When stores misprice an item

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Is it true they don't really have to honor it?


Best Buy made an error online by pricing their 52 inch flat screen TV for $9.99 due to an error and boy did many people order them and the company saw the error and corrected it and they cancelled everyone's orders and issued them a refund. They do state in their policy they have every right to change their offers or correct errors. I don't know if people knew full well it was an error or they really thought they were selling it at that price. I have seen good prices in stores and I would think if it was some error so I would bring the item to the store employee and ask them the price of it and they would see and it be true they had it marked at that low price. I once saw a GBA at a garage sale for three bucks and I had to ask the lady if it was the real price and she said it was and I said it's worth more than that and she said her son wants to sell it at that price and I said "Okay." The handheld system still worked and I bought it and traded it at Gamestop for Gamestop bucks. Of course mom told me to not tell them I got it for three dollars.

But two times for me have I bought something and it have a price on it but when I go buy it, the price be different at the cash register. I would tell them the price said something else and they would end up selling it to me at that price. I even got Brain Age Academy for Wii for $29.99 instead of $49.99 or was it $39.99? My husband said they mispriced it and I got it cheaper. I told him why did they sell it to me at that price then if they mispriced it and he said because they did the mistake and they have to sell it at that price because they don't want to lose me as a customer. Was my husband wrong about stores having to sell people an item at the price they mispriced?
I was unaware they honored me those prices when it happened to me twice at the same store. I thought they made a mistake at the cash register and I would point out the price of the item and they would sell it to me that cheap. Then my husband told me they mispriced the item and they have to sell it to people when they make mistakes to satisfy them. No wonder people change prices on items because if they do that, the store is obligated to sell it to them that cheap if they mispriced the item so some people try and take advantage of it by switching price tags on items to get it for cheaper.

I am really confused. Do stores have to honor their mispriced items or not? If so, does that not apply to online stores?

I have read many horror stories about Best Buy although I do not live in America so I can't speak from experience.

I have heard of companies who will put a price on their website.

When the customer comes in expecting to pay $50 they are told the price is $60. When the customer complains the clerk shows an (internal) website showing $60.

How about jewelery shops? Every second week they have a "50% off" sale.

Well, duh. If a diamond ring was "worth" $2000 last week how come you can sell it to me for $1000 this week?

And if you can sell it to me for $1000 then why does it cost $2000 next week?

Yes, as a former merchandising manager for a retail store I can tell you that it's a consumer myth =P.
Typically companies will honor a pricing mistake because they are usually small in nature, priced at 39.99 instead of 49.99, but it's merely in good nature. They do not have to.

The reasoning is is that just anyone can come in with fake price tags and change a price then he can claim the law backing him up. Computer hackers would be into the retail websites and databases all day long changing prices.
So, the law is actually on the retailers side in the case of misprices. That every flyer and every ebsite has a disclaimer saying something to the effect of 'we reserve the right to not honor prices made mistakenly and hold the right to cancel any sale' is just there to be nice, any company is legally allowed to cancel any sale they want, of course as long as the item hasnt shipped.

They should not have to, anyway! Its just selfish opportunism on the part of the customer to take advantage of someone else's mistake. Greed and selfishness.

People make mistakes. That doesn't mean YOU should feel entitled to benefit from it and get all pissed off like someone has done you a disservice by not giving you what you wanted whyen what you wanted was entirely unreasonable.



Grrrr This BestBuy thing makes me so mad.
Stupid selfish people.

Look at it this way too ... if the mistaken price was higher than the correct price, would you expect to be forced to pay the higher price?

I don't know. I have also been in situations when I buy an item and when I purchase it, they say the new price and it be cheaper and I tell them "I thought it was (insert price here)" and the cashier would say they lowered the price on the item but haven't changed the price tag and I take it as, "Yay I'm saving some money."

What if you don't know it was a mistake? What I do is I don't buy the item at all if it was at a different price because someone placed the wrong price tag on it or some customer switched price tags on items. I guess the reason why stores don't want anyone swapping price tags is because if they do that, then people see the item and think it's that price and bam they have to face the confrontation and the arguments from their customers about the actual cost of the item and wanting to pay the price the item said.


I agree people should have gotten skeptical about the $9.99 TV and they should have picked up their phones and call customer service and ask them if they are really selling the TV for that low of price. I once bought Pokemon Channel for $4.99 and I couldn't believe it was at that price because that game cost $29.99 at other stores so why was it so cheap at Best Buy so I picked it up and asked an employee about the price and he checked it at the computer and said "Yep four ninety nine." So I took advantage of the price by buying the game. I guess they wanted to get rid of it. Sometimes stores will make prices really low on items just to get rid of them. I've seen $9.99 Game Boy Color games and this was after GBA came out and I have seen how low prices are on GBA games these days when stores still have them.