Slashdot Mirror
Amazon Sells IPAQs for $10
TomHoward writes "In a pretty huge blunder, amazon.co.uk have put the HP IPAQ H1910 (RRP about £300) for sale for just over £7.32 (plus postage and packing). It's very hard to get through to their site right now, but if you're quick you can have a look at their blunder here." Don't bother clicking through, Amazon has taken the items down.
Amazon.com should honor any sale that was made while the price was still up. Yeah, right....
But still, it would be a very cool gesture.
Don't both /.'ing Amazon.
I would have preferred the CLIE anyway. Did anyone actually make it to one of these bargain bloopers before it went down?
--------
Free your mind.
but the postage and packing from the UK would have put me back whatever I would have saved.....
I wonder how many Mr TomHoward ordered before he submitted the article. :)
Amazon has said before that these things happen, and they won't honor orders for honest price mistakes.
Sometimes I worry that I'll develop Alzheimer's disease, but no one will notice.
In a pretty huge blunder, slashdot.org have put the "HP IPAQ H1910 (RRP about £300) for sale for just over £7.32 (plus postage and packing)." story up for its readers to digest. It's very easy to get through to amazon's site, and the item ain't even there anymore. Don't bother discussing, Slashdot shouldve have taken the story down.
S.t.e.v.e.
This is just another form of advertisement. See how many vistors amazon.com attracts... even a slashdot story pops up :)
We had the same thing happen with Argos and TVs some time last year. Argos never honoured their commitment to sell cheap TVs though. They are the ones who have the final say in the matter; there is nothing to say that they must sell anything.
This post contains benzene, nitrosamines, formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide.
So I was one of the first few to order one of the H1910s as the thing went out on our list first. I got the confirmation email. I ordered the H5450 too, got that confirmation email. Combined the orders, got that email.
I'd imagine they won't honour the orders as there's all kinds of boilerplate about Amazon not considering it a contract until they debit your account and dispatch the goods.
I'm expecting:
a) Nothing
b) An apology
c) A gift voucher and an apology
d) 1(one) Ipaq per person, if you ordered both then the cheaper one
e) 1(one) of each Ipaq if you ordered both
As it is a mate from Reuters has asked me for my order confirmation emails so expect to see something on Ananova soon and in the papers tomorrow.
Hopefully they'll anonymise my details (-:
This kind of thing happens all the time. Anyone who frequents the fatwallet or anandtech boards knows about it-- they will NEVER honor prices like this. That's why their disclaimer includes things like "not responsible for typographic errors." But it's still sometimes fun to order 1,000,000 when the prices are accidently posted as 0.00.
-- Is "Sig" copyrighted by www.sig.com?
Not *everyone* is profiteering and subversive. I'm sure a customer let them know about the error.
Sig.i>
Here is a link to that story about that 36-inch TV for $99 on Amazon. People sued to get the TV for the advertised price, and lost.
Sometimes I worry that I'll develop Alzheimer's disease, but no one will notice.
1. Put up a product at a ridiculous price on Amazon, say about 10% normal price.
2. Get noticed.
3. (optional) Process about 10 orders at absurd price, to gain goodwill from market.
4. After a threshold number of 'absurd' orders, take down product.
5. Send link to Slashdot.
6. Enjoy.
Wonder what Amazon's charging HPaq for all the 'free' attention.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Sure they meant iraq not ipaq, didn't they?
Bill
bamph
Lev13than writes "In a pretty routine blunder, slashdot.org has inexplicably posted an article about Amazon making a typo. The article is for sale for just over $0 (plus postage and packing). It's not very hard to get through to their site right now, but if you're bored you can have a look at their blunder here." Don't bother clicking through, Slashdot will post a dupe in 20 minutes.
When you have nothing left to burn you must set yourself on fire
The story was originally on the inquirer. The original came out and amazon noticed and pulled the whole site down for couple of hours, fixed the problem and put it back online. Only then does the slashdot story come online. I was wondering when the story being shown to subscribers first will come into problems.
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
The BBC have quickly picked up on this, you can find their story here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/2864461.stm It claims that "some workers were rumoured to be placing orders for 50 or 60 of the computers at a time"
I don't expect to get one, but I (and one of my workmates) put in an order nonetheless.
:-)
Not mentioned anywhere else I've found was that the HP iPAQ H5450 was priced at about GB£23 also!
Needless to say that I ordered me one of those, too.
Remains to be seen whether Amazon will honour the price, but I doubt it.
There was also a £560 wifi model going for about £27. The £7 one was #1 on the sales list, while the £27 one got to about #20 before they shut the site down.
If you read the small print it says they won't charge your credit card until the order is ready for shipping (i.e not right away, so they haven't actually taken your money & hence accepted the contract to supply the goods).
They also reserve the right to refuse your order in the event of mispricing.
We ordered a couple & got the acceptance, but we're not expecting to actually get them. Still, you've got to be in to win...
So, as this is one of the most pointless articles you could ever imagine (Amazon puts wrong price on thing, pulls thing, Slashdot posts article about it), what shall we all talk about instead?
I mean, go ahead and try to discuse this if you want, but what are you going to do; post witty quips about the prices of things? Anecdotes about how you once ordered something at the wrong price, and it wasn't delivered? Seriously, what is there to discuss?
Anyone got any interesting and funny tech anecodotes they want to share? Are we at war yet? What's the weather like in your part of the world? Some new trolling material? Anyone actually paying for this crap?
