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Found this whilst browsing the site. It seems a lot cheaper than all other retailers so it seems like a good deal.
[PRICE ERROR] Asus Eee Slate Ep121 Windows 7 Tablet - $122 Harvey Norman
LSuperCow on 26/12/2012 - 02:23
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The confirmation email only said that that the offer was received. The website is apparently yet another HN franchise which then sends the order to a HN store (franchise) for fulfillment. You are still at the stage of having offered $122 for the item.
Aside: Uncle Gerry seems to like to spin off these franchises. Some outfit probably bid for the right to run this online site. But all this franchising here and franchising there comes with the risk of poor quality control.
As for the conspiracy theory well I'm not interested in debating that, you can find my take on the debacle many comments back. I'm just pointing out that that what people imagine is a done deal isn't, legally.
If the techies knew there was something wrong soon after the link went live, they should have disabled the "add to cart" feature instead of just stopping the email confirmation engine … or remove the link altogether. Makes you wonder why they still allowed people to buy…
T&C
(7) If your Order is not accepted by Harvey Norman Online, Harvey Norman Online will notify you by telephone or email and arrange for a full refund of any payment made by you to be processed.(8) Harvey Norman Online may, in its sole and absolute discretion, accept or reject any offer made by you for any reason (or no reason), including an error in the advertised price for, or description of, the products on the website, or an error in your Order.
(10) Harvey Norman Online will be deemed to have accepted your Order on the first to occur of issue to you by email of a tax invoice for the sale and the fulfilment of your Order.
So, the order is not accepted till you have the good or you have an invoice. So nobody in this thread has had their 'offer' accepted. Their T&C say they can cancel any order for any reason.
While you could take it up with ACCC or similar i cant see that you will get anywhere.
Respected members of the Jury I bring forth the case of the Epilators
http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/86318
from HN Online same company (franchise) as the one currently under the microscope
and
The case of the dell printer
http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/37607
A different company but both operated in Australia under Australian consumer laws
Only a confirmation email was sent in both cases.
The Dell case was not a misprice but insufficient quantity and Dell decided to provide higher spec printers at the same price to fill all the orders. They might have argued the conditions but preferred to retain goodwill, which HN has lost, if they had any in the first place. No matter what you think of their hardware, Dell online is a higher class of operation compared with amateurs (you know which they are). Don't give up your day job to work as a lawyer.
Ok what about the Telstra 4G modem and Voucher.
Accepted as a pricing mistake but was honored.I still think as stated earlier a pricing error can occur once- which crashed the website, but if it was allowed to continue it means it is a genuine deal.
So what does this prove?
You make an offer, they choose to accept or regect. They fact the choose to accept one offer doesnt mean you have a legal precedent for them to accept a $700 loss on another product.
The T&C's are pretty clear.
The business may opt to accept your offer anyway.
As an aside, I'm pissed off with Bigpond Online shop for accepting my offer too quickly, a couple of months back. I had a Defy+ in my cart but when I clicked buy it had sold me a nano-SIM. I can't even imagine what kind of software bug would cause that substitution. Maybe a DB admin poking around the backend. I called them immediately but they said they couldn't stop the transaction. I had to wait a month for a chargeback to my CC.
So they are amateurs too, for writing a website that doesn't provide a final confirmation screen before taking my money.
And the Braun Epilators was most likely not a price error. I think it goes like this:
Manufacturer sells items at price X to company who pays them the money.
Company sells item at price Y to customer and receives their money.
Manufacturer runs promotion to increase desirability of their product and offers cash back to customers who buy their product.
So IMO there's no relationship between the company and the promotion. HN probably sold the items at or near cost because they're rubbish and they wanted to clear their shelves and warehouses.
DSE pricing mistake basically meant people paid for a modem and ended up with $150 free credit (if I remember correctly). I expect DSE negotiated with Telstra to write off the credit (which is of extremely low cost to Telstra, I'd guess $150 credit = less than $10) as a sign of good will. This case is a perfect example of a company honoring a deal because it's at very little expense to them.
Fair enough DSE and Telstra did it, so HN and Asus should do it as well. Simple.
No, fair or morals doesn't come into it.
The value of the items being written off is vastly different, don't you see that? What I'm saying is Telstra providing credit is like printing money, whereas HN can't write of stock which has a high worth.
That's the point i'm trying to make, companies will honor pricing mistakes if it doesn't cost them much.
Epilator wasn't a mistake.
4G/credit was a low worth mistake.
This is a high worth mistake.Hence they won't honor it, simple.
700 > 10
while it would be nice if they did, it isnt going to happen and there is no legal reason for them to do it.
