Posted on 12/27/2011 10:24:34 AM PST by Hunton Peck
“I wouldn’t touch you with a thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole.”
There’s a bit of inherent risk when shopping online. You’re handing over your credit card to a retailer that promises to ship you something in return. Most of the time transactions are completed without issue and orders are fulfilled as promised. Sometimes things go awry, though. And sometimes Best Buy ruins Christmas.
Best Buy started reaching out to customers earlier this week — you know, mere days before Christmas — that the retailer was unable to fulfill orders placed as far back as November. Big Blue was sorry but they were canceling the affected orders. Happy holidays! Signed, your merry friends at Best Buy!
Consumers traded the safety of buying an object from a brick and mortar store for the convenience and often lower prices found online. As Best Buy proves here, buying items online is still a bit risky even in 2011. Consumers just do not know for a 100% fact that they will get their product. Sure, receipts are issued and shipping estimates are given, but there are just too many variables involved for complete trust. Shipping companies can also break the chain, too. You just never know if the FedEx man is going to chuck your LCD monitor over a gate.
Generally though, the bigger the retailer, the more safe the transaction feels. Amazon, Walmart, Newegg and, to a lesser extent now, Best Buy should be considered trusted retailers. These massive companies should be able to fulfill online orders with minimum exceptions. But issues do arise. Customers are sometimes left without their order, feeling used and abused.
Don’t worry about Best Buy, though. The retailer isn’t hurting its bottom line by canceling orders en mass. The Wall Street Journal quotes an analyst stating “It’s a hiccup for the company” and “It probably won’t make a big difference for Best Buy’s holiday sales.” Oh good. Because Best Buy’s earnings were the first things I thought of when this story broke. Screw the customers. They don’t matter anyway.
Apparently if those with canceled orders whine enough, Best Buy will issue them a gift card for the inconvenience. Of course those that suck it up and move on get nothing.
There’s no way of knowing how many of these canceled orders were to be holiday presents. Reportedly many of the canceled items were sold on Black Friday. But even without Christmas looming, Best Buy held these orders hostage for nearly a month. They violated the trust of their customers. The retailer essentially cast a wide net, collecting just as many orders as they could, likely knowing it would be unable to fulfill them all. It’s greedy, unacceptable and just plain wrong. Merry Christmas.
Oh, and just in case you need help, the CEO of Best Buy posted a tip to his Facebook page.
As an IBMer and a Giants fan, I say they can both have the title.
Best Buy will be outa business in 5 years, if not less.
Christmas circa 2011 is a stupid holiday for the stupid.
If what you say is correct then the FTC would and should likely investigate. Either way though, I can pretty much guarantee that I will soon be seeing TV ads from law firms imploring me to call them (because the law firm really cares about me!) because I've been injured by BB.
Anyone whose Christmas was “ruined” by Best Buy, or any other business, doesn’t know what the holiday is really about. Mass cancellations of orders may be (and is) a bad business practice, but “ruin” Christmas?
Looks like BB dupicates the airline model of overbooking, meeting what they can, and screwing the rest.
Proof is always the hard thing, but as I said...
when you are rejecting orders for commonly available items, like a WII after a month of having the order, I am not buying for one iota that its a supply chain issue. This just doesn’t pass the smell test to me.
Combine that with they didn’t tell anyone they wouldn’t get their order until it was really too late for any more online orders for the holiday to come in.. sure as hell smells of intenional deception.
is that the company that makes blue M&M’s
seems like a michael bloomberg inferiority complex...
(/s)
Investigations will happen depending on how much was contributed to the obama administration.
it is very clear crony captialism protects best buy if they donated.
Best Buy Stole Christmas? Jesus, tell me that’s not true! Remind me what Christmas is about, I kinda forgot.
“Jesus, tell me that’s not true!”
I just posted the article.
Maybe you should try pinging Him...
I do.
I remember that there were store that did nothing but sell and repair appliances and did a thriving business. There aren't stores like that anymore.
I wonder why that is.
So basically you're defending crappy customer service (and waiting a month to inform your customer you aren't going to fulfill their order IS crappy customer service) as the capitalist way.
I am not defending anything
But this article is making what point?
Report their screw up and let the customer decide
Dont use it as propoganda towards the failures of evil capitalism
Basically you literally can't give away an old CRT TV anymore. I work near a big Goodwill donation center and watched one day as they loaded hundreds of them that had been donated onto a truck to be taken to an electronics recycler. No one wants them.
Where are you reading a general attack on capitalism? How paranoid of negative business stories are you?
ok but we never heard WHY. Is it some sort of secret?
And this benefits Best Buy exactly how
OK - I agree!
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