Not the programmer... the data entry staff (or maybe the person who wrote up the article originally)!
I hate when the programmer gets blamed because the client doesn't know how to use the system, or they make an entry mistake.
"Why didn't the system tell me the price was wrong?"
Ah, but that was under US law. This is under UK law.
Though I still doubt it'll be honoured.
Somebody made a list of how to sell something on slashdot and didn't include ... "#) PROFIT!" Maybe it's in the first few lines... maybe I just missed... oh no... oh god!! It's really not there! I'm going to faint, my world is in shambles. Excuse me while I try to piece my perception of this reality back together.
Its clearly a very slow news day when all you can do is wait for news.
LATEST: Shop puts wrong price on item. Corrects mistake.
LATEST: Person does something. Another person reacts.
LATEST: Dog barks at passer-by, cat sleeps on sofa.
Seriously, what the hell is this?
I still don't understand how sites like Amazon can get away with not honoring posted prices. In the US when a brick and mortar store mis-lables or mis-prices an item they have to honor the mis-labled price. I even think it is a law. Why is it not the same for online shopping?
[n8.r0n] http://petesweb.spymac.net/
This isn't the first time that Amazon has posted the wrong price for an item. In fact, they've done it quite a bit.
I bought the movie The Insider on DVD from Amazon when it was first released for $0.99 because of a pricing error.
Sometimes they will honor the pricing error on small ticket items. Usually, however, they will just send you an email announcing that they are unable to fill your order because of a pricing error and that your order is cancelled.
No contract until they bill you. Amazon don't bill you until it ships. Price cannot reasonably be thought to be correct. Under UK law they have zero requirements to give this to you. Quit whining: Governing Law and Contract Formation No contract will subsist between you and Amazon.co.uk* for the sale by it to you of any product unless and until Amazon.co.uk accepts your order by e-mail confirming that it has dispatched your product. That acceptance will be deemed complete and will be deemed for all purposes to have been effectively communicated to you at the time Amazon.co.uk sends the e-mail to you (whether or not you receive that e-mail). For the avoidance of doubt, any such contract will be deemed to have been concluded in the United States of America. Further, any such contract will be interpreted, construed and enforced in all respects in accordance with the laws of England, and you and Amazon.co.uk irrevocably submit to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the English Courts. "
The Register.
ZdNet.
People who I know must have orders 250+ between them. There is no way they would honour this - and every person who ordered realised it was a mistake, so they have nothing to whine about.
Vacancy for signature. Apply within.
Did this post bounce off the atmosphere from the 1940's or something? Cause this guy is WAY off.
This is my sig. The post is over.
Look at the Amazon URL. It includes the text "ref=sr_aps_electronics_1_1". That means that everyone following the link will get a cookie setting up a certain Amazon Associate to get a kickback of some percentage of everything you *do* happen to buy in the next couple of weeks.
What if you were going to sell your $12000 car and the ad in the newspaper printed $1200 by mistake?
Would you sell it for $1200? Doubtful. I love hypocrites who say a business should do what they wouldn't do themselves.
What if it were a company you owned stock in and you were going to lose part of your dividend? Bet you'd change your mind then too.
A company has no reason to "honor" mistakes, that's why they print those little disclaimers about erronious listings.
They've done this before, so this isn't big news. About 9 months ago, they had the new RCA/Xbox TVs, 36", MSRP of about $1200, on sale for $99! (It was funny, it said "YOU SAVE 92%" or whatever the number was)
It circulated pretty fast. I ordered 6 of them.
I did find their policy posted, tho - which stated that the could at any time increase the price of an ordered item and then notify you for your approval.. Or, if the price posted was too high and you ordered, they'd drop the price - and this wouldn't take your approval to push it through.
Needless to say, about 3 days later a bunch of us got emails stating that there was an error, and if we'd like to order them at $999, then we could re-confirm our order.. Hah
With respect to items sold by Amazon.com, we cannot confirm the price of an item until you order; however, we do NOT charge your credit card until after your order has entered the shipping process. Despite our best efforts, a small number of the items in our catalog may be mispriced. Rest assured, however, that we verify prices of products sold and shipped by Amazon.com as part of our shipping procedures.
* If an item's correct price is lower than our stated price, we charge the lower amount and ship you the item.
* If an item's correct price is higher than our stated price, we will, at our discretion, either contact you for instructions before shipping or cancel your order and notify you of such cancellation.
Please note that this policy applies only to products sold and shipped by Amazon.com. Your purchases from third-party sellers using Amazon.com Payments are charged at the time you place your order, and third-party sellers may follow different policies in the event of a mispriced item.
Amazon goes out of business from fulfilling 80 billion iPAQ orders at 7 dollars each... I don't think so! Or maybe they can offset the loss by collecting ~10% on the sale of Eminem's childhood house.
stuff |
I was one of the lucky ones who got a Kodak DX3700 digital camera for £100, so these things do sometimes pan out.
I looked into the legal aspects back then, when I was busy shouting at Kodak. There are a few interlocking issues.
Firstly, a contract is only formed if one party makes an offer to tender and the other party accepts this offer. For most web retailers, the most you get back is a "confirmation of order" email that has a dubious legal standing. Kodak's email, however, states in very clear terms that it is a receipt, suggesting a contract has been made.