Yes your right except for the fact they delegated their software to do the accepting of the offer. The offer was accepted and consideration was made (eg they accepted payment). Therefore its past that point.
If you read the brauin chat someone called brun who said its the store losing out for pricing too low. another said H.N. staff said it was a mistake they lost out.
Printing money??? Lol If Telstra could print money they wouldn't need to sell nothing. Why would Telstra pay for Dells stuff up.
Well yes why would any sucker buy this for more money than a Microsoft Surface!!! Even a Stupid iPad!!!!
with this pricing error, at least they got a lot of new client registration, client email address, their phone and home address. how can we request to hn to delete our data from their database? as we don't want get spam from their marketing department
What I personally don't understand is why money is automatically taken from an account but they can still cancel the purchase.
Would HN allow you to cancel the purchase once you have paid for an item if you walk out of the store and find out what you have purchased is cheaper elsewhere?That is why you need to use the power of petitioning.
One petition to HN to honor this deal.
Second to Australian Consumer Affairs to look into HN trading practice. If I press the purchase button by mistake, I am forced to buy something but if the BIG COMPANY wants it can cancel my order but not cancel the transaction, so I cannot use the funds to get any other deal during the Boxing Day sale Promo.
Be realistic most of the Good deals have sold out.
Never thought of it this way… this is brilliantly worded! I shall be arguing along those lines :)
This is a very good way to argue, if I accidentally clicked on "BUY" button and contacted the merchant and let them know that "IT WAS A GENIUNE MISTAKE" - Would the merchant refund my money without asking any questions. Petitioning!
oh yes ! good point. deals direct forced me to an order where my coupon didn't work, called them straight away to amend or cancel and they said too bad - years ago, coupon was in and accepted, but got lost when advancing, didn't notice the price change until 1 sec too late.
i posted the T&C of using the site above. Your offer is not accepted till you either have the goods or a tax invoice.
So you think the T&C are fair??
All I am arguing is that the T&C are biased too much against the consumer as validated by yourself and a petition should be made to the ACC.An almost identical thing happened with JB in the past.
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/archive/1248034
ACCC took no action against JB.
While you could try and take HN to court yourself i cant see you getting anywhere.
DO i think it is fair? Sure do. One simple digit mistake could easily see entire businesses destroyed. Just say you ran a business and one of your employees accentially put a $1000 product online as $10.00. 20000 ozbarganers all buy 10 each and you are suggesting the law should force to you supply these? Business doesn't work like that.
The T&Cs are optional in the sense if you don't want to abide by them, don't shop there. They're either legal or illegal, unfair doesn't mean anything.
Fair doesn't come into it. You don't have to shop at HN if you don't like the T&C. If you could successfully argue that they are illegal you might have a case.
As stated previously, if there was a mistake it should have been fixed when the website crashed. The fact that it was not fixed pertains that it is a genuine deal.
If I run a business and some wrong decision is made by my staff then yes I have to suffer the consequences.PriceWaterhouse Coopers debacle.
http://www.smh.com.au/business/pointing-the-finger-in-blame-…
Maybe they didnt know about it when the website crashed.
Anyway it is irrelevant, the T&C of the site a clear. If you want to challenge that i guess you would need to seek legal advise.What happened with JB was a difference of 2985 for a tv that was released 2 months before the deal.
The current item has a price difference of 700 approximately from the RRP as per HN and is an item released Feb 2011 in Australia, 1 year and 10 months ago which in the technology world is really outdated.
There is nothing similar.
EDIT: This item was marked for EOY clearance.
That's a 2 digit mistake
@sn809 The JB issue is almost identical. You choose not to see that for whatever reason. Go make your complaint to the ACCC, come back and let everyone know how you go. My bet is they will do nothing.
Dupe (mupe?) question, see http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/89032?page=6#comment-117311… for answer.
As of this minute I still have not received a cancellation email… Anyone else in the same situation?
At first I was like… ehh I'm not going to be an ass about it and argue but now I realize how much of a bargain this could potentially be I am slowly leaning towards quoting every ACCC and Fair Trading rule and regulation in hope they give in and allow the sales.I also know for a fact they will lose over $500 for every tablet they honour, hence they will NEVER do this.
same, except paypal receipt nothing happened so far
Where is the official statement to say that this is a pricing error? There has been no email or any information on their website to validate this.
this is crazy, i thought HN would be on the ball, seems unusual for a company to not get an email sent out asap. surely it would be easier then everyone calling or live chatting, even people who admitted to missing out were contacting them to find out if they would honor. lol. maybe they are giving you guys it. or just too scared. wonder if they will even say anything if they are going to cancel!
