Taiwan Regulators Tell Dell It Must Sell Mispriced Monitors At $15
from the ouch dept
Ever since e-commerce began there have been stories of mispriced items -- and following that, stories of the mad rush to buy the mispriced product (especially when it involves misplaced decimals, shrinking the price by orders of magnitude). In the US, at least, it's quite clear that such a mispricing need not be honored by the retailer, though public pressure often leads the retailer to offer something to those who tried to buy, just for the sake of PR. Given that, it's quite surprising to see Taiwan regulators tell Dell that it needs to honor the 140,000 monitors that were sold for about $15 each when they really were supposed to be $150. It's difficult to see how it makes sense to enforce the lower price. It was a clear mistake, and most of the orders were clearly only made due to the mistake.
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Filed Under: mispriced monitors, taiwan
Companies: dells
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are cheaper, but it sure seems suspicious that Dell never
has a $150 available for $1500.
If all these misprices are supposed to be accidental,
then there ought to be some hilarious mispricing
in the opposite direction too.
Strangely, mispricing upwards never seems to happen.
Even stranger, the opposite seems to happen in retail
stores: if the price on the shelf doesn't match the
price of the scanner, the scanned price is usually higher
than the shelf price.
I wonder why that is.
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Possibly because nobody will buy a product that is over priced by a magnitude of 10? And that price comparison sites will not list it or it will be so low on the list that it is not found!
If this was the case apple would of gone bankrupt by now...
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Best comment I've read in days! :)
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Sounds to me like you're a pessimist.
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Unless you've got a stronger word, I'll accept that.
Or, like 'big, bigger, biggest', I'm a pessimistest.
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You acknowledged the reporting bias yourself, that's why they "never seem to happen".
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Sure it does. You just don't hear about it, because no one rushes to buy a $150 monitor for $1500.
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Well I, for one, legitimately bought my 30,000 Dell monitors.
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I fail to see your logic in this. You go on and on about the "power of free", and at the same time, ignore something called a "loss leader". Offering something at one price and then refusing to sell it is called bait-and-switch, and has driven a lot of companies out of business (Sun Electronics is one from my area that was known for this decades ago). Recently, this happened to a LOT of NY companies that were selling cameras.
Having the government enforce customer price protection in this regards can only be a GOOD thing - otherwise, what will prevent EVERY company from offering widget xyz at $15 and then charging you $350 for it?
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Now, those laws are in the US, I don't know about Taiwan.
It all depends on how Dell handled it. At Sun Electronics one was forced to pay that price and the "mistake" was never fixed (I don't know for sure, I'm just going off my experience at Best Buy). If Dell announces that mistake and offers to return the money and fixes that mistake than it's probably a mistake.
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Unless there is more information from another article, it appears that more than just a simple decimal error happened. I would think that a simple decimal error would count as a legitimate mistake. Changing pricing from $15 to $148? That sounds more akin to bait-and-switch.
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"The fact that they announced the error and offered compensation for it is pretty telling in a company as large as Dell."
Dell manufactures in bulk, so much so, that the monitors probably only cost them 15 dollars each. Also, typographical error from 150 to 15 I could understand, but not 148 to 15. That was deliberate. Whether they wound up mixing their wholesale price with their retail price, that is their problem. Again, if it was caught before the transactions were completed, I would say ok on the apology. If the transaction went through, a deals a deal. The contract has been signed. Dell is out of luck there.
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I am with Technomage on this one. Had the error been $15 to $150, I would have gone with the thought that obviously the price was in error and not honored sales, or not honored any multi-monitor sales (their discretion). The law does permit honest and obvious mistakes to be corrected, but courts tend to look at these "errors" carefully to be sure they errors and not bait-and-switch, even if the "bait-and-switch" is inadvertant. Changing a price from $15 to $148 just looks bad.
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Taiwan consumer regulators have ordered Dell to honor an online pricing error that offered 19-inch LCD monitors for only NT$500 (US$15, £9).
The agency said in a statement (in Chinese) it received 471 complaints after Dell corrected the listing to the intended price of NT$4,800 (US$148, £90).
So US$15 -> US$148 or NT$500 -> NT$4800 seem fishy, but £9 -> £90 could have just been a decimal error.
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FYI, if the last digit is >= (that's greater than or equal to) 5, you increase the second to last number by 1.
$14.5 = $15
$14.7 = $15
etc.
If the last digit is
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Foreign currency exchange rates often don't make sense.
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"Taiwan consumer regulators have ordered Dell to honor an online pricing error that offered 19-inch LCD monitors for only NT$500 (US$15, £9)."
So Mike's statement is correct, with the exchange rate always fluctuating it's about 15 USD.
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You: "How much did you spend on this gift for me?"
Kids: "About..."
You: "Don't give me any of this about crap! I want exact figures!"
Kids: "But daddy, we bought so much stuff that day. And we didn't keep our reciept." (crying)
You: "Well that will teach you. Go return all the gifts, re-buy them, and tell me the exact price you payed!"
yeah. All kinds of fun at your house.
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You guys going on and on about which of the two it was: What's the freaking difference?