Secondly, if one party can be shown to have acted in bad faith, the contract can be annulled. This occured in the case of people buying a £299 TV for £2.99 from Argos: the price was ruled to be clearly in error, the buyers must have known it was an error, so they were acting in bad faith. In Kodak's case it was not so clear cut; the price was low, but it was marked as being a special offer, so not utterly incredible.
In the end, Kodak decided the legal waters were muddy enough that it didn't fancy trying them out, so it gave in and sold the cameras at the advertised price. But that's not to say it would have lost, merely that the bad PR of fighting it and the chance of losing would be too costly.
In any event, if you were quick enough to get one of these PDAs ordered, don't get too excited: I'll be shocked if you get one. Amazon wouldn't lose if this went to court.
(IANAL, of course)
You win again, gravity!
Going by a mailing list I'm on it seems that some of the early buyers actually had their credit cards charged for this. Now under UK law these make a legally binding contract as payment has been made. Its going to be interesting to see how Amazon reacts to this one.
There was a similar case a few years back with Kodak where the mispriced a camera and finally ended up honouring the deal. Details on the inquirer.
Cheap UK and US VPS
In a bid to get more readers, Slashdot has become a site advertising great deals much like fatwallet and bensbargains. Technology related news was deemed unimportant compared to the savings that can be passed on the Slashdot community. Look forward to great prices on dsl modems, cdr's, and other assorted computer hardware/software. "Who needs news, when people can check www.cnn.com for that crap?" exclaims Cowboy Neal.
Maybe somebody hacked the site to get a dirt-cheap iPac. Then again, who the hell would want one of those POSes except maybe his grandma?
Repeal the DMCA!
I remember that because I also placed an order for a $99 RCA 36" TV from Amazon and received a letter back from them stating that they are under no obligation to honor "price mistakes".
Could someone explain why Amazon and other on-line retailers are not held to the same standards as their brick-n-mortar counterparts with respect to this? It still sounds like "bait-n-switch" to me...
Chris
At some point in the chain, a human has to fatfinger a number in. The original wholesale price, the retail price, whatever.
A mistake such as this could happen anywhere along the line.
I spoke to a guy refilling an ATM once and asked him if they ever switch the denominations when they refill the teller machine. He said that it has happened once or twice and that you can see the logs show how people keep withdrawing 50s that come out as 100s.
In those cases they just correct the error by adjusting the balances of the individuals' accounts. I think they also gave them each a call and probably got responses like: "REALLY!?, I had no idea the machine was giving the wrong bills, I always draw money one 50 at a time! Besides, it was your error, you can't/shouldn't correct it now at my expense!"
Ah but in the UK, a similar thing happened with Kodak digital cameras. If I recall correctly, those customers who got confirmation that their order had been taken were legally able to purchase at that price. IANAL though.
But I wonder how many stupid people got fired?
--- WAL
Sure, as long as they want to pay the programmers to develop those checks. But they probably didn't want to budget for it.
Even if they do code that in, it would have to account for marketing costs, administration costs, and all other costs before they could accurately reflect the minimum they could sell it for.
Then, of course, they would have to deal with the various types of wholesale costs. The product might not have a fixed cost. They might pay less for the item if they sell more. I don't know if they have that kind of deal, but car dealers do. The more cars they sell, the less they pay for each. So the wholesale price would change depending on how many have been sold.
Or, they might get a group lot of them in, and only pay for the lot. Another lot they get in might have a different wholesale price. They could average the price, but that gets hard to do when they get in new lots at different prices regularly.
This is an example of why you should subscribe to slashdot. Getting the news 10 minutes in advance could make a difference! :)
DNA in your Linux: DNALinux
If a brick-and-mortar store mislabels an item, they don't have to honor the price. A lot of the department stores do, because they sell so many items, and they are all cheap, and the value of good will is more than the value of the item.
Also, if they mislabel the item, and sell it at price to whites, but not to blacks (or Catholics but not protestants, etc), they can get in trouble that way.
And if you *call* the store, and ask "Do you have a Black-n-Decker Stove-top drill with automatic surprise reverse torquing" and they say "yes", and you ask "What is your price", and they say "$25", and you ask "please check--all the other stores say $50", and they say "I know, it's $25, come and get it", then they can be bound by their verbal contract.
But if they mislabel an item (especially a boutique store) and you discover it, they can say "no, I'm sorry, that's $135, not $1.35." And if you don't like it, you can still buy it, or you can leave. Or you can break all their little hummel figures, and go to jail until you pay for them -- it's up to you.
That said, I think it would be *great* if the Amazon site was set up to every so often lower the price of one or two new items, drastically (especially open box items.) That way, you'd go there, just to check.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
That wasn't a legal thing. Kodak just realised the bad PR that was being generated was probably costing them more than the value of the cameras.
There's also the consideration that the price was not quite obviously wrong. Very very cheap, perhaps, but this was at a time when digital camera prices were dropping like crazy. Nobody would consider a PDA to cost £7. They'd be sceptical if it was a used gameboy at that price.
I'm a US expat living over in the UK. Apparently there is some weird pricing law that says if you find a product in a shop with a price tag that's wrong, you can buy the product for the price on the tag.
I was out w/ my girlfriend looking for a memory card for her camera a few weeks ago. We found a 128MB card for about half of what I thought it should be. When we asked how much the 256MB cards where, the shopkeeper discovered the mistake. But my girlfriend quickly said "we'll buy the 128MB one". When I told her that the real price might not be such a good deal, she said "I get to pay the price on the tag. It's law here." and the shopkeeper agreed. Obviously a bit secondhand, but I figure the shopkeeper would have objected if it wasn't true.