It was advertised $998 in August (Check google)
No way they would drop it down to $122 in 4 months
Guys , accept its a price error and move on
Ive bought one myself, and am happy to get a refund
Its oppurtunitists like us that force retailers to close down or go into administrationMaybe give us a chance to think about the person that made the pricing error , if HN had to honour the deal, don't you think probably that person would be at risk for getting the sack !! How bout if it was one of your relatives who made the mistake and got sacked , now how would that make you feel !!
if this is a price error, no matter whats the end, he will be sacked
Either way he may get the sack… Since the boss might think "he did it once he may do it again…"
When it comes to money, always check 10 times and more…. I remember hearing a horror story regarding $10mil and 1 accident…
You mean we have the power to force HN to close?! Well, this changes everything. Everybody to the ACCC!
Edit: Just to be clear, I'm joking… Sorta
don't you think probably that person would be at risk for getting the sack
at best a written warning
I bought the 7" galaxy tab from Telstra 2 years ago for $200 reduced from over $1000 and thought this was much the same thing. Personally I think HN should honour their advertised deal and perhaps one per customer.
Totally understand what you are saying…
What makes me wonder is …. whos is in charge of this pricing… Is it just one person in a big retailer like Harvey? Just before anything goes online there are few people who have an eyes on it…. What the hell they were doing…. or is it just a stunt
Clearly a pricing error and good way to get their website up there in google…
The mention of stock levels raised a neglected issue in my mind. Since Gerry has seen fit to make all these units "franchises" with loose coupling, I suspect that if it hadn't been a misprice, HN would have hit a much bigger boulder on the online highway, when customers discover that the shop "franchises" don't actually have the stock to fulfill all the online orders. The mobs would have been baying for his blood.
This is what comes of trying to retrofit an online model on an ancient bricks and mortar organisation. You really need close coupling of the sales and stock control systems. People reported being able to enter an insane number of units in the form. That's not a sane e-commerce system.
I am happy to receive my refund but I do not like how Harvey Norman has handled this at all! almost 24hours after purchasing I still have not received an invoice for payment or cancelled order notice nor official statement regarding the matter after making a payment though CC. Luckily though I did copy the confirmation number after the purchase but those who are unaware of ozbargain and made a purchase may have absolutely no clue on the situation and most importantly to their money.
I agree! How hard is it to send out an automated apology message to everyone? Absolutely pathetic customer service.
Hi Macduff,
Unfortunately it took a few days to separate out all the customer email data.
Apologies for any issues this caused you.
Kind regards
HN
unsure how genuine this is, but attempted to pick up the item, unfortunately the sales staff were already aware of the issue. He informed me all orders are going to be canceled and an E-Mail is being sent out to tell everyone it was a pricing error and it was in fact a SAVE $122 from the $998. This was odd given their display model had the FULL RRP on it and this was his explanation but it was meant to be an 'online only deal'.
He claimed to have seen the deal in the morning and was going to get one for him-self but then realized the price couldn't be right and contacted head office who 'got on-top of the issue right away'. Later I mentioned how I thought it was plausible because as mentioned in this thread, old specs, limited windows 8 capability etc.. He said he thought the same to begin with (which kind of contradicted his point of reinforcing it was a $1000 product that he knew couldn't be selling as cheap as it was, but anyway).
He told me he would look after me for the inconvenience with the best possible price, so he tried to up-sell me to alternate $800 tabs (that are much nicer then this if I ever was seriously in the market for this at RRP it's a joke!), but I had to tell him many times, I got this because it was a cheap deal for what it was, I don't want to spend even a few hundred on a tablet. He tried very hard to up-sell me though, I was interested in a new budget laptop if he could do me a great price but throwing in 4GB RAM on a laptop for $50 extra that he (wouldn't do for anyone else) and i know the RAM is worth ruffly $40 isn't exactly what I consider an exclusive deal.
As others have mentioned with the monster cables, if this is their morals for sales of stock, our chances of them ever honoring this price error where always non-existent unfortunately.
also I asked if this was a widespread issue because I was clueless this was a price error and he said not really just you and another women experienced this issue. (Although he meant his store specifically, I think he attempted to downplay the magnitude of embarrassment of how big of a F up this actually was).
has anyone been refunded yet? i guess emails will be pumping tomorrow as businesses officially open up after holidays
I put in a paypal dispute saying if its a pricing error please refund me promptly, seconds later I got this email. (but no refund as yet).
