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Worst Buy
Cutriss writes "Steve Lynch of Hypothermia has been running a consumer awareness page following of an Internet pricing disagreement between Best Buy and over 2000 angry customers, where Best Buy refused to honor a web-only sale price of a GeForce4 Ti 4600 for $129.99, at a "Special pre-order price". The situation has escalated further - Rod Hill, Store Manager for Best Buy #513 in Tucker/Dekalb County, GA, had a customer arrested on Friday of last week, citing Fraud and Criminal Trespassing. Hill informed police that Abraham Cherian, an Indian American, was trying to rip off the store, the same store that had conceded to give another customer his video card as requested 10 days earlier. Best Buy is now apparently red-flagging inquiring troublemak^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hcustomers who attempt to obtain their purchased cards from Best Buy locations." FWIW, if the description of what happened is accurate, Best Buy has entered into a binding contract to sell the cards at the advertised price, and if they don't want to honor it, the people affected should take them to court (or contact their local Attorney General's office, which is what they appear to be doing). It's Best Buy's obligation to make sure their prices are accurate.
http://www.bestbuy.com/infoCenter/Policies/Deliver y.asp#2
Best Buy may, at its own discretion, limit or cancel quantities purchased per person, per household or per order. These restrictions may include orders placed by the same BestBuy.com account, credit card, and also orders which use the same billing and/or shipping address. Notification will be sent to the e-mail and/or billing address provided should such change occur. We reserve the right to limit the quantities sold, including the right to limit or prohibit sales to dealers.
Prices and availability are subject to change without notice. Errors will be corrected where discovered, and Best Buy reserves the right to revoke any stated offer and to correct any errors, inaccuracies or omissions including after an order has been submitted and whether or not the order has been confirmed and your credit card charged. If your credit card has already been charged for the purchase and your order is cancelled, BestBuy.com will issue a credit to your credit card account in the amount of the charge. Individual bank policies will dictate when this amount is credited to your account.
While Best Buy takes steps to ensure the accuracy and completeness of product and third-party services provided, please refer to the originator of information for details, for example the manufacturer for complete product details.
They seem to do this intentionally. This isn't the first time Best Buy has misguided customers on its website. They purposely mark a product with the wrong price to get everyone's pre-order dollars and then don't ship it and call it a "typo". They then proceed to either refund you or give you a "discounted price" for their "mistake" which is no where near the original price advertised on their website.
It is some kind of cheap ploy to get people to use their website for all of their purchases. This is all to common with e-tailers these days. I for one sincerely hope that Steve and Hypothermia take Best Buy to the cleaners over this one.
Still waiting for mine! ;-)
--
From: onlinestore@bestbuy.com
To: <ajs@ajs.com>
Subject: BestBuy.com Backorder Notice
Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2002 05:32:13 -0600
Message-ID: <EC0250S603avN3qljWw0001d1ed@ec0250s603.xbby.co m>
Dear Aaron Sherman,
Thank you for shopping at BestBuy.com!
Unfortunately, the following item(s) are still unavailable to be shipped, but we hope to be able to ship this item(s) to you soon.
If you prefer to cancel this item from your order, please contact our Customer Care representatives at onlinestore@bestbuy.com or call our Online Store help center toll-free at 1-888-BESTBUY (1-888-237-8289).
We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.
ORDER NUMBER: 213****
Order Date: Feb 6, 2002
Credit Card Used: ****************
Item Description Type Qty Web Price Total Status
VisionTek Xtasy GeForce4 Ti 46 --- 1 $129.99 $129.99 On Backorder
[................] SNIP!
In case you missed it, here is the quote from hypothermia about the original web offer:
Type something, will you? We're paying for this stuff!
You're on crack.
If the price read "129.99" instead of "329.99," that's a typo.
"SPECIAL PRE-ORDER! 129.99 $200 SAVINGS!!" is most obviously not a typo.
