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Downloading Amazon Kindle app for iPad2 in Singapore

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Last week I got my brand spanking new iPad 2.

One of the major reasons I wanted this piece of technical indulgence is to use as a e-book reader on the daily commute. 

So after plugging it in for the first time and going through the arduous ceremony of setting it up and doing the software update you can imagine my dismay when I discovered that the Kindle App was not available in the Singapore App Store.

Now I’m already used to the fact that there is no Music or Video content in the Singapore version of iTunes and get by quite happily without it. But disallowing the downloading of a free app is taking it a bit too far.

Fortunately for those in Singapore there is a workaround.

VPost

The first step is to create a VPost account.

For those who don’t know VPost is a service run by Singapore Post that effectively gives you a shipping address in either Japan, Europe or the United States. You can then get online shopping orders delivered to this address and they will forward the items to your Singapore based address.

It’s a great service which has many uses and I thoroughly recommended it to anyone.

Another iTunes Account

Once you’ve got your VPost address in the US you’ll need to create a new iTunes account using your US based address and not linked to your credit card as iTunes validates the billing address of the credit card against the address entered in the sign up form and prevents from signing up if the country is not the same.

The full list of steps are listed on the Apple Support site http://support.apple.com/kb/ht2534.

Downloading the Kindle App

Now that you have your US based iTunes account you can back to your iPad go to Settings > Store then sign-out of your existing account and sign-in using your new account. 

Next up go to the App Store the search for “kindle” and low and behold it should appear and be able to be downloaded.

Because your US account has no payment information tied to it, you’ll need to remember to sign out and sign in using your Singapore based account whenever you want to buy any apps.

Amazon Account

Now that you have the Kindle app you’ll need to create an Amazon account in order to be able to buy books.

It is possible to use your Singapore address for this account, but bear in mind that there are quite a lot of books which are not available in the Asia-Pacific region. So to get around this you can use your US based VPost address and you will get access to all

To get started go to the sign in page and select “No, I am a new customer”.

Conclusion

Despite the hoops you have to jump through to both download the App and then get the content this workaround does make it all possible.

Hope this helps someone.

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