Fisch 16" Band Saw Deal of the Decade

[Tom Ghesquiere]

A buddy sent me an email and called to tell me to jump on this deal at Amazon. They had the Fisch 16" band saw for $8.99 plus shipping, total delivered price of $18.98. I ordered one and have a confirmation #. Now the website says they are out of stock/discontinued, so no use trying additional orders.
I'm very anxious to see how they handle all these confirmed orders at $8.99. Somebody is going to have a bad day! Anybody ever have a similar experience and what was the outcome?

Thanks,
Tom

[RichMagnone]

That will be one hell of a gloat if it ever showes up. Too bad you couldn't get free shipping! :)

[Maurice Ungaro]

......boy...someone at Amazon is getting fired right about now!

Maurice

[John Shuk]

Keep us updated. It showed out of stock when I checked.

[Tom Ghesquiere]

I just got a note from Amazon saying:

We regret to inform you that an error caused "Fisch FBS16000 16" Bandsaw" to be displayed at an incorrect price. In accordance with our posted policies on pricing, we are unable to offer this item for the incorrectly posted price. Therefore, we have cancelled your order for this item. At any given time, despite our best efforts, a small number of the millions of items on our site may be mispriced. We do, however, verify prices as part of our shipping procedures. If we discover that an item's correct price is higher than our stated price, we will, at our discretion, either contact you for instructions before shipping or cancel your order and notify you of such cancellation. This policy is posted in the Help section and is accessible through numerous other areas of our web site.
I was so ready to post a major gloat!

Tom

[Maurice Ungaro]

What a letdown! Sorry for your loss.

Maurice

[Jeff Sudmeier]

I can't say as I really blame amazon for this, however, at my place of work you WOULD have gotten the bandsaw for that price. Of course we don't sell bandsaws. But we have sold MANY $50 items for $5 because of a mis-print. Anything for the customer :)

[Tim Marks]

It sometimes pays to keep a close eye on Amazon, and jump on the little unadvertised specials like this. Last October, two people on rec.woodworking actually got a Unisaw for $448 in one of thise "unadvertised two hour sales". Numbers 3-10 got the "we regret to inform you message.."

[Tom Ghesquiere]

I may just decide to pursue this a little further through legal channels. Somebody check my logic here: Amazon advertised the item at $8.99 plus shipping and I accepted their offer, I provided a valid charge card. They confirmed the 'deal' with a letter back to me with an order number, additionally, they misspelled my last name in the confirmation letter so I sent them a note requesting they use the correct spelling. Again they sent me another letter confirming the order. At this point, I view it as two parties entering a legally binding contract. If they had sent me the 'we regret to inform you' note after submitting my initial order, I would understand. Sending me two confirmation statements and then retracting does not seem right. Where do I stand?


Tom

[Jim Dunn]

Try it, using your logic. Worst they can do is deny your request. I do have a something you may want to ask yourself. How much will it cost getting a lawyer involved? Just my .02

[Jim Becker]

I suspect that a review of their written/posted policies will find a specific clause that lets them adjust pricing at any time...that will end up costing you money for whomever reviews it on your behalf. These folks have been in business for quite awhile now and this is not the first time that this has come up.

[Brad Knabel]

I'd have to guess that Amazon is probably pretty well covered here. Given the number of items that they sell there are bound to be a few errors here and there.

They've done right by me in the past in terms of providing a credit for a missed rebate since an item was backordered and doing price matching when their prices change. I think it might be unreasonable to expect them to honor such an extreme price error. You are talking about getting the saw for essentially the cost of shipping.

They're a big company and I'm sure the lawyers they have on staff have certainly got their butts covered. And given the number of items they sell this is not the first time they've crossed this bridge. I'd guess that if you make a great deal of noise that they might come through with a small coupon or gift certificate to make up for your trouble. But I would not expect to come out of this with a new band saw.

Good luck, whatever path you choose.
Brad

[Alan Tolchinsky]

I may just decide to pursue this a little further through legal channels. Somebody check my logic here: Amazon advertised the item at $8.99 plus shipping and I accepted their offer, I provided a valid charge card. They confirmed the 'deal' with a letter back to me with an order number, additionally, they misspelled my last name in the confirmation letter so I sent them a note requesting they use the correct spelling. Again they sent me another letter confirming the order. At this point, I view it as two parties entering a legally binding contract. If they had sent me the 'we regret to inform you' note after submitting my initial order, I would understand. Sending me two confirmation statements and then retracting does not seem right. Where do I stand?


Tom

Tom, I understand your disappointment in all this but do you really believe you are doing the right thing in pursuing this? Did you really think you would get the saw at that price? If you were in the sellers position how would you feel about a customer taking your actions? Anybody can make a mistake,even big businesses. The questions is: Should anybody lose thousands of dollars just for a simple mistake? I don't think so; I don't think it's fair. Please don't take offense at this as it's just my opioion.

[Jeff Sudmeier]

Every advertisement that you get in the mail has the exact same notice at the bottom: Not responsible for mis-prints, basically. Now, where it gets hairy is that if that price were listed in a brick and mortar store in Wisconsin, you would have gotten the saw. There are laws that state that the item must be sold at or below the posted price, IN THE STORE.

So, does the online web qualify as a store? I don't know...

However, I think you will have a tough time with this one. If nothing else, Amazon has the money to tie you up in court about it long enough, that it would cost you more in lawyers fees than the saw :)

Good luck!

[Harry Thornton]

"meeting of the minds" is an essential element of a legally binding contract. A court would summarily throw it out. Clearly they did not mean to sell the item for the stated price and courts tend to use principals of common sense and justice when making business type judgements.