Mike mentions the interesting case of decimal errors because they are more frequent, and easy to enter, but harder to catch. But either way, an error is an error.
And for those of you (AC) pissed that Mike "said it was a decimal error in Taiwan, but it wasn't" have a look at how Mike discussed the decimal error matter. It was in a completely generalized context:
"Ever since e-commerce began there have been stories of mispriced items -- and following that, stories of the mad rush to buy the mispriced product (especially when it involves misplaced decimals, shrinking the price by orders of magnitude"
Man! You're the kind of people that could get struck by a lightning bolt, die, and spend your dying moments arguing whether the bolt shot up, or down.
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There was no switch here. It was "bait and sell". That is a clear indication of a pricing mistake, not a shady sales strategy.
For the record, Bait and Switch would occur IF the website advertised the $15 monitor, displayed it for sale, but would 1) not let you purchase it as they hard-sell a more expensive monitor, or 2) only let you purchase it after hard-selling a more expensive product. Do you see how both of my actual cases involve a "switch". There was no switch in the Dell case.
Who cares whether it was a decimal glitch or a different glitch? It has none of the telltale signs of a scam. It was a mistake, bears all the trappings of a mistake, people flash-mobbed to take advantage of the mistake, and Dell should get egg on their face, and that's about all.
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Re: NY companies that were selling cameras.
I hope the regulators have done something about those scam artists.
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Re: Re: NY companies that were selling cameras.
Cameras are also a very popular bait and switch ecommerce item.
Of course, this is very different from the Dell case in that there is a definite "bait" and a hard-sell "switch", which Dell never did.
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Speculation
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Re: Speculation
Found a link http://www.warp2search.net/contentteller/news_story/buy_a_geforce4_ti4600_and_get_arrested_bestbuyco m.html
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I'm with the regulators here. If Dell made mistake on its website and when consumers tried to buy were told, "Ooops, it's a mistake, sorry." I'd agree with you.
But if the consumers are able to complete the sale and obtain a confirmation that the sale went through, then I see no basis to allow Dell to back out.
The problem is, when it's a mistake to the detriment of a large corporation, the corporation wins. But when the detriment is to the little guy, like the guy who dares to turn on his iPhone in Canada and gets a bill for several thousand dollars, the corporation still wins.
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losers weepers
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UK
But in this case, the sales went through, people got their order confirmation 's. you cant go back on a sale that has been confirmed.
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One of the cop-outs you refer to is where there is no reasonable belief that it should be that price and also I think there is "causes the company significant financial loss".
Either of those would do the job in this case.
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Sales alerts
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I don't see a problem...
There's nothing much wrong with having it either way, just as long as the regulations are clear and consistently applied.
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Its not consumer protection (because vendors could simplying refund the $15.) its about monopoly and anti competition. Dell priced monitor at $15. Drive sales of maybe other item to their sites, increase revenue, then says ops, sorry, mistake. Now, HP just lost potential customers because of marketing tricks. Granted, its a geniue mistake by Dell but the idea is the same and Laws are made to protect business from unfair competitions.
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That it was a clear mistake is immaterial, because next time it might not be "so clear".
This will make sure that next time they check their figures before advertising
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I am surprised at the responses here...
While I might put in an order for an item like this but I wouldn't complain if I didn't actually get it.
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Re: I am surprised at the responses here...
But your biggest flaw in your argument is saying that "It isn't like they are selling bread and milk; these are luxery items," --First off, what if these people buying them use them for their businesses? --second, "luxery item" or not, a price was posted, sales were made and the customer deserves to have the retailer honor the sale.
You are right that it's not the end of the world, but then again, imagine what would happen is the "bread and milk" industry started posting prices for their products and then claiming it was a simple "mistake."
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Re: Re: I am surprised at the responses here...
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Thats a big chunk of change
just some math for my point
normal selling price = 150 x 140,000 = 21 Million
discount price = 15 x 140,000 = 2.1 Million
Dell is going to take a loss of 18.9 million from this judgment.
Now doing a quick wholesale search I found the cheapest price around 120 each but since dell has larger orders and better buyers I could see this price cut to 100 or even 80 each. Even at this price dell is taking such a large loss and never advertised outside one specific webpage this price that its insane that it could be anything but a mistake or actual fruad from an employee (who could get rich off buying lots of them)
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Somone is...
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Wow....
I spent close to ten years working in the grocery industry in California. Near the end of my time with them, the grocery chain I worked for had almost bi-weekly, unscheduled visits from weights and measures. Now this wasn't because my particular store was doing anything wrong, but that there were three or four stores that had been nailed for improper pricing and sales.
Basically what this means is that even if an employee screwed up making signage or placing tags, the price that that was in front of the item better match what it scanned at the register. If it didn't, and it didn't matter if it was low or high, the store and the chain were fined. And it was a fine in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
It got to the point that we were so paranoid that we were triple checking everything in the store, not just the department we worked in. If anything was wrong, we had to be prepared to honor it at that price. If that meant that a $80 bottle of scotch was sold for $20, then so be it.
All due to regulations by the state, and possibly federal government, department called Weights and Measures. This applies to any store that sells anything. Not just to items that have to be weighed first. If the item once scanned does not match the price that the sign says, the store is in violation of regulations.