Anyway, I'm just wondering why this doesn't seem to apply to Amazon. Some have said it's because they didn't charge the card, but the shopkeeper hadn't taken any money by that point, either...
Wow...some programmer has his balls in the vice for that one.
You mean data entry clerk.
I know this because Tyler knows this.
This might be worth mentioning if they were selling Segway Human Transporters for GBP10
Hell, I'd be impressed if they were actually selling any Segways at all.
I think the first of the major pricing blunders was buy.com who, back in the day, put up a 19" Hitachi CRT monitor for somewhere around half price. Many ordered, few if any got their monitors, however there was a class action suit and we won. I got a check for $50 out of it. So, for what its worth, there is *some* history of the customer being right in cases like these.
This too shall pass.
it could be considered bait & switch, or at least fraud.
Just wait. They soon will be.
BBC News
if you had read the link that the parent poster had given, it explained why it didn't need to be honored.
~Jon~
This space for rent, inquire within.
Any fatwallet or anandtech junkie will know that this deal will never be honored. But if there was any chance that it would, posting it up on /. killed it. If you find a deal like this, keep it quiet until your item has shipped! Nothing kills a deal faster than telling the world and having 20,000 people try to order it within 1 hour.
Patent claim: A method of increasing sales comprising the distribution of items to a plurarity of customers, in exchange for financial reward (the "sale price"), wherein the sale price is of lesser quantity than the sale price offered by competing merchants.
also don't "get" the concept of "Legal Tender".
Never forget the shop keepers perfectly legal right to tell you to "F*** Off".
This has nothing to do with legal tender, but with the distinction between 'invitation to treat' and 'offer'
This has to be the stupidest and most misleading Slashdot story I have seen in ages. Amazon is not selling IPAQs for $10 as the headline read. You wrote the headline, so if they are selling them at that price, then let's see a shipping receipt, michael. The headline should have been Amazon Typo Discovered.
This is just journalistic sensationalism and Amazon should sue Slashdot for publishing something that misleading and damaging. Now Amazon customer service will have to deal with every bottom-feeder that read the story on Slashdot and then demanded an IPAQ for $10. The end result: No one gets an IPAQ for $10 and Amazon just raises prices to cover the expense of handling the mess that Slashdot's inaccurate headline generated.
I know it doesn't, what I'm saying is that the people who expect to be sold a £1000 computer for £10 are the same people who expect the shopkeeper to be legally obliged to accept 500 one pence pieces instead of a 5 pound note.
They overlook the shopkeepers right to refuse sale.
Read this Legal precedent in consumers' favour
Powered by onion juice.
I'm saying that the 500 x 1p case has nothing to do with legal tender either
For a moment, I thought so. :-) And then I said to myself, e-commerce has come a loooonng way!
Are you trolling?
I know that 500 * 1p pieces has nothing to do with leagal tender.
What i'm saying is that there are huge number of people who _don't_ - and they're normally the same people that think a shop keeper _has_ to sell something that has been priced incorrectly.
that /. would post a story about a website making a mistake. I mean I've never seen a typo or dupe here.
Aren't there scores of websites dedicated to uncovering up-to-the-minute pricing blunders, for people to take advanatge of? Is this really the remit of Slashdot?
-- "In order to have power, I must be taken seriously." -Mojo Jojo
That's because, if you would bother checking, you'd find out that the samba vulnerability news were published las t saturday.
Articulos para gente geek: Poleras, linux, libros y mas
If such a mistake were encountered by me I wouldn't hold any ill feelings towards the company in question. Thats because I understand that companies have to be able to make a profit in order to sell me the things I want. I'm not some immature person who wants a $1000 object for $10. Thats obviously not the right price and only someone completely without dignity would bitch about not being able to rob the company blind.
Of course I also realize that I am in the minority on this and that the unwashed masses will foam at the mouth like rabid dogs outraged that they were unable to "stick it to the man".
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
Somehow so try http://www.jonnyclark.com/amazon.html
Rus
Cheap UK and US VPS
About two years ago Amazon (US) accidentaly put a book for sale at 10 cents. I ordered it for that price and got it delivered without problems.
Perhaps it's only recently they've changed their price policy? Ff you've got a receipt with the "faulty" price and money drawn from your account they should also deliver it. Their mistake.
Ciryon
According to BBC radio 2, Amazon have decided not to honour any orders placed.
Unfortuantly, no web link yet, and the radio was somewhat lacking on detail, but they implied that no-one was going to get one at that price.
This wouldn't be the first time that a retailer has renaged on an online deal, offereed in error. A couple of years ago (Sept 1999), Argos offered a £300 TV for £3. They refused to honour it, and I'm not aware of any legal rammifications for Argos.
So, looks like this will be just another one of those curiosity stories.
Amazon.com now selling products at a loss!!!!
How is this any different than any other item they sell? They lose money on every transaction, but hell, they make it up in volume!
Did anyone else read the headline and think that Amazon was selling IRAQs? Or was it just me?
