Discounts
”Dell Reduces Instant Discount By $200 Somewhere Between Shopping Cart And Order Confirmation
Before we get to the typical bad-company shenanigans—in this case, Dell's $599 discount mysteriously shrank to $400 between when he placed it in his shopping cart and when he reached the confirmation screen—we want to share this bit of ridiculousness. Dell's CSR Vanessa gives us the scoop on Dell's sophisticated order fulfillment system:
More »Jack: Can you look at sales history today and verify whether you sold this system at $599 off today? This was to be my third dell purchase, now I will not purchase again!
ATG Vanessa: There isn't a cart history unfortunately.
Jack: Sales history! Actual people who purchased this system today!
ATG Vanessa: We don't keep record of that.
Jack: You're telling me dell does not know what it has sold today?
ATG Vanessa: Remember this is done online and there's some confidential information we usually erase to protect customers.
Jack: Like what computers you have to build?
ATG Vanessa: So no, there isn't a record where you can see how much have been sold.
Jack: How do you know what you have to ship?
ATG Vanessa: It depends on what we have available at the moment.
This Toys "R" Us Discount Is Of Dubious Value
Dylan writes:I saw this today at the Toy"R"Us store in Elizabeth, New Jersey and though you folks would be interested. This Lego kit (the Exo Force Sentai Fortress Battle Set) has a sign that indicates its original price was $19.99 and that it is on sale for $69.98. The sign helpfully indicates that this is a savings of negative $49.We've seen fifty-cent adjustments in the wrong direction, but fifty dollars? That's pushing it.
Exclusive: AOL's Collections Guide Encourages Agents To Lie And Deceive
An anonymous tipster sent us AOL's 153 page internal collections guidebook for prying money out of delinquent account holders. The guide shows that AOL is following some of the debt industry's most egregious collection tactics by encouraging agents to deceive and lie to customers. After the jump we present AOL's scare tactics, tricks to negotiating a substantial discount, and the full collections guide.
More »
Restaurant Gives 25% Discount To Birthday Diners, Writes "Bug On Food" For Reason On Check
A restaurant in Dubai gave a 25% discount to a party of birthday diners after they found four bugs in their food. Says a restaurant official, "The guys thought being friendly and having a joke about the environment would relax the diners because it was a birthday, but unfortunately it didn't." We sort of think after the second or third bug, you should probably just comp the meal—and then shut down the restaurant for fumigation. More »Haggle With Chain Stores
The Times is reporting that recession-fearing chain stores like Best Buy, Home Depot, and Circuit City are increasingly more desperate to clinch sales by negotiating prices. Hit the jump to see how ordinary shoppers are wielding research and charisma to knock added savings out of retailers. More »
reverse discounts
Want To Use Amazon Prime? You'll Pay $50 More For This TomTom Unit
Steve was going to split the cost of a TomTom GPS Navigator unit with a friend so they could give it to his sister as a gift. They were having trouble figuring out how to split it, though, because Steve—who is a paying Amazon Prime member—was being offered the unit for $300, while his random stranger friend was seeing it for $50 less.More »
misleading
Is It Legal To Use Out Of Date List Prices For Comparison On Sales?
Last week we pointed out how Apple artificially inflates the discount of its refurbished units by using the original introductory list price as a comparison, even if the price has since dropped and the true list price is now lower. Now a reader writes in to say he caught Toys R Us doing the same thing on sale prices of Playstation 3 bundles and 30 gig Zunes. Our question: is this legal? New York City's consumer protection law seems to imply that—at least for retailers doing business in NYC—it's not, unless you clearly indicate the trail of price reductions, something neither company is doing. More »
misleading
You Can't Discount The Past, Apple
A reader noticed that Apple is selling refurbished 8gb iPhones for $349, and they're listing the original price as $599. "Save 42% off the original price," says the Apple Store. Gosh, that's a huge savings! Wait... well sure, the original original price was $599, but we all know that Apple knocked that down fairly quickly, and now a brand new 8 gb model sells for $399—which means actually you're only saving 12.5% off the Real World Price Right Now of a brand new iPhone, if you went and bought it today. More »
haggling
Pick Up Some Haggling Tips At HowToHaggle.com
HowToHaggle.com is a short, easy-to-skim website devoted exclusively to the concept of haggling. It's not the world's most extensive resource, but the tips page lists 15 very good things to keep in mind the next time you want to score a better deal on a product. More »
survey says
U.S. News: It's Your Own Damn Fault You Can't Redeem Rebates
U.S. News & World Report hates our inability to redeem rebates. If we only tried harder, they say, we might be able to conquer our "tendency to procrastinate and inability to follow multistep directions." Yes, that must be the problem. More »
theft
Thieves Steal 42" Plasma TV From Mall During Shopping Hours
Those post-holiday TV sales just aren't enough for some people, because somehow, a 42" plasma set used for display in a retail store in Albany, Georgia, was stolen from the counter during business hours. The employee who was working at the time had possibly the least helpful eyewitness testimony ever:More »
retail
Stores Beg Shoppers To Come Visit This Weekend
Spooked by the (apparently mythological) low numbers of shoppers this season, several retail chains are pulling out the stops in an attempt to lure consumers in over the next 72 hours, reports Reuters. Seven New York-area Macy's stores are now open non-stop until 6pm Monday. Kmart is holding a "64-hour sale" that begins tomorrow morning and lasts until 10pm Monday (we're not sure if the stores are staying open around the clock, however). JC Penney is advertising special sales tonight and tomorrow morning. More »
clothing
Sales Of Women's Clothing Drops, May Mean Steep Discounts Over The Next Week
Mastercard reported on Sunday that, after a slight bump around Black Friday, sales of women's clothing has dropped again, down 6% even while sales of men's clothing has gone up 4.5%. They think it has to do with an overall weak year for women's fashion, and the fact that mothers tend to cut back on new clothes for themselves first when faced with a tighter budget. The silver lining: there may be considerable discounts at women's clothing retailers in the immediate future as they try to bump up sales at the last minute. More »
discounts
3 Sites To Help You Save Money Online
PriceSpider works much like WishRadar that we mentioned last week, except PriceSpider focuses exclusively on electronics, and searches more sites. You choose the product and set a target price, and when it sees that price somewhere online, it sends you an alert. More »
how to
Save $10 On T-Mobile Total Internet
A reader writes in to say he saved $10 on his T-Mobile bill when he called up to ask why there were two different "Total Internet" options on his add-ons list. Were they the same thing? Yes. So he could switch to the cheaper one without penalty and get exactly the same add-on? Sure.More »







