On 1/14/17 8:36 AM, Jack wrote:
On 1/13/2017 12:37 PM, Leon wrote:

It just seemed that Jack was comparing different prices on Amazon
for the same thing and apparently not noticing that a low price,
that does not include shipping, was more expensive than the Prime
item which included shipping.

No, that's not what I was doing, and in fact bitched about item
prices being higher when bought thru prime. If an item cost $5 plus
$5 shipping and $9 with free shipping under prime, then, how much
free shipping are you getting? Someone is lying, both can't be
right. I'm absolutely certain Amazon used to do that, not sure if
they still do, but they did, and I bet they still do.


With probably 50 million customers, at some of them as smart as you
:-), I don't think the practice would last long before being outed and
possibly means for a class action lawsuit. If it were systematic policy
then people would catch on quick and there would be plenty of outrage.

One thing that leads people to believe that is taking place (and I was
in that camp for a while) is how they lump together all their different
vendors along with themselves. Amazon used to not warehouse anything
and there were simply a conduit between sellers and buyers. After they
started being a vendor themselves, it was easy to conflate them all as
one and the same.

So you have one guy selling widgets at, near, or under cost just to get
rid of them and possibly make some scratch off an inflated shipping cost
(remember shipping and "handling?"). And you have Amazon selling them
for a fair profit and offering free shipping which costs them a lot less
than the little guys because of bulk postage deals with shippers. It's
easy to think they are just boosting the price to cover the free shipping.


Granted again prices are all over the board on Amazon. While Prime
is expensive up front each year, $99, that gets whittled away
quickly if you need items quickly and actually pay extra for 2nd
day delivery.

Prime is good for some and so much for others.

My kids have Prime, I sometimes buy through them if the item
warrants it. Mostly I just add stuff to my wish list and when it gets
high enough for free shipping, I buy it. Everything they sell
doesn't qualify for free shipping, and everything doesn't qualify for
prime, so due diligence is required. I've been screwed more than
once when I paid stupid prices for shipping that I thought was
included with the free stuff.

Another nasty habit I noticed is sometimes an online search will
find the item on Amazon at a low price. If you go off the page and
do a search directly on Amazon for the exact same item, it comes up
with a different price and you can't get back to the original price.
They obviously have a number of pricing schemes to get into your
pocket. Another reason Amazon loses trust from me. They are a shaky
out fit and if you are price conscious (cheap, like me) due diligence
is a must.

This may also be attributed to old links and out-dated ads. Some
prices on Amazon change daily for various reasons. If one of there
vendors gets a huge delivery of widgets which he got at a great
wholesale price, he lists them for cheaper than they were yesterday and
that all of a sudden becomes Amazon's lowest price. Another vendor had
widgets for sale at a super low price and he sold out. Well, today the
price for widgets on Amazon suddenly goes up because said vendor sold
out.


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"Playing is not something I do at night, it's my function in life"
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