11.0010010000111111011010101000100010000101101000
I seem to remember that under UK credit laws if you buy on your credit card and the supplier fails to deliver then the Credit card company can be liable. Might be an interesting route to persue.
if it's just a honest mistake they got no legal obligation to sell it at that advertised price, at least not in most places in the world(well, we were teached this at school: if car dealer accidentally puts the price at 33 instead of 33thousand he doesn't have to sell at that price.. however it's illeagal to just use things like this to con people coming to your shop with false adverts).
like, if they were advertising that in papers, web, tv and at all places for 99$, then it would be questinable if it was just an honest accident that the price was printed at 99$.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Back when I was architecting eMarkets, I seem to recall that credit card processors (visa, mastercard, etc.) wouldn't allow online merchants to actually charge a buyer's card until the item was actually shipped. So the merchant would first do a pre-authorization for the purchase amount and then do an actual charge when it left their warehouses.
It could be the loophole that Amazon is using when they state that there is no actual 'contract' until the item is shipped.
I'm not trolling.
There is a popular belief in the UK, promoted by bloke-down-the-pub legal experts, in 'legal tender', being a certain upper limit to the amount of small change a shopkeeper is obliged to accept for a purchase.
Your use of the term 'legal tender' and example of somebody paying a shopkeeper with 500 1p pieces suggested that you shared this misconception. I now stand corrected.
Yep, saw that... it was a government organized rally and there certainly weren't 10's of thousands of people there. So what does that tell you?
And what's up with slashdot. Why did that not seem to post the first time?
well, here it's a lovley sunny day, not a cloud in the sky, about 10 centigrade, speaking of which, does anyone know what's the difference (if any) between Celsius and centigrade? I've only ever seen them used interchangably.
Seems to me that you're a tad bit jealous that you DIDN'T subscribe, and thus didn't see the article early enough to snap one of those IPAQ's up for $10 dollars.
;-)
Besides, how much subscription could you have bought for the difference? A good lot without a doubt. But no, that's not value, it must be a thought provoking article that is worthy of your superior intellect...wait...why are you here then?
Oh, and no we don't value you because you submit stories, post comments and moderate, it's your big **** that keeps all of us coming back
No Comment.
I disagree - they were also offering iPAQ H5450s for £23 - this sounded like a loss-leading special offer, especially after a quick check on ebay showed that the 5450 should be less than double the price of a 1910, rather than over three times. I'd expect a pricing (maybe exchange rate?) mis-calculation to be consistent.
Yes. Those were strange numbers whatever the reason. £7.52? Makes no senseat all.
The best thing would be if a duplicate story would be posted tomorrow on /. when site xxxx (the register) posts about this.
priceless jokes are coming....
If anyone is interested in the horses' mouths, here are a few references:
This statute means that you have made a valid and legal offer of payment of your debt when you tender United States currency to your creditor. However, there is no Federal statute which mandates that private businesses must accept cash as a form of payment. Private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether or not to accept cash unless there is a State law which says otherwise.
The Kodak things was far more complicated. It was not obviously wrong, because in the first place it was advertised as special offer on the website. Secondly the mistake was made sometime on Friday afternoon, and surely it would have been fixed first thing Monday morning. Not so as I placed my order around 9:40am on Monday morning so I had good reason to believe that the price was genuine.
./ers can think of a dozen ways you could design the system to make it difficult for the mistakes to happen in the first place and detect them automatically in the second place and suspend the items until investigated. In the first place if you can enter a retail price that is lower than the wholesale price without large warnings comming up requiring multiple click throughs to set the price at that level then the system is bust and they deserve to be out of pocket.
The decision by Kodak was clear, they could fight dozens of battles in the small claims courts around the country at a cost greater than selling the cameras at the advertised special offer price, face loosing at least some of them, and get lots of bad publicity, or just sell the cameras to thoses people who ordered them and don't risk setting a legal precidence.
I don't believe there has yet been a legal precidence set in the U.K. on this matter. However it is clear from the customers point of view that there has been offer, acceptance and consideration so it is a contract.
It is not clear exactly how the consideration (handing over of credit card details) differs between a website and bricks+morter shop, as a normal shop frequently does not deduct the money from your credit card the instant you make the purchase at the till (check your next bill if you don't believe me). Further more shops accept cheques and clearly the money does not leave your account until well after you have left the shop with the goods.
Therefore one can clearly argue that the consideration is handing over payment details and these being accepted by the website. Sending a reply out by email to say your order has been accepted further strengthens your case that consideration has taken place.
Clearly the websites defence is that consideration does not take place until they actually charge your credit card. However it is difficult to see how this can stand up when we compare it with a normal shop, where clearly the consideration does not take place at the time the card is charged but when they take the details.
The only difference is that in a shop you will have left with the goods before they realize their mistake, where in a website they still have them.
There may be some relevant precidents set if someone has purchased an item for home delivery,
left the shop and then recieved a phone call the next day to say sorry we made a mistake with the price you can't have it until you pay us some more money, and they have taken to court to enforce delivery.
The basics remain that there is no legal precident been set in the UK on this matter yet. Until there is we can be sure that websites will probably choose not to supply the goods. However in the meantime the exact legal position is far from clear.
Really it amazes me that web systems allow such mistakes to be made. I am sure most
Not really, a basic check would be if retail is less than wholesale complain loudly to the person setting the price and require confirmation from them that is more than a simple click on a button.
It does not stop you making any mistake, but it does limit the size of any losses you are going to make. Besides which you could change it to retail having to be more than wholesale plus 10%, or whatever is relevant.
"sure, we'll give you 1,000,000 units at $0.00 - but that will be $20M for shipping and handling."
