Thoughts on retailers discounting a lot right after selling with no forewarning of sale.

sheramber

Chrysalis said:

born_again said:

Chrysalis said:

Feels like its really common practice now aka flash sales.  but to me it feels its immoral so as a consumer I am tempted to take advantage of right to return and repurchase on discounted price which I am seeing more and more people do now.

Is this something other money savers on here do themselves if they are a victim of the next day/week post purchase price drop?

The retailer knows ahead of time they about to change the price.

TBH, as most people will know there are certain of the year when odds on prices will drop. 

But end of the day, if you need a product, you need it.


Is it immoral? No, what would you expect them to do knowing say Black Friday is coming up & they are cutting prices? Stop selling products for a couple of weeks?

Would I return one if it went on sale, as it was cheaper after purchase. NO. Life is too short to be messing around. Could work the other way & it's gone up.

No I would not expect them to stop selling the product, but you can try and go that extreme if you want if it makes you feel better.

Personally if I knew I had a planned discount coming up in my business, I would yes be telling customers about it in advance or giving it to them early.

Black Friday isnt a flash sale and isnt relevant to the question I asked, its a seasonal sale, and as such people know its a thing that happens every year around a certain date, similar with boxing day.

But what about the people who bought the day before you decide to reduce the price and start selling it early. There will always. Be some one who bought the day before so how far back would you go? A week, a month, six months?

RefluentBeans

Yeah agree with everyone here. Think you’re taking it too personally. Of course, you can try and appeal the law via your MP, but outside of that, its down to the retailer. 

I assume if you have such an issue with it - you’ve stopped using Amazon in protest? 

timmy963

Imagine agreeing mutually on a price, then the buyer coming back 2 weeks later saying they want it at the now cheaper price.

Imagine agreeing mutually on a price, then the seller knocking on your door demanding an extra 50% because they put the price up 2 weeks after you bought it.

oldernonethewiser

Chrysalis said:

oldernonethewiser said:

Chrysalis said:

Aylesbury_Duck said:

"Victim" implies deliberate exploitation, which it isn't.  Yes a retailer knows in advance that they're going to reduce a price, but they have to pick a date and time for it to take effect, and what should they do, suspend all sales until they can enact the change?  I see this as swings and roundabouts.  We benefit from the ability to buy almost anything from anywhere at any time, which presents lots of opportunity for customers but also the scenario where prices are dynamic. You win some, you lose some.

As for the tactic of returning online orders to repurchase at a lower price, that's a right of course, but as you'll see on this board, you run the slight risk of problems with missing parcels, disputed returns, delays and so on.  Depending on the discount you're chasing, that risk may not be one worth taking.  And if lots of people start doing it to the extent the retailer realises it's popular, they're perhaps going to be less likely to run sales in the way they do.

I would say its exactly that, exploitation, it used to be more common to pre announce sales, but flash sales have become trend now.

A middle ground is announce ahead of time, and tell staff to encourage people to buy when the sale starts instead if they about to over pay for an item.

I think if the end result of mass returns was to result in the end of flash sales, I would like it.  Prices are way too volatile now, Amazon price history graphs are an eye opener.  Go back to same price for the duration of stock and have predictable sale seasons.

Ironically this tactic did cost Amazon £500, I brought a phone a few years back for £880, 2 days later it dropped to £520, I told Amazon, lets make it easy refund me the difference, they refused so I took advantage of my consumer rights, their courier picked up the phone and then lost it.  Obviously they had to still refund me.   If only they applied common sense.

Some companies, including some retailers offer retroactive compensation to customers who "just miss out". Usually via price assurances (if we discount within XX days we refund the difference) or automatic adjustments to ordered within past XX days prior to offer.

What business would encourage staff to stop people buying things at the regular price? (not over paying)

Your "common sense" and Amazon's, and I suspect other retailers, are not the same thing.

I know a few, not every business chases every penny they can get, some pride themselves in other areas, if you dont know off any, john lewis is one such business.

I never really posted my own personal opinion as such, but for me if its over a month gap, I probably wont care, and likewise if its only a small amount of money, I would say the phone example I posted is probably the one time I got annoyed enough by it happening to do something, usually otherwise I dont bother doing anything.

I got a steam deck in September and two-three weeks later they went on sale, didnt do anything, but I know some asked for and got refunds equalling the discount on the uk steam deck discord server.

Is it really

Money_Grabber13579

oldernonethewiser said:

Chrysalis said:

oldernonethewiser said:

Chrysalis said:

Aylesbury_Duck said:

"Victim" implies deliberate exploitation, which it isn't.  Yes a retailer knows in advance that they're going to reduce a price, but they have to pick a date and time for it to take effect, and what should they do, suspend all sales until they can enact the change?  I see this as swings and roundabouts.  We benefit from the ability to buy almost anything from anywhere at any time, which presents lots of opportunity for customers but also the scenario where prices are dynamic. You win some, you lose some.

As for the tactic of returning online orders to repurchase at a lower price, that's a right of course, but as you'll see on this board, you run the slight risk of problems with missing parcels, disputed returns, delays and so on.  Depending on the discount you're chasing, that risk may not be one worth taking.  And if lots of people start doing it to the extent the retailer realises it's popular, they're perhaps going to be less likely to run sales in the way they do.

I would say its exactly that, exploitation, it used to be more common to pre announce sales, but flash sales have become trend now.

A middle ground is announce ahead of time, and tell staff to encourage people to buy when the sale starts instead if they about to over pay for an item.

I think if the end result of mass returns was to result in the end of flash sales, I would like it.  Prices are way too volatile now, Amazon price history graphs are an eye opener.  Go back to same price for the duration of stock and have predictable sale seasons.

Ironically this tactic did cost Amazon £500, I brought a phone a few years back for £880, 2 days later it dropped to £520, I told Amazon, lets make it easy refund me the difference, they refused so I took advantage of my consumer rights, their courier picked up the phone and then lost it.  Obviously they had to still refund me.   If only they applied common sense.

Some companies, including some retailers offer retroactive compensation to customers who "just miss out". Usually via price assurances (if we discount within XX days we refund the difference) or automatic adjustments to ordered within past XX days prior to offer.

What business would encourage staff to stop people buying things at the regular price? (not over paying)

Your "common sense" and Amazon's, and I suspect other retailers, are not the same thing.

I know a few, not every business chases every penny they can get, some pride themselves in other areas, if you dont know off any, john lewis is one such business.

I never really posted my own personal opinion as such, but for me if its over a month gap, I probably wont care, and likewise if its only a small amount of money, I would say the phone example I posted is probably the one time I got annoyed enough by it happening to do something, usually otherwise I dont bother doing anything.

I got a steam deck in September and two-three weeks later they went on sale, didnt do anything, but I know some asked for and got refunds equalling the discount on the uk steam deck discord server.

Is it really

Yeah, that was my reaction when I read that too. John Lewis’ customer service seems to have gone down hill massively in recent years. Understandable I guess; they’re losing money, cost savings need to be made somewhere. We might not all agree on where those cost savings should be but customer service always seems to be a prime target.