Please be advised that this is a refund confirmation for your online order. While we are sorry to hear that the > purchased goods were not suitable for you, we would like to thank you for your business and look forward to
future transactions with you.Seriously??
Kind of glad it won't go thru, 2-3hr battery life is crap!!
i still haven't received a cancellation email or the refund yet… i paid with credit card… who can i complain to??
Check your CC account if you have online access to it. As far as I can tell mine hasn't been touched, no preauthorisation, no debit. I hope it stays that way. And I'll stay away from HN.
Well it looks like I spoke too soon. A debit was made yesterday 27/12 so they had better refund me soon or I will join the list of claimants for redress. You'd think they would have stopped the process by that point.
I got my refund after opening a PayPal dispute instantly.
However make sure you read your invoice mine had a very sneaky adjustment fee.Delivery charge $5.95
Adjustment Fee $2.35
Total $247.60
(Incl. GST $22.72)
Make sure you email them straight away to get this changedEmail who? Paypal or harvey norman?
adjustment fee! WTF, they seriously gonna get some ass whipping if they gone do that. Very dodgy business indeed
I would be ensuring you get every cent of your refund back (adjustment fee included). There is no way Harvey Norman could legally charge an adjustment fee when they are at fault (and cannot provide the product). This would be different if you initiated the cancellation.
adjustment fee for what?
I got charged an adjustment fee! what the heck, they should be paying me not the other way around, how do i fix this?
More than 24 hours have passed. Still have not received a refund notification or even an email from Harvey Norman. Poor form.
Hope Department of Commerce will look into the online transactions for such grey area as people transferred the full purchase amount to the merchant's bank account and treated as a deposit for an order and can be cancelled anytime at the merchant's decision is more like a loop hole for the merchant to abuse it more frequently in future. If it is a mortar and brick store I wouldn't hand over my money until I have the goods I am buying in my hand unless I am told upfront it is just a deposit for an order.
It's currently showing as an Authorisation Only or Authorisation Hold on my CC. So it's essentially the same as what hotels or rental car companies do when they hold a room or a security bond. It does reduce your credit limit though so it does restrict you in that sense.
Hopefully HN will be decent enough to reverse the hold when they send out their email/refund notification. But if they are true to their current form, the hold should reverse automatically if it isn't "settled" by the retailer after a certain period (approx. 7 days depending on the retailer’s banking system.)
Read the comments mate. Some people waited for a month to get their refund! It hasn't been deducted from your CC yet but it will within a few days and they will refund you a month later.
Reading this post there are so many entitled whingers out there. It was a mistake on Harvey Normans while not great it happened they do not deserve the hate they are getting.
Now just from a quick browse this tablet sells for about 800 at the cheapest razor thin margin shops. So lets just say the loss HN has on each unit sold at this price is 500 dollars. With 1000 orders (I could easily see this being in the tens of thousands) that is half a million dollar loss with 10,000 that is 5 million dollars.
Now that are charging 1.25 dollar administration fee they will make a cool 12000 dollars.
business without ethics!!!
What a callous disregard for customers!!!Serious? That's a bit messed up, they could at least wear that.
I've just opened a paypal dispute with HN as well. As per Rexxy01's post, make sure you check the credit notice as they add in a $2.35 adjustment fee. Have just sent them an email so here's to getting my money back soon.
I laughed at their email address - [email protected] - please everyone know's HN put their customers last and have absolutely no sense of customer serviceTo the people who used CC not Paypal, has anyone received any kind of notification at all from Harvey Norman? I did not receive an email confirming my order nor have I received notification of my order being cancelled.
neither~ ://
still processing, ill give it till friday and im going to call
Those who ordered with credit card, have you received your refund yet? Please tell me how :(
I ordered both on paypal and cc
I would not expect any quick turn around on cc orders.
it is boxing day sales and there is money to be made by them.It will be on the very bottom of there to do list
I guess just remember, we took a gamble on a suppossed deal, we lost out
what do i do if they end up not refunding my payment? do i tell my bank it's a fraud?
Jumping the gun a fair bit there. If you don't hear from them today call head office tomorrow and ask for your refund to be processed. 02 9201 6111
You should tick the rep box, you aren't fooling anyone.
For complete transparency, Duff5000 does or did have an association with HN.
http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/73762?page=2#comment-931380
Says he used to sell extended warranties and process warranty claims at Harvey Norman. This explains why he is attacking everyone in this thread.
Mods can you please ensure that the rep tag is activated for this user as he is distorting the discussion with his biased views as an employee/ex-employee.