Here's an experiment to try. Go to your local Wal-Mart and find a display of an item that has a price that looks too good to be true. Using your trusty Cell Phone camera, start recording video. You might want to make sure that you have a phone with a memory card in it and set your video to full size recording. Record the display, maybe your watch (with date and time), the price on the display, and leave your camera running. Go get in line and make your purchase. Now the fun part. If the item scans at a higher price, tell the cashier and watch the fun. They will send a manager to check on the display. The manager will come back and tell you that you were wrong, of course, and that the display sign matches the price scanned. Now, go back to the display with the manager and you will see that yes, it does match. But, just 5 minutes ago, it didn't. Now you get to pull out your cell phone, still recording of course, and show the manager the video. Then see what happens. You will probably get kicked out of the store for videotaping without permission and they will not sell you the item.
This may seem like an extreme condition, but it's happened to me at least twice, and to other people I know several times. The only way to get them to honor that price is to force them to with the proof.
Now when it comes to a website deal, screenshots rule. Don't let them try to fake you out like that.
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Re: Wow....
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Perhaps it has happened too many times?
A company the size of Dell should have many layers of checks when a website is changed to reflect a new price for an item. I find it a bit too convenient that Dell claims "it was a mistake" when this "mistake" seems to occur more then once a year.
Dell needs to buck up and take it on the chin with this one, and review their procedures for Website changes. Why the consumer is always asked to "be the big boy" when this happens seems, to me at least, is wrong. I'm willing to forgive a company's mistake once, but if that company continues to claim "mistake", then it should be the responsibility of that company to insure it doesn't make mistakes; one way to help assure that Dell and other company's stop making mistakes is to hold them responsible for such mistakes.
As for the consumer wouldn't have purchased this except for the price, while that may be true, just why is it the consumer who gets penalized for the company's "mistake"? We are always saying people need to take personal responsibility for their mistakes, shouldn't we also expect the same from the Company's we do business with?
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Re: Perhaps it has happened too many times?
But if we cancel the sales, how does the customer lose? They are net zero, same place they were the day before the purchase. Dell is also net zero. That is the best outcome.
People arguing that a deal is a deal, and a contract is a contract. OK, if you have the monitor at your house, maybe the deal is concluded. But if Dell realizes promptly the error, and hasn't shipped the screen yet, is the deal really concluded? In the US, we don't bill the customer until the item ships...so if that is also the case in Taiwan, no charge made to the customer, no LCD shipped, and no "signed contract" as a few people have suggested. Just a few clicks on a web page and a confirm email.
Yes, Dell should look stupid, lose brand value, have people somewhat annoyed at them, but they should not be forced to give everyone a windfall.
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Reasonable Expectation...
And for the record, bait and switch is when you advertise a sale on one item, and then hard sell on a different, more expensive item, on the basis that the cheaper item is no longer available. Even if I hard sold on a more expensive item yet the cheaper item was still available, technically its not bait and switch. (I work in retail!)
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Re: Reasonable Expectation...
I alos think too many here are making an incorrect assumption that $15 is "obviously" wrong. A few years ago a radio station teamed up with a gas station for a one-day gas sale to advertise a particular year (I think it was the year the radio station was founded, they wanted gas to be the price it was that year). So, for 8 or 12 hours a particular gas station had $.60 per gallon gas when gas was around $2 per gallon. Is that an "obvious" mistake or an advertising gimmick?
Just because something is ridiculously reduced in price does not mean it is an error. I just saw this week where Wal-Mart reduced the price of the leading national colas to $4.40 per case, which had to be below their cost, and the "sale" was not advertised in any outlet I saw. In fact, the newpaper circulars I got showed cases of cola were priced at $5.50 per case, but store displays were at $4.40. Mistake or loss leader?
We could think of thousands of examples where stores provide ridiculously low prices on something to draw in the crowds. As someone else pointed out earlier, I could see Dell selling $15 monitors hoping something would go viral - which seems to have happened.
As others noted, Dell did the thing that was not only stand-up, but they did the one thing that would keep customers happy - even if they took advantage of a Dell mistake - and regulators happy.
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Re: Reasonable Expectation...
I suppose that you're either being facetious or you've never heard of sales and promotions (like black Friday).
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Australia
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Reasonable Expectation...
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Easy fix...
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Yeah, but that should be a PR or policy decision that the store gets to make. Until you exchange funds and goods at the register, they should be able to say "oops, my bad, this was labelled wrong" and you should be able to say "I won't be coming back here".
If your way prevails, how many customers will be moving pricing stickers in stores, and then saying "it was labelled at $1 - now honor it."
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Dell is simply denying the discount offer it was given that night. It may be called a wrong discount, but the price was never wrong.
I simply can't stand it when Dell won't apologize for their mistake while still trying to mislead the world.......
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u no can haz discount
"The sales flyer offers whatchamajiggers for $4.99 but they rang up at $14.99? Oh well so sorry, the typesetter screwed up and they really are supposed to be $14.99."
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P.S I bought one 20" LCD...but...I really dont care I will get it or not
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