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Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

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Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#171

Post by Can_Not »

dodobirdlord wrote: post #104
judge2020 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This probably plays into the antitrust issues. Amazon is so big that they can drop probably $200,000+ In revenue in exchange for news articles like this one and to let users know Amazon always takes their side. Say a new non-unicorn competitor joins the e-commerce space. They can't afford to burn money like Amazon can, so disputes are treated on a case-by-case basis with investigating sometimes taking weeks before ch…

> Suddenly people stop buying from this company because there isn't a 99.5% chance that the company will refund any future fraud or mishaps. In this scenario one company offers a better product via a better customer experience. Simply being able to offer a better product because of scale is now enough to get people talking about antitrust issues. Not everything is an antitrust issue. It's really starting to grate on…

> It's really starting to grate on me that it's impossible these days for a title to have "Amazon" in it and nobody to be down in the comment section grinding an axe about trust-busting

How do walk right into text book examples of modern antitrust issues and get mad people notice?

No, of course none of the strawmen are the issue, it's their vertical and horizontal sizes that break the theoretical math of competitive markets and the use of their weight to enforce their hegemonic authoritarianism on/against municipalities and small businesses.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#172

Post by eyeundersand »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #116
Kye wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not some over-burdened shop owner on the corner. I doubt any people were involved in setting these prices. Some algorithm messed up somewhere in a company for which this is a rounding error.

I agree. But you have to admit it is unethical. People justify stealing $16 million from the government because it is just a rounding error every day :)

I'm interested in finding out more about your final statement. Care to explain?

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#173

Post by VvR-Ox »

kls wrote: post #108

Sounds to me like someone at Amazon is good at marketing. Let a few things go for an insane deal, knowing it will hit the front page of every blog. Then reap the rush of next years prime day with people scouring the site for pricing "errors". Pretty cheap and effective marketing. Kind of like a raffle but without having to get all the lawyers involved to make sure you comply with raffle laws.

Exactly. The funny thing is: It's basically the same thing as the "prime day" itself.

Provide stuff at a price point no one can compete - do this just good enough to hook people and keep the thought in their heads to buy at your place.

Not totally reasonable when thinking it through but that's just marketing of people who know how the human psyche works.

@amzn marketing: well done.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#174

Post by rootusrootus »

the_reformation wrote: post #153
kls wrote: post #108

Sounds to me like someone at Amazon is good at marketing. Let a few things go for an insane deal, knowing it will hit the front page of every blog. Then reap the rush of next years prime day with people scouring the site for pricing "errors". Pretty cheap and effective marketing. Kind of like a raffle but without having to get all the lawyers involved to make sure you comply with raffle laws.

Even when literally losing thousands of dollars to honor a price advertised to customers, HN manages to spin's Amazon's actions as somehow duplicitous.

I see it more as people rationalizing their own decision to take advantage of such an obvious mistake.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#175

Post by awkward »

the_reformation wrote: post #153
kls wrote: post #108

Sounds to me like someone at Amazon is good at marketing. Let a few things go for an insane deal, knowing it will hit the front page of every blog. Then reap the rush of next years prime day with people scouring the site for pricing "errors". Pretty cheap and effective marketing. Kind of like a raffle but without having to get all the lawyers involved to make sure you comply with raffle laws.

Even when literally losing thousands of dollars to honor a price advertised to customers, HN manages to spin's Amazon's actions as somehow duplicitous.

If you feel like you need to defend them from the accusation that they're doing marketing, it means they're really good at marketing.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#176

Post by qiqitori »

FireBeyond wrote: post #137
danso wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But price matching is predicated on realistic economic competition, not we'll-match-it-no-matter-what-based-on-principle. There are already exceptions based on only dealing with "major online retailers" – i.e. retailers that operate on making stable revenue/profit from selling things – as well as disqualifying certain kind of discounts, like clearances and Black Friday prices. And in any case, Best Buy's qualifying r…

One of the things they "fixed" was requiring it to be sold by Amazon or Fulfilled By Amazon. A few years ago there was a little racket in creating an Amazon seller account, "selling" things at stupid discounts (which you neither had nor intended to fulfill), go into Best Buy and say "Look, half that price on Amazon, match it!".

Huh, it's crazy that they do this at all.

How do they check this kind of thing? Do they ask the buyer to display the Amazon page on their smartphone if it's just a small discount? Or do they always check on their own devices? (Amazon reportedly sometimes displays different prices for different accounts.)

In my experience, if you need a retail clerk to do something for you and the first person turns you down, you can often just go to a different clerk (if possible in a different shop) and try your luck again. (I've done this 1) to get my phone company to change my phone number despite not quite fulfilling the requirements 2) to get an MP3 file of a store's theme song.)

Now I believe trying to fake an Amazon page in order to get a price-matching discount is most likely fraud, but it still seems like some people who aren't fraudsters in general (e.g. teenagers) would be trying this kind of thing.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#177

Post by bromuro »

nkozyra wrote: post #121
kls wrote: post #108

Sounds to me like someone at Amazon is good at marketing. Let a few things go for an insane deal, knowing it will hit the front page of every blog. Then reap the rush of next years prime day with people scouring the site for pricing "errors". Pretty cheap and effective marketing. Kind of like a raffle but without having to get all the lawyers involved to make sure you comply with raffle laws.

> Sounds to me like someone at Amazon is good at marketing. Ah yes, finally someone will be talking about Amazon and Prime Day.

To me is the first time i hear about it.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#178

Post by _Nat_ »

acid__ wrote: post #123

I got in on this! I got a Sony A7R II and a 24-70 2.8 II I'd always wanted but could never justify the purchase of. ($~3k value for $200) A few observations: - Despite the extraordinary deal we got, my friends (who also made a purchase) and I all have our joy offset by a feeling of regret that we didn't order more. Greed! - Despite the fact that I couldn't justify the purchase before I owned them, I now definitely do…

Grats on the lucky score!

> A lot of people saying the orders are going to be cancelled -- seeing as I currently have both body and lens in possession, I find that unlikely.

Gotta agree that it's unlikely for these orders to be cancelled. Seems like Amazon.com's got a lot of cash (without checking, but I assume?), so they can probably afford it. Instead, the smart move would seem to be to play this up hard -- perhaps, for example, pushing a few stories in advance of the next Prime Day about this mistake, driving more sales as folks hope to enjoy a similar lucky break.

I mean, overall, seems like a nice feel-good story.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#179

Post by lysp »

docker_up wrote: post #164

This is an unintentional by-product of shipping so quickly. As Amazon moves to quicker and quicker shipping policies, it means that errors like this can't be reversed in time. I would imagine that Amazon could threaten to close the customer's account if they refused to return the camera equipment but that might be a bit extreme and might be very bad press.

You'd think they'd add a fail-safe into their systems just in case for these circumstances.

eg.

* If SalePrice * If (CostPrice - SalesPrice) > $500 - Delay Order

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#180

Post by gingabriska »

huangc10 wrote: post #4

They will cancel majority of the purchases. However, if you were smart, you'd have chosen 1 day shipping and have received the item. Me? I was not smart and did not select 1 day shipping so it looks like my order will most likely be canceled once Amazon deals with this...

Amazon has made this mistake in past too and it seems they are unable to solve it.

I think Amazon might start asking manufacturers to add remote bricking ability, so that when mistakes like this happens, Amazon remotely bricks the device before even customer gets to open it and then Amazon sends them an email, "it seems the device we sent you at unbelievably low price was broken before even reaching your door, if you return it you would receive a $20 gift card" )

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