Overstock.com

[Janus67]

I've bought items from Overstock a handful of times in the past and never really had too much of an issue, but this week has really annoyed me.

On 12/2 I put in an order for a WiiU (with Zelda) bundle as one of their sales for $250. When I purchased it the site said there were a handful left and I was happy to get my order in for such a great price (normally $300). On the 5th the site still said processing my order, being used to the same/next day shipping by Amazon and other e-tailers I went onto their chat support to ask for an update on the shipping, they said that the product is there and on the way to shipping, but it can take up to 5 days - how it takes 5 days to go from warehouse->box->out the door I don't quite understand, but I shrug it off and thank the CS rep for the information.

Get to this morning (12/7) and I wake up to a wonderful email from Overstock that the product is out of inventory and I will be refunded my money. I just don't quite understand how it can take 5 days to find out that a product wasn't actually in stock I don't know.

Just had to vent, was pretty frustrating as the wife and I started getting pretty excited to play through some of the new Mario3dWorld game and a couple others (went as far to get a couple controllers and a game that were on sale), and now won't have one, unless I went to spend an extra $50-75+ [tax included] buying from somewhere else.

 

[ninjacore]

I've been seeing this the last month or so with a couple other vendors as well. Maybe it's just some new holiday policy, but it seems like stores are accepting orders beyond their actual on-hand stock, hoping they can fulfill the orders, then, after several days of the order showing as "Packaging", they cancel it when they finally determine they won't be able to make the sale.

I agree that it is a pretty annoying practice. Personally (and I'm assuming the same is true for others as well), when I purchase something marked "In-stock", I immediately stop shopping around for it, assuming my job as a consumer is complete. Since I typically shop around quite a bit for stuff, it's an infuriating waste of my time when my order is cancelled several days later. What if I needed it by a certain date? What if I had passed on another deal for only a bit more and the price has now gone up?

Etailers seem to have reached the point where they're too big to care. They know the masses are still going to flock in and they also know there's too much noise on the internet for rants such as ours () to make a dent in their sales. The haydays of consumerism are behind us, it would seem. Now, we're stuck with just a few, ugly options:

1) Full retail prices, but good service (zappos)

2) Better prices, but terrible service and possible order cancellations/delays/high return fees (overstock, tigerdirect, ... newegg )

3) Better prices, but possible scams (and cat hair) (eBay)

4) Shopping in brick and mortar stores Just kidding