From: James Lai (orialv21_at_mindspring.com)
Date: Tue Apr 27 1999 - 15:34:38 EDT
For those of you who thinks it's a mishap. They did it again today with the
TP600 PII300 with 32MB for $0.01
Now doesn't it look suspicious??
> -----Original Message-----
> From: M. Kokaly [mailto:ranger5_at_u.washington.edu]
> Sent: Monday, April 26, 1999 10:01 AM
> To: Aaron W. Brown
> Cc: thinkpad_at_cs.utk.edu
> Subject: Re: $313.95 !!!!!!!!! THINKPAD 560 P2-233 4.0GB
>
>
>
> Good points Aaron. There is one question many people who were supporting
> "just letting it go, they made a mistake" are forgetting to ask
> themselves. I noticed they had an ETA of 4/22 for the Thinkpad. However,
> there is now no mention of that particular notebook anywhere on their
> website that I could find after the "error". So, what happened to those
> notebooks that were supposed to arrive on 4/22? Could it be they never
> existed? Doesn't sound like a "mistake" to me at all. I ordered one and
> never got a notice from Access Micro. I did notice that in those posted,
> there wasn't a line that said something like "There was a pricing error,
> the correct price was $xxx. Please contact us if you want to order the
> notebook at that price." How come there wasn't?
>
> Matthew T Kokaly
>
> On Mon, 26 Apr 1999, Aaron W. Brown wrote:
>
> > I have a couple of thoughts on this issue which I don't think
> have been
> > addressed yet.
> >
> > I too tried to order this Thinkpad. I don't have much
> sympathy for them
> > and here's why:
> >
> > I called the 800 number to order. As soon as I said "I would
> like to order
> > a Thinkpad", the person said "You mean that $300 one? That was
> a typo, we
> > don't even have any in stock." (no bait and switch was
> attempted on their
> > part)
> > I called them on the phone rather than order online because
> there was no
> > way I would give them my:
> >
> > A. credit card number
> > B. email address
> >
> > I would suggest they collected quite a few of both over the 3
> DAYS(!) that
> > price was listed. Many folks set up new accounts and might return just
> > because of that. How many people bookmarked this $313.95 site?
> > Also: Now that they have your email address they might market to you
> > (spam) in a future email.
> >
> > Another issue:
> > Is this online dealer intentionally posting low prices to
> insure they come
> > up as "the low price" in these popluar price tracker sites like
> > pricescan.com? Low price, yes, but so low they don't need to honor it.
> > This would have the effect of getting the online dealer noticed
> by potential
> > buyers who were previously unaware of the site.
> >
> > Even if these are not the reasons for the $313.95 Thinkpad,
> remember this
> > rule of advertising:
> > I don't care what you say about me as long as you spell my
> name correctly.
> > Similar to "Any PR is good PR".
> >
> > One more idea (the dealer is the victim): The dealer's site
> maintainer
> > gets paid by the "hit".
> >
> > I would not discourage or judge anyone who wants to fight
> them to honor
> > their price. The BBB should at least warn people of these practices.
> >
> > Aaron Brown
> >
> >
> >
>
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.3 : Thu Jan 23 2003 - 09:54:54 EST