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Amazon Adjusts Prices After Sales Error
An anonymous reader writes "On December 23, Amazon advertised a 'buy one get one free' sale on DVD box-sets, but apparently did not test the promotion before going live. When anyone placed two box-sets in their cart, the website gave a double discount — so the 'grand total' shown (before order submission) was $0.00 or some very small amount. Despite terms stating that Amazon checks order prices before shipping, Amazon shipped a large number of these orders. Five days later (December 28), after orders had been received and presumably opened, Amazon emailed customers advising them to return the box-sets unopened or their credit cards would be charged an additional amount (more threads). Starting yesterday, Amazon has been (re)charging credit cards, often without authorization. On Amazon's side, they didn't advertise any double discount, and the free or nearly-free box-sets must have cost them a mint. But with Amazon continually giving unadvertised discounts that seem to be errors, is 'return the merchandise or be charged' the new way that price glitches will be handled?"
(Morality aside,) Wise customers either cancelled their credit cards or placed blocks on Amazon being able to charge them.
"We can categorically state we have not released man-eating badgers into the area." - UK military spokesman, July 2007
Ok, let me get this straight. Your online service, which you claim to test rigorously, fails to charge me. We (myself and your system) agree on a price for these goods ($0.00), you charge me for it, send me my merchandise, and now you're trying to make me give it back or pay more for it? IANAL but the legality of this seems rather dubious.
There is no mod option "-1: Disagree" for a reason. "Overrated" is not an acceptable substitute. Post something instead.
It might be true in YOUR state. There where lies the problem. It could be there are different fault rules for other states.
But to be honest, I just don't see a problem here. The customer knew there was an error but still ordered anyway. Even if he didn't know, one would reasonably suspect that he would want to be charged for one of the box sets (Knowing how these promotions work, possibly the higher priced box set)
So while Amazaon is being a dick about it, I don't see why there is even a problem here.
All the consumer has to do is refuse the charge. Once charged, billed and shipped, the transaction is done.
Amazon committing a charge after the transaction has completed should be considered fraud and treated as such.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
Amazon advertised "buy one get one free", which is what those customers got. The fact that they also got another one free doesn't violate the terms laid out. Amazon's just hoping that enough people eat the charge without complaining that they don't lose a ton of money.
It is for this reason that fraud protection exists.
You're right, except you're forgetting that fraud protection laws also protect the merchant.
Not in this case, they don't. There is no legal way Amazon can charge these consumers: they quoted a price (whether mistakenly or intentionally, it doesn't matter, the price was quoted on their web site where anybody could see it), took payment, and delivered the goods. A contract was formed, and now Amazon are expecting the customers to honour a different one.
Tell me, what exact law did any of those customers break? Because the law Amazon are breaking is quite clear: by instructing their card acquirer to take additional payments from their customers, they are declaring that they have been authorized by the customer to do so, which is clearly untrue. They are therefore obtaining money by deception.
If the customer is legally in the wrong, then Amazon are free to pursue compensation in court. Trying to obtain it directly by themselves, however, is not a legally justifiable action.
I totally agree, and yet I also agree with the next poster. It has become dog eat dog. While at a restaurant I would definitely want to be honest, simply because this could come out of the waiters pay. When it comes to large corporations I have been screwed by them numerous times and been treated like dirty. These corporations show absolutely NO morality when dealing with their customers, specially when it comes to hidden fees are other crap charges... Yea you try screwing up your bank account one month and see if they feel any remorse about taking $400 of your hard earned money in fees..
I see corporations as non entities, feel cheating them is about the same as cheating at a computer game. Though I wouldn't break any laws to cheat them, I don't feel sorry for them either.
In your world, there is no honor system. You'd sneer and leave the resaurant without paying what you owe. You'd pat yourself on the back while the restaurant owner struggles to pay his workers and keep the doors open.
Also the restaurant is a place that cooks and serves babies. If you're going to paint a ridiculously dark scenario, you have to go All The Way, man.
If I'm at a restaurant and the check arrives with some of the items I ordered absent from that total, I am probably going to assume that the waiter comped them to me, and leave a generous tip. No sneering involved.
I put it to you that if a restaurant ever went out of business because of food that was served but never paid for, the restaurant shoulders at least part of the blame for employing a waitstaff that can't keep track of an order properly. But it would have to be quite an epidemic problem for that kind of thing to happen.