Ah, makes perfect sense his eager defense of this company. Good find
hahah lol used to many years ago. I quit a long time ago. I have also posted how their margins work, how their suppliers work and how to get what you want by contacting head office. Would i do that as an employee? Like most ozbargainers, i only shop there when there is a decent bargain. The Olympus EPM1 for $280 comes to mind.
I am not defending HN by the way. I and defending common sense that says a business can make a pricing error and not be forced to sell at that price. I run a small business, if i made a mistake like this i would be put out of business if laws were set up that way. I dont care which retailer makes a pricing error like this, the T&C (and laws) covert hem.
From the rules:
Declaring Relationship with Business
If you work for the store, or have any interest in promoting the store, you must check the 'I am associated with <store>' box before submitting a new comment in a deal post.
Examples of when this checkbox should be checked:
■ You are an employee of the store or have in any way worked for the business (e.g.website designer or sales rep)Are you all serious?
A guy says should he contact his bank to say it is fraud before he contacts the store. I point out that is jumping the gun and apparently that means i am sticking up for HN? Why on earth would you go through the bank claiming fraud before you contact the seller? Use your brain people.
Yes i worked at HN many years ago. I havent made any secret about that. I left because i didnt like working there at all. If anythign i should be more anti HN that most people here. IF i wanted to make some secret of that why on earth would i post what % you should be able to bargain extended warranties down to? (amongst other things)
Can you check the rep box when you post in here, k, thnx
@Duff5000- Taking your word that you worked for HN 'many years ago' and not enforcing the rep tag for your comments. However, if you really have no interest in promoting the store, you have already made your point, and it's best to move on and not get personal.
I looked at my CC account online and there was no debit so nothing to refund.
I emailed the HN CC and this is the content
Customer first!!!! What are you even upto HN? First u claimed to have a pricing error on the product, but still continued to sell it as many were interested to purchase it. And now when i ask for the full refund, you charge me the adjustment fee for no reason what so ever!! You wasted my time this shopping time of the year and had seriously let me down as a customer.
Just refund the full amount you charged me including any adjustment fee! Thanks for the bitter experience..you lost a hundred customers who are out there just like me!!Sent from my iPad
its cool bro
but i'm afraid of they dont care whatever we talk or complain abt their serviceP.S: can u please to give me which email of HN that u sent to?
(i ordered via my paypal but untill now i havent got refund yet)
many thanksyes, please provide their email. They still haven't emailed with regard to cancellation. Just poor form of a business. And hells to the no should they add an adjustment fee for their royal stuff up
Email I'd: [email protected]
Well.. Actually even I have no hopes of getting a reply for my mail to them. It's just incase some thing happens in the future. I opened up a problem ( a dispute) via PayPal asking for the FULL REFUND from HN the seller. As soon as I sent the mai,l I received a response from HN probably an automated one I guess stating that the refund has been actioned. What really aggravated me is that they charged me adjustment fee($1.25) for no reason. The charge is for one single unit, so if u purchased 10 devices it would be 12.50 which is downright ridiculous.
complain on their twitter and facebook about the adjustment fee. They'll take action quicker than if you email them. Especially if loads of people do it. i certainly will
send email to channel 7 or 9. i think they are interested
We shouldn't have to ASK for a refund - its been a few days since this stuff up, and if 'reps' / 'store staff' have alerted head office to this, then head office should have already cancelled the orders in the system, and refunded everyone automatically. They pulled the product off the website the next morning - do the rest then too!!
Disgusting performance from the wonderful Harvey Norman. Yes, we all took a gamble, but we shouldn't be out of pocket while they fluff around and eventually decide to refund / tell their 'customers' what the hell is happening. If we owed them money, they'd hunt you down as soon as they wanted it - other way around, you can wait until we're ready.
precisely. If it's an error, ok, fair enough. Then refund my money ASAP, yet not to hear a word or an email from them regarding the stuff up, let alone a swift refund, is very very poor form. Then to charge an 'adjustment fee' for the refund is beyond the pale
They cant charge an adjustment fee for their error. They would have no legal grounds to do that.
Call the HO in the morning 02 9201 6111
Just finished opening a Paypal dispute. If I don't hear from them by the 2nd, I can escalate to a claim.
At least I know MY precious hard earned bucks won't be in their hands before then.Also CC-emailed a message to:
Now we play the waiting game… o_O
Not correct, some have received confirmation emails of the order.
The fact that the website went down and was then restored means a "human" was involved. If the website went down, they should have queried the reason and only restored it after doing a full check. Upon restoring the website and in allowing the orders to be processed they have automatically indicated that it is a valid deal. As others have stated it is an old item and to target the market for clearance the current price was fair compared to other tablets available.