Now, if they offered the product at $0.00 with "Free Super Saver Shipping", the joke would be on them...
http://www.snopes.com/business/deals/banana.htm
Might be true about buying a stereo, but probably not about buying a new car.
-- Boycott Shell
(IANAL, Applies to US law....)
If you advertise something for sale at a given price, you must sell it at that price until you can change the erroneous add, sticker, sign, web page, what have you. Typos are no exception, it's your sign, you are responsible for what it says. The only exception is where a third party (eg: a newspaper) mistakely quotes a wrong price.
In this case, Amazon mistakenly listed iPods at a ridiculously low price - on their website. It's their mistake, their responsibility, and so they must honor that price for all customers who placed an order at that price. And that's everyone who managed to get an order in before they corrected the oversight.
(Score: -1, Stupid)
Exactly - it could be argued that Amazon have been negligent - how hard can it be to implement this check? They should suffer the consequences!
The moral of the story is that if you come across one of these price blunders, you probably want to order one (or three, and sell them on eBay), and keep quiet.
- drak
James Gilden is a travel journalist reporting for the Los Angeles Times. He once found a roundtrip fare on Travelocity for Los Angeles to Rome for $90. Of course, it was a mistake, but he booked it anyway. Read about his experience (free registration needed) with Travelocity. This company rejects 30 reservations per day (or about 10,000 per year) on a total of 10 million annual bookings. When you manipulate -- and refresh several times per day -- databases as big as the ones from Amazon or Travelocity, it's simply *normal* to see mistakes from time to time.
There was a glitch at a local gas station yesterday that had them selling gas at 16 cents per gallon... it went on basically all day, too.
imo Bush needs to be ousted from power as well, but that will happen before too long anyway. (I mean seriously, this guy starts off by raping the environment and finishes by raping foreign countries...)
Either 1) you are lying and you are not an American or 2) you are an idiot that doesn't understand how democracy works in America.
A president can not be "ousted" period. There are no recall procedures for federal offices. A president can be impeached and then forced from office, but considering everything the president does has to be passed by the majority of our elected representatives (and often by 60 in the senate) then he is acting in concert with the people. A 'high crime' has to be committed to begin an impeachment. There has been no crime whatsoever.
The vast majority of people agree with President Bush. Period. All this FUD about most disagreeing with him is just that, FUD. He has enjoyed the highest approval ratings in history. Higher than FDR. (read your history). You may disagree, and that is fine, but you need to clearly realize that you are in the minority. You have the right to disagree. This doesn't make your FUD true.
As to raping the environment, this is so unfounded its rediculous. This is straight out of the Democratic handbook. Unsubstantiated and FUD. Anwr? Yes, we should drill there. Look at the results of drilling in other areas of Alaska. So far, the most damage it has done is to create a population explosion of carabu. Really. Once again, check your facts. I could go on and on, but it really doesn't matter. You don't care about the truth.
But then again, it doesn't matter to people like you. You are not anti-war. You are not pro-environment, you are just anti-Bush. Facts don't matter. Reality doesn't matter. You just are so filled with hate for this man that no logic, facts or reality could ever matter.
Oh, for the record. I didn't vote for Bush. That doesn't make him a bad person and doesn't make everything he does wrong. In retrospect, I wish I had voted for him. I still don't agree with him all the time, but I respect him and believe he is doing what he feels is the morally correct thing to do.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
As a US citizen (stop booing), why is a ruthless dictator in Bagdad, any of my business. Two hundred and some odd years ago, we had a similar problem with a dictator here. We kicked his ass out of our country. Yes, we had help, but the key is that we wanted it bad enough that we took the risk. We did it. We did not have some other country decide it was time for us to change our government.
I do not have a problem with the fighting for what I believe in, but what exactly is it that we are supposed to believe in, in this situation? Yes Saddam and his ilk (yes I used a word that I am not sure what it means) are sadistic SOBs, but what makes him any different that 100 other tyrants around the world.
Are we trying to prevent future terrorism or Saddam's support of terrorism? I believe in America we call this prior restraint. If there are crimes that Saddam has committed against us, let's define them.
Are we punishing Saddam for 9/11? It is relatively common knowledge that Saddam had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11. Ossama Bin Laden thinks Saddam is almost as evil as he thinks we are.
Are we trying to get rid of the newly coined WMD? Then we probably need to go after other unstable governments that have them, like India, Pakistan, Korea, and Russia. Where to we get off telling people that can't have the same toys we have anyway? Who the hell do we think we are?
Do we need more oil? Then, raise the price of gas. I am happy to pay more at the pump, if it prevents people from dying.
Why is W declaring war on this guy? I thought only congress had the ability to declare war. Yes, Yes. War Powers Act...yadda..yadda..yadda..blah..blah..blah. The War Powers act was meant to be used in a situation like Peal Harbor, where we are attacked outright. It was not meant to be used so that the President could kill whoever he wanted for 90 days.
What ever happened to snipers? Why are we sending in a quarter of a million soldiers to wreak havoc on this country? If the real goal is to get rid of Saddam, wouldn't six SEALS and a couple of sniper rifles to just as good a job for less money.
Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels.
...when this is news. This isn't news, folks. It's a mistake. Fold your fangs back and find your blood elsewhere. Mistakes happen; quit trying to "stick it to the man" all the goddamn time and talk about something important.
Why convert the price to dollars in the headline? Quite frankly, the number "7.32" was close to being the most interesting part of this whole yawn of a story.