In the UK I think there is something in law which states that the customer must expect to pay a reasonable price for an item, and they don't get all the rights if the retailer messes up the price. Can't find an exact citation but this has come up before in similar on-line foul-ups - Argos offered TVs for a pound or something like that, and they were legally entitled to cancel all completed orders as the price was not a reasonable price for a TV.
Here's some detail on the Argos case, and on other examples in the UK including Amazon. It would seem that the retailer was able to cancel the contract by admitting a mistake - a mistake that should have been obvious to customers as the price was not reasonable.
Seems fair to me - mistakes can happen both ways. Imagine you were writing a cheque for a big item in a hurry, and put down too many zeroes (or maybe you have trouble with writing). Would it be reasonable for the retailer to keep the extra money from the mistake? After all, the transaction is completed, and it's not the retailer's fault if the customer has difficulty writing cheques. to me, that sounds wrong.
Just as in all walks of life, there ain't such a thing as a free lunch.
Contracts covered under the Uniform Commercial Code are not subject to contract common-law provisions such as mutual consideration and/or detriment-benefit consideration.
But again, IANAL. If you are, then you'd certainly be more informed about this stuff than I am.
You go in to a big-box store. You see a special two-for one advertised and buy the products. When you get to the register the clerk mis-rings it, punching in the wrong amount. Do you A.) Politely notify the clerk of their mistake and pay the difference, or B.) Walk out knowing you just got away with not paying what you expected to.
I know what I'd do. Even though I hate big, faceless corporations, I'd pay. I wouldn't even think about it. That's just the way I was raised, I guess. Would I do the same thing on Amazon? I'd like to say yes, because I think the morality is pretty clear, but I'm actually unsure of what I would have done in this situation. The real difference is looking somone in the face and knowing, "hey, this person will probably get shit if I do this and their boss finds out." Without that immediate, person to person contact, the urge to put one over on a big corporation when no one will get hurt is pretty tempting.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
As a former food-service worker, you are 100% correct. You leave the difference as a tip and you don't have to worry about tipping above that number. It's called "a Win-Win". For the record, most restaurants throw more food away than they actually serve to customers. But I digress...
Come and see the violence inherent in the system!
Let's say I bought a $10 armoire from a garage sale and later found a $10,000 holder's bond attached to the underside of it left by the seller's long deceased grandma. The seller later finds out about the bond and wants to reclaim it. If I fight him in the court with the argument that the transaction has already taken place, I'll lose. The court will not reward windfall.
In the Amazon case, the buyers (intentionally or not) are getting a windfall from the transaction. As such, they won't be rewarded by the court. Granted none of them will end up in court given the relatively small cost of a DVD set.
Since our collective "morality" if you will are defined/judged by the court, the right thing to do in this case will be to either return the DVDs at Amazon's cost or be charged for the price advertised (buy 1 get 1 free).
What I will say is that you are mixing morality and legality here. Stealing is a legal issue, not a moral one. From a legal standpoint, Amazon probably doesn't have a leg to stand on. From a moral standpoint, the people who intentionally took advantage of the mistake are slime.
However, I take great offense at this statement: Come on, you can lawyer your way around the T&C all you like Companies like to jerk consumers around with T&C all the time. They have hidden, arbitrary limits to usage, "bait-and-switch" price changes (not in this case, obviously), attempted restrictions on fair use rights, remote-destruction of the product if they decide that it is not being used within their terms... Fighting them using their own terms is akin to guerrilla warfare. You have to deal with these people on their terms, because they will never deal with you on yours. If they want to take away all the power of the consumer, then they need to realize that they are also assuming the consumer's responsibility.
Whenever I shop online, I will use a virtual/throwaway number (from citibank, in particular). The virtual number is different than the regular card number, expires in one month and (AFAIK) only allows one charge; any further ones get refused. I saw a demonstration of this restriction early on when I began using the feature, I made a mistake--generated three different virtual numbers but sent the same one to three different merchants I ordered from. The first one was accepted and the other two got refused.
I'm wondering now,,,, (with this particular card issuer/feature) if any merchant would have a way to put a second charge on?...
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It certainly wouldn't be completely effective but it would seem to fit our model of transactions better. More of a shopkeeper telling a regular customer, "We both know you purchased that item for a price that was obviously a mistake, essentially free. And now I'm asking you to make it right by agreeing to pay what the advertised price was, the price that you saw it was supposed to be when you put it in your cart. You have the right to say no, to not pay, but if you take that path you are no longer welcome to shop in my establishment. Please take your future business elsewhere."
And to those that would argue that they believed Amazon was actually giving away boxed DVD sets for $.01 I shake my head wearily.