In mid-November Todd jumped on a sensational deal for a big-screen HDTV and a home theater system. He placed his order, sure that he wouldn’t find a more appealing offer on Black Friday, but says Dell has yet to ship his order or explain the delay.

Todd isn’t the only one complaining about the problem. He writes:

On November 15, 2009, Dell Home Inc. offered consumers a holiday bundle of a 50” Samsung Plasma Television along with a Samsung home theater system for $770+tax. Rightfully so, many consumers (myself included) purchased this bundle as it was full 1080p and better than other retail competitors. Within hours the deal had died online. Surprisingly though, Dell continued to take orders over the phone and through their online chat even up until Tuesday November 17th. This is actually uncharacteristic of Dell, yet many consumers still took advantage of this apparent great deal.

As of today, Dell has yet to ship one bundle out, but they have not offered any sound explanation.

From my own experience as well as from a very active forum (1000+ posts) on this deal, Customer Service Representatives offer excuses such as: it will ship at a later date, your credit card info was incorrect, this was a pricing mistake, basically anything they can seemingly make up to get off the phone.

Was this truly a pricing mistake? While the deal is slightly better than some other recent deals, it’s not out of range completely.

However, it’s not the fact that Dell MAY have made a pricing error which upsets me.
The first mistake was they continued to take orders for the bundle for 3 days, thus making it appear that the item had an abundance of stock. In the past when Dell has made price mistakes, they usually have not continued taking orders for days after via the phone or online.

It’s also the manner in which they communicated (or, really, lack of which) with those that purchased the bundle which is upsetting. They provided nebulous reasons every time we call them (i.e.incorrect credit card number was given, there was too much demand, the system is slow, etc…) Shouldn’t at least SOME of the systems have shipped 5 days after the order was placed? Not one tracking number has been distributed to date.

It appears that Dell has been intentionally lying to its consumers.

Recent posts appear to suggest that ALL of our orders will be canceled (At least 5 days after placing them, with no real update at this point.) This is just inexcusable; I could have bought a tv from a legitimate company during this time for about the same price.

Dell’s lack of customer service in this matter is appalling, and I doubt I will be ordering anything from them again.

Todd checked in again yesterday, saying that Dell continues to push back its expected shipping date. He suspects Dell may have made a pricing error.

What would you do in Todd’s situation?

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