they will collect hardware, securely recycle and then return any residual value to the department, a service that was not offered by any other supplier. Not all users or departments have purchased from XMA before, but the registration process for new users is quick and simple. New users can either register on the XMA portal https://he.xma.co.uk or by emailing ouapple@xma.co.uk. XMA will reply to the email with registration information within two working hours. All departments in the University are strongly encouraged to order their Apple (macOS & iOS) hardware from XMA. If for any reason XMA are not able to accommodate your requirements then please contact Mark Bowen, Director of Purchasing. For more information about the XMA offer, please see the latest Shopping News. That deal will be reviewed in 3 months [from c24/08/16 ...]
Not all users or departments have purchased from XMA before, but the registration process for new users is quick and simple. New users can either register on the XMA portal https://he.xma.co.uk or by emailing ouapple@xma.co.uk. XMA will reply to the email with registration information within two working hours.
All departments in the University are strongly encouraged to order their Apple (macOS & iOS) hardware from XMA. If for any reason XMA are not able to accommodate your requirements then please contact Mark Bowen, Director of Purchasing. For more information about the XMA offer, please see the latest Shopping News.
That deal will be reviewed in 3 months [from c24/08/16 ...]
Feedback, issues or concerns with XMA should be reported directly to Mark Bowen, Director or Purchasing, mark.bowen@admin.ox.ac.uk.
Sales Contact
Higher Education procurement portal https://he.xma.co.uk
Email: ouapple@xma.co.uk
All purchases of Mac hardware via XMA include their own three year hardware warranty.
AppleCare may be purchased optionally. Please note that devices are not automatically enrolled in AppleCare and one has to register the warranty for each device manually using the AppleCare portal.
Quote from XMA regarding adding Mac/iOS devices to a unit's DEP account:
"I can confirm that this won’t be a problem. We can either automatically enroll orders straight into DEP based on your DEP Account Number (we, or OU, can add a line item ‘DEP01’ at £0.00 to the order flag this and initiate the automated process), or we can add manually if requirements will differ by order. We have a strong degree of flexibility so can operate in whichever system is preferable. We are one of the few distributors/resellers to have direct integration between our system and Apple’s so this is a very efficient process."
Chris Hamilton chris.hamilton@xma.co.uk, Internal Account Manager at XMA has been helpful for DEP issues.
For more information on Apple's Device Enrolment Program:
https://www.apple.com/education/docs/DEP_Guide.pdf
http://www.apple.com/education/it/
https://deploy.apple.com/
VPP Credit can be procured from XMA using a Purchase Order.
Units can claim the software licences included with Mac & iOS hardware purchases (Pages, Numbers etc) into a VPP account for distribution. See https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203022. Note that to deploy software to Orchard devices select Managed Distribution as Orchard does not support Redemption Codes.
For more information on Apple's Volume Purchasing Program:
https://volume.itunes.apple.com/gb/store
Should there be any requirement for Apple accessories or other compatible hardware such as docking stations, printers and monitors, please feel free to contact us for any advice.
The EMDS Orchard Team are not responsible for the procurement of any Apple hardware and accessories, this is the responsibility of the unit. We can however assist and provide expertise when it comes to hardware choices and can offer general advice with the purchasing process.