In addition, if it's a typo, then you don't honor it. You don't honor it for some people, turn other people away, and have other people arrested for trying to get what they ordered at the price they ordered it at.
I used to work at Incredible Universe, an electronics store where the television department alone was roughly the size of a Best Buy. All the ones that made money were bought out by Fry's, and I was at one of the ones that made money. The way it was always explained to me was that we actually weren't responsible for the physical price tags on the items on the self; people could switch those, alter those, and so forth. We also weren't responsible for misprints or out-of-stocks on the newspaper ads; the ads are run for the whole country, and so long as one of the stores has the item in stock, it's a legal ad and not bait-and-switch. Misprints, of course, are the responsibility of the printer.
So people'd buy an item, take it to the register, and the clerk'd scan the UPC. We were responsible for the price the item scans at the register, and if it was wrong, tough titty, we'd have to sell it anyway. We'd change the price in the system pretty damned fast, but we'd at least have to sell it to that guy.
Actually, the $30 coupon originated from Cheetah Mail, an online direct marketing company. So, now they sold your information to a marketing company as well.
The $30 "gift-certificate" (actually a "coupon") also had a few extra strings attached.
What a nice way to "make up for their screw-up."
Also, if you used it, then you forfeit your ability to enter into any class-action lawsuit, or complain in any way after that, or receive any part of a settlement or compromise that could happen at a later date.
Don't steal. The government hates competition.
At this point, I would call the local friendly legal professional. I bet he or she would be very happy to pursue a wrongful detention civil suit against Best Buy and its manager. Lawyers love this sort of case, especially when it's a little guy clearly in the right versus a big retailer. You get the chance to teach BB a lesson, see the manager get his ass fired, and you could get a nice little chunk of change for your trouble.
And let us know how it goes. BB deserves the smackdown for this one.
'I'm tired of waltzing for pancakes.' - Gwen Mezzrow
Karma: Excellent Birds (mostly as a result of listening to Laurie Anderson)
I have had problems with that store as well. That manager, in fact. They must be desparate for ANYONE to work there as a manager to keep that bozo.
I was also accused of attempting to defraud them when I tried to return som RAM that wouldn't work in an IBM Aptiva. (Picky box, Crucial ram worked fine). He told me they didn't even sell the brand I was returning. I had purchased it less than 30 minutes earlier! When I tried to get him to look in the locked case where the ram is so he could SEE THE SAME BRAND, he ordered me out of the store.
I am no longer a customer. I will not EVER be customer again. I go out of my way to tell anyone who will listen to my story just how crappy of a store Best Buy, and the Tucker store in particular is.
I vote for quality business with my money. Best Buy would eventually go out of business if it were not for the hourdes of people willing to tolerate crap for service where they shop.
Best Buy advertised the VisionTek Xtasy GeForce4 Ti4600 for preorder at the price of $129.99 (plus applicable sales tax) on their website (bestbuy.com) on Wednesday, February 6, 2002.
Over 2,000 customers placed orders for the card at this special price.
These customers were greeted with confirmation web pages, confirmation e-mail messages, issued order numbers, and some even received backorder confirmation e-mail messages (some even received multiple backorder confirmations).
Within hours, Best Buy pulled the offer, and "corrected" what they later called a "pricing error."
Cancellation e-mails were sent out, and cited a "systems error" for the mistake.
Best Buy issued a press released (only published at news.com) which blamed "human error" for the mistake.
Customers who called Best Buy to inquire about the order cancellation were told that VisionTek would not allow Best Buy to sell the cards at the originally agreed-upon price (Best Buy was falsely accusing VisionTek of illegal price-fixing tactics).
Best Buy does have a disclaimer on their web site in the form of their Terms of Service Agreement.
At no point during the account-creation or order-placing processes are customers required to read or actively agree to these terms (see Specht vs. Netscape; also see the FTC's Advertising and Marketing on the Internet: Rules of the Road).
Best Buy has actually changed their Terms of Service since this entire fiasco began.