And besides, you got the math wrong... The exchange rate listed on my bank's web page is around 2.2 for the Sterling Pound, so that makes $16.91.
And before you correct me and say "No, its not 16 dollars; 7.32 pounds is more like 19 dollars", then someone else says "What? 7.32 pounds is exactly 22.87 dollars" realize that I don't live in Australia (the first number), or in the Barbados (the second number). Nope, I live in Canada where 7 pounds is around 16 dollars.
Just a reminder that the first 2 "dubya's" in "www" is "World Wide" which doesn't equal "USA". Although... maybe we can move from "french-fries" to "freedom-fries", and from "www.blah blah.org" to "usaww.blah blah.com"??
(Wow the political overtone of this posting took over pretty quickly, no?)
Omg...im watching too much news.
Pssst. Nobody is getting them for $10.
I would only expect this story to be posted if it were indeed true, and it wasn't. They were not selling them for $10. They had a pricing error listed, they weren't actually selling them that cheaply. There are deal sites out there for things like this. People on them bitch all the time about how companies screw them by not honoring price mistakes online. No need to see it here, and certainly no need to pay to see it.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
You can take a look at what the page looked like here!
Personally, just couldn't get there fast enough. A friend of mine 'bought' four - seems unlikely that they'll honour the orders though!
No big surprise, CNet is reporting that Amazon will not honor price: http://news.com.com/2100-1019-993246.html
Therefore, Amazon is guilty of bait and switch if it offered the IPAQs for $10 but doesn't deliver.
Don't believe me? Then try putting up a small ecommerce site that offers IPAQs for $10. Then tell your customers that you are not able to offer the IPAQs at that price but will be happy to sell them for a few hundred dollars instead. See if you'll be able to get away with it. I promise you won't.
They aren't going to honor it so stop bickering: http://news.com.com/2100-1019-993246.html
I don't need to be afraid of terrorists. We don't have them around here because we DON'T try to tell the rest of the world how to do their own business. Quite unlike the US.
UN doesn't see the problem because there is no problem. Those small countries aren't afraid of US's power (or of course they are, but outcome this war is not going to change that in one direction or the other), but they DO NOT HAVE any terrorist problems nor has Iraq ever bothered them in any way. It's (at least partly) your fault and your problem.
UN's word is the only one that counts on the international level, and if you are not listening to it, you are not doing a right thing, you're doing a WRONG THING.
Citizens of the Britain and Australia happen to think so too, dunno about Spain, even if their leaders are too busy kissing US ass to listen for their own voters - tells much about the so-called democracy, eh? And yes, we have quite similar system, it may suck but it's still better than the alternatives seen so far, so yes, I "like" it. Go on, spread it all you want, but don't do it with guns. Someone put to power by armed forces of another country is not how democracy is supposed to work, you know.
Your past mistakes have generally been PUTTING men like Saddam into power, and otherwise telling others what to do. Then cleaning up the mess. Don't do the first and you don't have to do the second, it's really that easy.
I can try to understand a concern if you show me a real one. Saddam is a bad man, but he's under vervy tight surveillance and can't do anything with an element of surprise, he's no threat.
And what exactly is it that I should feel empathy towards? Lives lost in wtc? Purely hypothetical lives lost in future if Saddam is not put out of power right now? Lives lost when arabs that lost relatives, home, etc. become terrorists take revenge against this and the Afghanistan war?
Why would I feel any more sympathy towards those than I should feel sympathy against iraqi or afghan civilian lives lost in your rampage trough middle east? Are US people somehow supposed to be better and more sympathy deserving people than rest of the homo sapiens on this planet?
And please tell me what is different when someone you call a "terrorist" kills people without consent of the others, and when the US kills people without consent of the others? Others being for example, the UN. Both are trying to hurt or scare the opposite so it does doing it, but neither will succeed and the circle of vengeance goes on forever.
... but as I was reading the "Cable Con" article on MSNBC, the following link was at the bottom saying Amazon wouldn't fill these orders.
http://www.msnbc.com/news/887491.asp?0bl=-0&cp 1=1
Ah well...
Nine times out of ten any retail outfit will honor that price.
A 90%-discount blunder will be honored 90% of the time? Those are conveniently easy to spew numbers. Cite sources, please.
Expensive? Not when you consider the value of a LIFELONG customer!
1. Will the customer cease to be lifelong if the price is not honored. Maybe, maybe not. 100% of the time? 50% of the time?
2. Because I successfully con them once on a typo, will that ensure that I am a lifelong customer? Maybe, maybe not. 100% of the time? 50% of the time?
I don't have the answers either. But then I'm not making quantitative claims.
According to the BBC article:
Amazon's conditions of use state there is no contract between the company and a customer until Amazon sends an e-mail confirming it has dispatched an order.
In fact, Amazon's exact wording is "No contract will subsist between you and Amazon.co.uk for the sale by it to you of any product unless and until Amazon.co.uk accepts your order by e-mail confirming that it has dispatched your product."
But Amazon ALSO says, in their online help, "You can cancel any item from your order, provided that we have not yet begun to process it."
