A***** Prime Sale Price Con

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yorkshirechap

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I wasn't going to post on this, but whilst browsing Google news tonight, I came across an article on the very same subject, relating to a supermarket.

The press article pointed out a "special offer", which took the form of a supermarket offering 2 bottles of orange squash for £2.50 or £1.59 individually. Sounds all well and good, until you learn that immediately prior to the offer period, the price per bottle was £1. In other words, an outright con and legally dubious at best. In retail this is common practice and I've seen it in supermarkets before, but never online. Perhaps I'm just not looking for it when I shop online, or a bit naive.

Anyway, on Tuesday I ordered a Fisher Price Jumperoo for the little lad. The price was listed as £69.99. This was duly delivered and all was fine.

Yesterday was a special event for Prime members and they had an enormous promotion with "special pricing for members only". One of the upcoming items included in the "flash sale" was the very same item I had ordered on the Tuesday, the Fisher Price Jumperoo. It was not yet an active deal but purely out of interest I clicked on the item link. Miraculously, on the item page, the price had changed to a non-sale price of £89.99!

Unfortunately, I didn't get chance to see the flash sale price but you do not have to be a rocket scientist to work out that it would not have been less than £69.99. So there was absolutely nothing special about the offers they had on, at all, despite all the promotional nonsense.

I don't know about you, but I find this sort of activity disgraceful. The only reason I post this is just on the off chance that someone, somewhere is not aware of this issue and may get caught out.

I'm all for retailers being allowed to charge whatever they want for items, but this is blatantly misleading. The CMA apparently agree, as they have just launched an investigation into the issue regarding supermarkets, not that I expect much to come from it, being as cynical as I am.
 
The CMA investigation has been ongoing since April 2014.
I wonder what stupid amounts of money have been thrown at it so far.
 
Yes definitely isn't right. I got to admit that I do research and compare with other shops as well before I hit buy in a sale.

Like with the Amazon Prime flash sale yesterday. I'm no too bothered what Amazon sold it for the day before, but I did check around and see what others were selling it for.
 
Retailers have it down to a fine art, studied, calculated and practised, they know what attracts they eye and the itchy trigger fingers and play on it mercilessly. The great unwashed masses have been conditioned to be greedy and not look too closely at 'bargains', anyone who ever worked in retail could tell horror stories of the great rip off.

The only thing you have to keep in mind when shopping for anything is that the retailer exists to take your money and for no other reason.
 
I too check prices against other reputable sites before clicking the buy button, who doesn't.

I bought 2 items via the prime sale on Wednesday, one was half the price of any other retailer, the other was £40 off retail and £30 less than anywhere else.
I did notice a few items that seemed to be only a few pounds cheaper than elsewhere though.
 
Any shop can have a never-ending sale - you just change the items that you're selling. It can be one range of sofa for a month, then next month it's tables, then next month it might be beds etc. You jack up the price during the non-sale period for at least six weeks, then drop the price. Same with jaffa cakes and other things. Which is why I'll look up prices from various sources where possible to buy the cheapest. Or I'll buy more when I know something's cheaper eg shower gel works out to £1 a bottle during sale times but £1.50 at other times.
 
yorkshirechap said:
which took the form of a supermarket offering 2 bottles of orange squash for £2.50 or £1.59 individually. Sounds all well and good, until you learn that immediately prior to the offer period, the price per bottle was £1.
Click to expand...

Yes seen something similar for a long time - the original offer was £1 each, then back to "normal" price, with a new offer of 2 for .... Can be very frustrating and I have seen it on Amazon Black Friday before when something was in the Black Friday deals, but a week or so later, was offered at the similar price - 1 that is current is PE13 - has been on offer on the Prime day for £39, has previously been offered for £39 just as a reduced price...
 
Anybody see the telly program on "Sports" Direct? People still shop there.....
 
What program was that? What is ring with Sports Direct? I've bought things after shopping around and saved money with them
 
Dale_tem said:
What program was that? What is ring with Sports Direct? I've bought things after shopping around and saved money with them
Click to expand...
It's the way they treat their workers, the warehouse near Derby is mostly zero hours with a 3 strikes and your out policy. A strike could be taking too long to pick an order.
Buy 'named' brand companies (Dunlop, karimor) and move production to cheap labour abroad and drop the quality.
The football shirts deals seem to be very one sided to Sports Direct.

The list goes on, if you know anyone who support Rangers then they'll have a lot to say.
 
We're all being conned and ripped off all the time.

And we mostly love it.

It's the consumer society and the modern social contract.
 
how many shops do you see with clearance, sale, closing down, everything must go etc etc etc.. and a year later they are still there. im sure black friday deals are just the same, along with every other deal out there. much like the totally mythical RRP that gets thrown around by just about everyone but has b****r all bearing on the actual price.
ebay pricing just as bad so many times see things on there and then find them cheaper on amazon or elsewhere.
i pretty much wont buy anything online now until ive found the item on at least half a dozen ( UK based ) websites and compared prices . Even Currys and PC world can have different prices yet its the same company.
one tesco can be more expensive than another due its location ( higher rent and all of a sudden some things are just that little bit more ).
 
A lot of items are bought in especially to con people, I remember years ago my mum saw a coat for £400 we all laughed and said it's not worth that. Within weeks it was down to something like £59.99. Stupid people were going wow, this used to be £400 and going mad and buying it. Retailers are not stupid, the lower price is the one they wanted originally. If some dunce does buy at the inflated price, they are laughing.

Most of us do not buy our cameras at launch, as we know they will come down very quickly.
 
Dale_tem said:
What program was that? What is ring with Sports Direct? I've bought things after shopping around and saved money with them
Click to expand...

I _think_ it was Panorama but it was one of the "heavyweight" programs like that. There were basically 2 allegations (backed up by lots of interviews and examples)

1. Most prices in their stores are very close to breaching the law. For example, I bought a Karrimor trail shirt from them for 15 quid. At that price it's good value - but I suspect (and the programme proved) that it had never been offered at £75. Everything in their store is basically from brands they own so was prices are largely fictional even if they were ever charged. They also have never ending "closing down" sales which the program alleged were illegal. They have bought out many established brands and pretty much destroyed them (Karrimor, Dunlop, Donay etc)

2. As @PaulF says, their picking warehouses aren't the most worker friendly places. Though I didn't see anything that isn't common in Amazon picking warehouses and probably lots of others. They expect their workers to work hard and fast and if something goes wrong they get fired.

They now own Sweatshop which used to be good. Now they recommend their appalling Karrimor shoes to pretty much everybody who gets a gait analysis.

ETA: It was actually C4's Despatches. http://www.channel4.com/info/press/news/sports-direct-investigation-reveals-harsh-working-conditions
 
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I bought something on Amazon last week for £99.99. I was happy with that price, still cheaper than elsewhere and it had been that price for sometime. As it happened I decided to return it for a refund as it wasn't quite what I thought.
On the prime exclusive deal thingy I saw the same item listed, out of interest I had a look at the deal price, which was £99.95!

Wow a whole 5p off. What really bugged me was the fact it said it had 50% off from the original price.. A price which they haven't sold it for since the day it was released.
 
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