Amazon Black Friday scam

dodger1

Fella wrote: »

Sigh. Really don't need "proof" that something which is actually more expensive than it was a week ago being advertised as 55% off is a scam.

But feel free to try to argue otherwise until you're blue in the face

Last weeks price is completely irrelevant, today's price is based solely on a percentage off of the RRP of £100 which is the same price on Philips own website. A black Friday deal is nothing more than an offer on a particular time slot on a particular day, nothing is mentioned about it being the cheapest deal they offer.

I do however thank you for the camelcamelcamel site, quite interesting.

Money-Saving-King

I can't see anywhere where it says that toothbrush is a deal specific for Black Friday.

sharnad

I've got loads of bargains from there and haven't had to go out shopping today. It's been great

lovinituk

Money-Saving-King wrote: »

I can't see anywhere where it says that toothbrush is a deal specific for Black Friday.

I think the black Friday deal has run out and its gone back up to £64.99.

Fella

JimmyTheWig wrote: »

OP, do you think that what Amazon have done here is against the law?
Do you think it is against some rules that they should be following?

Or do you think it is technically within the rules but manipulative nonetheless?

If the latter, out of interest, do you believe that the rules should be changed in some way to prevent things like this from happening?

I'm sure it's not against the law, very much the latter. I think this kind of thing is difficult to enforce with rules because those kind of rules tend to be easy to circumvent. For example with furniture stores, who step around the rules about fake discounts by selling each item at the "real" (in reality pretend) high price for a 2 week period each year then offering the 50% discount for the other 50 weeks with some smallprint at the bottom that says something like "this product cost the higher price for 2 weeks during MM/YY"

So I actually do think in cases like these the best action is to post on forums like this & if MSE Martin made a fuss about it out then so much the better. At worst a few people would be wised-up & at best the likes of Amazon might be shamed into better practices. Although that's probably optimistic

powerful_Rogue

Money-Saving-King wrote: »

I can't see anywhere where it says that toothbrush is a deal specific for Black Friday.

Dont worry, you havent missed your opportunity to be scammed - they are still offering the item at 35% off RRP.

Would that make it a triple scam as the price has changed 3 times recently?

Money-Saving-King

lovinituk wrote: »

I think the black Friday deal has run out and its gone back up to £64.99.

Well no my point is Black Friday deals are specific items not a general sale on everything. For example the Supermarkets also do it but if I walk in Tesco today I'm pretty sure I won't see Tesco value baked beans half price because it's Black Friday. The Black Friday deals are on specific items.

Amazon seems to have some automated system where prices can change depending on product demand eg this product which is now gone up in price during the day. I'd assume that's because it's sold so well the price was able to be taken up, maybe the op's link got it some extra sales because it was still pretty cheap anyway!

As I said though the discount on this item isn't listed anywhere as being a discount because of Black Friday. This is also probably why the price has changed because this product had nothing to do with Amazon's Black Friday deals anyway.

lovinituk

Money-Saving-King wrote: »

As I said though the discount on this item isn't listed anywhere as being a discount because of Black Friday. This is also probably why the price has changed because this product had nothing to do with Amazon's Black Friday deals anyway.

I'm pretty sure there were a specific number of units available at the lower price under the Black Friday deal. Hence why the OP saying at one point 88% were sold and then 100% were sold. Once 100% of the BF priced units had gone, it reverted to the 'normal' price.

Fella

lovinituk wrote: »

I'm pretty sure there were a specific number of units available at the lower price under the Black Friday deal. Hence why the OP saying at one point 88% were sold and then 100% were sold. Once 100% of the BF priced units had gone, it reverted to the 'normal' price.

Yes that's correct, it's still listed under "Missed Deals".

JimmyTheWig

Fella wrote: »

I'm sure it's not against the law

Then I think everyone is pretty much in agreement.