But what if I want to cancel between the time they've started processing and the time they dispatch the item? It can't be an instantaneous process. For a certain time (which can be more than a few minutes, in my experience) they're "processing" the order. If no contract exists until they send me an e-mail saying it's been dispatched, I should be able to withdraw an item (or my entire order) while they're doing that processing, shouldn't I? Therefore, if Amazon won't let me withdraw or modify my order, doesn't that imply a contractual agreement has already been reached?
http://www.msnbc.com/news/887491.asp?0bl=-0
missing sig
They will not honor the sales, I know from experience. I once saw a flat screen tv for $150 when its normal price was $1000. Needless to say that it was suppossed to be $150 off of $1000 and not $150 total. They would not honor my purchase.
Choosing the lesser of two evils is a choice for evil.
Hey, I saw Newtons for $10.....
Uh....
Oh, right. That's not a typo.
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
This was not an 'offer' by Amazon which consumers are free to 'accept' and thereby form a binding contract. Rather, it was an 'invitation to negotiate' which really means nothing. The consumer can 'accept' but the offeror is free to reject the consumer. Amazon might decide to honor the purchases, but there's no obligation on their part to do so.
All those people who get to see articles "in the future" can get the goods. Worth the price of admission. :o)
Now if Slashdot Hosted a copy of all the links in the article too that only subscribers could get to it might be worth it. Even with a 20 or 30 minute delay I would miss most posts. I read /. at the end of the day - long after most linked sites are reduced to smoking craters or text only pages.
See Slashdot Subscribers see the Future article. And yes I've actually read the FAQ. Personally I think the Cache would be a great idea - especially if the site changes after ./ing. I want to know what the original link said!
So you read /. every day, but you don't think you're getting something of value. That doesn't make sense to me. Why do you keep coming back?
I one time saw that Amazon mispriced a 4 dvd set that was supposed to be 75 dollars for 19.99. I ordered it for Dumb and Dumber alone. I figured that was worth 15 bucks to me, and if one of the next three (Long Kiss Goodnight, Spawn, and Mortal Kombat Annihilation) was worth 5 bucks I would be making out like a bandit. :)
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Yeah, I still felt ripped off, but at least Amazon honored it
--Joey
And I do like it here, but I won't subscribe until I feel that it is worth it. That's my right.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
I don't suppose anyone happened to mirror/cache it? (since it was taken down before it was posted on /.)
"You had this look that of an angel, it was such a bad disguise" --Dishwalla
A president, or any other official, can be ousted thru a revolt. It has happened all throughout history, and I suspect it will happen at some point in the USA's future...though I don't expect that that time is now.
The vast majority (about 70%) of Americans agree that war is necessary to remove Hussein. Fewer than half of Americans are strongly convinced that Bush's policies are correct, however.
Of course, the flip side is that over half of Americans believe that this will increase terrorism in the short term, and almost half think that it will increase terrorism in the long term as well.
International polls aren't nearly as favorable towards Bush or the USA.
His approval ratings were highest immediately after September 11. They've been declining since. Lately, they've dipped down to Clinton numbers. And approval of things other than the war on terrorism have been less than stellar.
I suppose that depends on whether or not you think oil rigs and pipelines are a scenic addition. Oh, and don't forget the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
I believe Bush is doing what he feels is morally correct as well. Unfortunately, I'm not sure I share his morals or his view of world politics.
You are only allowed to call foul if a retailer breaks a contract with you. (For example, if you bought a TV for $99 at a store, they gave you the TV and then said 'Woops. Give us more money.' youre in no obligation to pay them.)
However, with Amazon, the contract isn't established until you pay them and when your product is delivered. As they don't bill you until they ship your product they are under no obligation to take a huge loss here on an honest mistake.
Plus it says so in their T&C.
suddenly I feel very tired
One thing that differs between bricks & mortar shops and online outlets is automation. I was looking for a laptop computer last year and found one online for about £600, tax included. This was by far and away the best system in relation to price, so I placed an order. I first received back an email confirming the order, then later I received an email confirming the sale. It was a few days later when I received a phone call explaining that there'd been an error on the website, and the laptop should actually have cost more than double what it was listed for. They were discussing the matter with their lawyers and if I didn't want to cancel the order, I'd have to wait and see. Eventually I did get the laptop for the reduced price, and from what I understand, the automated confirmation of sale that was sent was effectively a binding contract for them to supply me that laptop at that price.
If he agreed to it with the UN, shouldn't the UN be the one to enforce it. We are not the UN we are the US.
Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels.
Someone still has to code that into the system, and then someone else still has to enter the wholesale price correctly.
Even if the wholesale price doesn't change regularly, so that the per unit wholesale price is reasonably static, it still requires that someone enter the wholesale price initially.
There would then have to be checks that test that the wholesale price was entered correctly. Anytime you have data entry, you have potential for error.
Even one check requires that someone write the lookup code. This requires a project manager to actually think it important enough to include it as a task. If it crosses application systems, which I guarantee you it does, (the sales system has to access the purchasing system, and each system is a different department with different management, even if all systems are on the same hardware), then you have to deal with politics and have meetings and discussions to get people to agree on how it will be done.
This all costs time & money. Some department will have to be charged for it. No one wants to pay for it, so it doesn't get done.
I saw something like this at a client years ago. The mainframe had something like 4 cpu's, and they needed more. Problem was, all the software on the mainframe was licensed for up to 4 cpu's. Get one more cpu, and someone would have to pay for the next level of licenses for everything. The policy required that whichever department paid for the new cpu would have to pay for the licenses too.
Needless to say, they never upgraded. The limped along for years trying to get away without buying more processors. They could have had several of the profitable departments agreeing to divide of the costs, but no one did.