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Website Checkout Glitches: Two Very Different Corporate Responses
Freshly Exhumed writes "On the morning of December 26th, 2013, an error on the website of Delta Air Lines' produced impossibly low fare discounts of as much as 90% for about 2 hours before the problem was corrected. Delta, to their PR benefit, have swallowed the losses, and the lucky customers have shared their delight via social media. Unfortunately for many buyers of goods from The Brick furniture retailer, no such consumer warmth is forthcoming. The Brick's website checkout had awarded them an additional 50% off, over and above all other costs, but the official corporate response has been to demand the money be returned. Affected customers are now lashing The Brick with social media opprobrium and drawing direct comparisons with Delta's response. So, given that these are not small, mom-and-pop companies, have we reached a point at which online retailers are expected to just swallow such costs for PR purposes, as part of doing web business?"
Same rules don't apply.
Mom and pop would notice something was up and take down the sign.
Consumers should whine less when these things happen. Mistakes happen, and if a business goes down, real people suffer.
1. If it seems to good to be true then it is.
2. Don't do something to someone else that you wouldn't want done to you.
3. Don't be a whiney d-bag just because you tried to take advantage of a computer or human cock-up and now you don't get your cheap whatever-crap-you-ordered.
4. And stop whinging on social media too, trying to shame the company. That's also the worst of the twittersphere right there.
Karma, dude.