Major online retailer lets you trade in your old electronics for gift cards

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Amazon is joining a growing number of online retailers who will trade your unwanted electronics for gift cards or cash.

As technology advances at a glaringly fast pace, tech-savvy consumers are updating their devices as often as every six months and in doing so, find themselves with drawers full of 'obsolete' mobile phones, laptops, tablets, MP3 players, cameras and GPS devices.

Amazon's new Electronics Trade-In Store provides consumers with an easy way to swap unused goods for giftcards. Consumers visit http://www.amazon.com/tradein to find out how much their unwanted devices are worth, put them all into one box, print off a shipping label and then wait for their virtual giftcards to arrive in their Amazon account.

Last week American network carrier T-Mobile announced a trade-in program (which is currently limited to mobile phones). American retailer Best Buy started a buy-back service earlier in the year and eBay launched its own electronics recycling project called eBay Instant Sale in October 2010.

"Technology is constantly evolving and newer, better versions of consumer electronics are introduced all the time," says Paul Ryder, vice president of Electronics for Amazon.com.

"We want to give customers the opportunity to get great value from their used electronics. Hundreds of thousands of customers have already received millions of dollars in gift cards from the other products in our program. The Electronics category is a natural extension and we are delighted to offer our customers more trade-in options."

Amazon's Electronics Trade-In Store joins the company’s existing trade-in scheme where customers can swap textbooks, video games and DVDs.

Amazon’s Electronics Trade-In Store will pay consumers up to $402 for a 16GB iPhone 4, $417.25 for a 64GB first generation iPad with 3G, $175 for a Nokia N8, or $90.75 for a Nikon Coolpix S70 digital camera.

http://www.amazon.com/tradein
http://green.ebay.com/instantsale/
https://www.recyclerebates.com/t-mobile