Best Buy's Terms of Service do not supercede federal, state, and local consumer protection laws, which (in many cases) specifically outlaw this type of activity.
Best Buy's Terms of Service exist for the sole purpose of tricking customers into surrendering their consumer rights. The way consumer law is written, customers must exercise their rights; if they surrender them, the company in question is not required to adhere to these laws.
"E-tailers" are subject to the same rules, regulations, and laws that apply to their brick-and-mortar cousins. (See the FTC's Dot Com Disclosures)
Best Buy has stated that absolutely no one will be receiving the card at the previously agreed-upon price, yet well over 140 customers have already done so.
Best Buy is ignoring its customers at this point. E-mails go unanswered, and phone calls are greeted with a promise to escalate the call, but the customer must wait for someone to contact them; this, of course, never happens.
At least one person has already taken this to Small Claims Court. He had his first hearing a couple of weeks ago, but Best Buy requested a continuance, which was granted.
A class action lawsuit is still an option, and one that may be used.
There are more facts that are pertinent, but these are the most commonly misunderstood or ignored pieces of information.
Because Best Buy owns Musicland, they support the CBDTPA.
Another reason to avoid shopping there.
He looked at me and said, "Kid, we don't like your kind, and we're gonna send your fingerprints off to Washington."
However, there are some especially sensitive jobs for which merely an ARREST is flagged. The fact of being arrested generally doesn't disqualify one for such jobs, but if you fail to reveal it when asked, that's lying, perjury, and in some cases (applying for government jobs involving security and secrecy) possibly even a felony. When you do put down "YES" then you will be asked to explain the circumstances. While this is certainly not something that would be a problem, the fact of having to do this, possibly the rest of your life, can be a hindrance. And in some cases you can be improperly discriminated against if the employer finds it more convenient to hire someone slightly less qualified than you just because they won't have to check and validate the arrest record (if they have to ask for ARREST instead of CONVICTION for highly sensitive jobs, they surely have to followup and verify). Fortunately most jobs don't fall into these categories.
Mr Cherian should have a lawyer pursue an action to have his arrest expunged so he can then legally say "NO" in the few cases an arrest might be asked about ... and then file suit naming the Best Buy store, the Best Buy company, and the store manager Rod Hill, to cover all legal expenses to set things straight. There is even the possibility of pursuing criminal action against the store manager for false arrest (the lawyer needs to advise on that).
In the mean time, be sure to do searches on the bestbuy.com web site for terms like "arrest", "ripoff", "rod hill", "consumer terrorism", etc. They do log these things.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
The worst part of this all is that the "new" price of $399 is horrible. They are also trying to shirk with a $30 coupon. Link below.
:
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1 . tml Worst Buy Highway Robbery Inc. Trying to give only $30 bucks for mistake.
s tbuy_gf4deal.html
_ arrest.html
3 .
Here are a few links to show you how to find a deal on this card, Vision Tek part number 30001522
Pricewatch Search for 30001522
Tip on searching Pricewatch (my favorite); the url format is: [http://brook.pricewatch.com/search/search.asp?cr
Streetprices Search for 30001522
Pricegrabber Search, I don't like Price-grabber, but its here to show that even a crappy Shylock engine is better than Worst Buy ©(TM)®.
BEST BUY charged with FRAUD:
Best Buy & HRS Credit Insurance Fraud to their customers. Big Ripoff Scam!
Story also covered here:
http://www.theinquirer.net/10020202.htm
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/24005.htm
http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/19176/
http://courses.wcupa.edu/jredingt/BestBuy.htm
http://www.hardocp.com/
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/2404
http://hypothermia.gamershardware.com/
http://hypothermia.gamershardware.com/articles/be
http://hypothermia.gamershardware.com/articles/bb
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2002/4/24/11357/303
I have had horrible experience with them as well. I won't even go into it, but they tried to do something fraudulent and were obstinate about owning up to it.
Legalize the constitution. Think for yourself question authority.