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Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

arstechnica.com

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Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#161

Post by autoexec »

leetrout wrote: post #70

Lenovo has entered the chat. This is everything in the Lenovo online store. I signed up for a business account and called a rep on the phone and got a quote for a single machine and the rep gave me a discount of 15% and then when I went on the website the exact same machine was 35% off (and is perpetually on sale for that discounted amount).

This is the least of Lenovo's issues. They're fine with shipping computers that have malware and backdoors, sometimes in exchange for money. I don't know how much more clearly they can communicate to people that they shouldn't be trusted.

Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#162

Post by m463 »

bibanez wrote: post #48
jerf wrote: post #16

I just straight-up ignore "sale" claims now, unless I have personal experience that says this really is a sale. This is mostly limited to groceries where I definitely know that the $4 bag of chips really is on sale at $1.50. Along with all the active deception, I also just count all the times I've gone price shopping for non-trivial things and the prices I see and how festooned with the word "sale" the page is is sim…

I go to a store where they put the price per kilo, even when it is discounted. This way, I only need to compare price per kilo with other products to see if it's worth it!

I usually find the numbers are (purposefully?) ridiculous.

if you compare products, one might say "3.24 per EACH" and another might say "0.04 per oz" or some other nonsense.

Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#163

Post by m463 »

dcow wrote: post #69
lotsofpulp wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Costco is pretty good about their sale prices being lower than most times.

Came here to say this. At this point I consider it part of Costco’s brand that I can trust I’m getting close to the lowest possible price for a product when I buy from them. Sure Costco still has it’s own deals and sales pop up on a cadence (for example, never buy tires off-sale because they run the tire sale basically ever 6 weeks, the Traeger event happens something like quarterly, etc.), but overall they’re trustw…

I also find that sometimes a product seems to be comparable, but isn't.

There was a grill at costco I was interested in and it seemed to be about the same price at home depot.

But looking further it turns out the costco model also included a grill cover and a thermometer.

Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#164

Post by lotsofpulp »

m463 wrote: post #163
dcow wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Came here to say this. At this point I consider it part of Costco’s brand that I can trust I’m getting close to the lowest possible price for a product when I buy from them. Sure Costco still has it’s own deals and sales pop up on a cadence (for example, never buy tires off-sale because they run the tire sale basically ever 6 weeks, the Traeger event happens something like quarterly, etc.), but overall they’re trustw…

I also find that sometimes a product seems to be comparable, but isn't. There was a grill at costco I was interested in and it seemed to be about the same price at home depot. But looking further it turns out the costco model also included a grill cover and a thermometer.

I also assumed Costco’s longer warranty meant that products bought from there would be made at least a little bit better.

It is a shame the 4 year appliance warranty is gone. Used to be such a no brainer to buy appliances at Costco.

Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#165

Post by dylan604 »

autoexec wrote: post #160
dylan604 wrote: post #74

Isn't this standard operating procedure for anything retail? Why is Dell being singled out? Amazon is notorious about this. Look at the prices before one of their "events" on items, and then when the "event" starts you'll see that the price is the same only they list a higher price as the original and show the normal price as the sales price. So there's no difference in price before/after the event. Brick and mortar…

Why the hell are you worried about dell being singled out instead of thinking "At least one of these bastards is being held accountable!" Everyone one of them should pay, but I'm glad that today it's Dell.

Why the hell can't all of them be held accountable? Seriously, why are they only able to hold one company accountable? What are their limitations? What were their criteria to single out the one company? The SEC just charged multiple crypto companies that everyone knew charges were coming. They were able to avoid the "why just one" by not charging just one.

Seriously, why the hell?

Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#166

Post by slim »

leidenfrost wrote: post #14

For other people in developing countries: Isn't it weird to see news about a massive outrage for practices that in our place are totally common? Where I'm from, this happens all the time. And the law permits them to just change the price at whim. So they can just raise the price of any product and slap a "discount" label on them, even if the new "discounted" price is higher than the previous one.

In Tunisia, North Africa we have laws against that. It works even in third world, because those bad practices do not benefit the business, they really need to get rid of inventory sometimes and they need to do it in a safe trusted way.

Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#167

Post by ethbr0 »

JohnFen wrote: post #98
throwaway173738 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also just because something is in a larger size, it doesn’t always make the prices better. Once I was at Fred Meyer and the 1 pound bags of lentils were $1.50 but the two pound bags were $4.00. They were charging more for larger handling units.

Yeah, this is a trick that retailers have been playing for a long time. Same with buying from those bulk bins. Much of the time, the bulk bin goods are the same price as the packaged versions. Sometimes, they're more expensive. Numerous times, I've seen store employees filling the bins by opening retail packages and emptying them in. You can trust nothing in grocery stores.

It's not a "trick" -- it's a consequence of dynamic pricing and how efficient supply chains are now.

You're effectively running volume arbitrage to even out inefficiencies in seller's upstream suppliers.

Or, to put it another way, the seller's profits (margin*volume) can often be the same on smaller package (even for cheaper per weight unit) as larger package (for more expensive per weight unit).

Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#168

Post by rstuart4133 »

vxNsr wrote: post #24
jerf wrote: post #16

I just straight-up ignore "sale" claims now, unless I have personal experience that says this really is a sale. This is mostly limited to groceries where I definitely know that the $4 bag of chips really is on sale at $1.50. Along with all the active deception, I also just count all the times I've gone price shopping for non-trivial things and the prices I see and how festooned with the word "sale" the page is is sim…

Yup. A lot of the consumer protection regulations are being totally ignored with impunity. It’s nice to see one retailer held to account. But I don’t think it foretells a larger trend. These days you need to be very aware of what a fair price is for any given thing and then shop around to find the best deal based on that understanding. Totally ignore %-off, initial prices. Just look for the deal based on what you kno…

> Yup. A lot of the consumer protection regulations are being totally ignored with impunity. It’s nice to see one retailer held to account. But I don’t think it foretells a larger trend.

I'm Australian. I saw the headline, and my first thought was "I wonder if this is some US retailer playing fast a loose with the truth in Australia". And yup, it was.

Australia is not the USA. You don't ignore consumer laws in Australia with impunity like you can in the USA.

The best example I've seen was HP not honouring their warranties on laptops. The ACCC (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission - a government agency) forced hp.com to put a 1/2 page banner at the top of every web page saying they didn't honour warranties, and spelling out the details of what they did. It was in your face, it was ugly, and it was startling sight for any hp.com visitor.

I've only saw this happen twice. The other time was a local retailer called kogan.com. That's probably because that demonstration of what the government will do to companies that don't comply with the law (I'm sure it hurt more than any fine) there is now near 100% compliance with what the companies doing business in Australia say they will do on their web site, and what they actually do.

Another classic example is Australian ISP's are forced to advertise what your minimum download speed at peak hour will be. And it's enforced. Can you believe that? There is a place in the world where download speeds are what they say on the box, and "unlimited downloads" really means "download as much as you like".

Australia is a living demonstration that you don't have to live in a post-truth society. It is possible to pass laws to say you have to spell out in straightforward, non-misleading terms on the box what is in the box. And it's possible to enforce them in imaginative ways that remarkably effective, yet don't involve fines so you don't get companies evaluating the tradeoff of paying the fine versus lying and keeping the loot. And yes, the end result makes life simpler fairer for everyone - including the retailers.

Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#169

Post by Elfir3 »

autoexec wrote: post #157
Elfir3 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have the same issue with rice, they always put the price per kg, never per grain..

weight is better for rice since individual grains will vary with size and width.

That's the point, I would only take the biggests.

Re: Dell in hot water for making shoppers think overpriced monitors were discounted

#170

Post by jonfw »

diffeomorphism wrote: post #11
jonfw wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if you want the free market to work, consumers can’t use price to evaluate quality

This is a bit of a chicken and egg problem and too abridged. It is like arguing that for free speech to work everybody has to write newspaper articles or that you personally need to be a programmer for opensource to be useful. These can be different people and for a free market (/free(dom) speech/free(dom) software) to work you need a sufficient number of qualified people. So I wouldn't blame the consumers (btw this…

Price is even more easily gamed than reviews, i don’t care how bad reviews get, pricing will always be a terrible signal
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