Snotty email to HMV

[plaid_dragon]

HMV recently offered a number of reduced price DVD titles, including House S2 at £9.99. When I went to place an order (to hold for my stepfather's birthday), this was still listed on their website as having available stock, and they accepted my order and sent me a confirmation email. Today they have told me that they will not be filling my order

Comments

[the_magician]

I shall be most annoyed if they do the same to me, and to my other friends that placed an order at that price.

It's one thing to be short on stock, a separate thing to advertise and take money for product that they never had any intent of supplying at that price. I will be demanding a refund for the House Season 1 boxset I bought at the same time if they try to do that to me.

I shall also be informing them that because of their sharp business practices towards you I will not be shopping with them again.

[plaid_dragon]

I hope they honour your order too. I actually placed two orders, and they have not yet cancelled the later one. If they fill that one, I will be having more words.

I shall also be informing them that because of their sharp business practices towards you I will not be shopping with them again.

While I'm happy for your support, don't spite yourself on my behalf. :-)

[pbristow]

"It's one thing to be short on stock, a separate thing to advertise and take money for product that they never had any intent of supplying at that price.There's no indication here that that's what happened. We have no data on their intentions, only on the results of their actions. To me it looks like a simple cock-up

[plaid_dragon]

Most of the web-based shops I use have linked stock control, so they know how many items are for sale, and how many orders they have taken. Therefore they should be able to only take the number of orders they are able to fill. I would much rather find a "sold-out" label than be led to believe I am going to receive something and then discover later that I will not be.

[armb]

That sounds as if it ought to be crossing the line into being illegal of them. But I am not a lawyer, and a lawyer will cost more than a full price DVD set.
I guess it probably depends on exactly what their confirmation mail says - is it "we accept your order", or is it "we have received your order and it's gone into our system but this isn't a contractual acceptance of it yet and we might change our minds about what we are offering". But even in the latter case I thought deliberately offering something you weren't planning to provide ("bait and switch") was illegal.
Clearly wrong of them though.

[rdmaughan]

I suspect they have broken the sale of goods act. They made an offer to sell, you accepted this offer and they confirmed the sale. I doubt they have any grounds for refusing to honour the resulting contract.

[plaid_dragon]

Sadly, they put a disclaimer on their website about promotional items, and a line in the order confirmation email that specifies it does not become a contract until they ship the goods. So they are within the law, it is just bad business practice rather than illegal business practice.