wageslave

On Aug. 16 I ordered Forbidden Planet (Two-Disc Special Edition) and paid 9.99. I ordered from Amazon, and not a third party seller, and got free shipping since I also bought Office Space and Bram Stoker's Dracula.

Now on 8/28 Amazon wants 22.99 for the same thing. I guess I got lucky and bought at the right time but WTF? Jack up the price by over 100%? I know they change their prices often but WOW!

Link:

http://www.amazon.com/Forbidden-Plan...9935202&sr=8-2

nemein

I suspect what happened in the $22.99 is more around the normal price and you just happened to catch it when it was cheaper/some sort of sale. On a somewhat related rant the whole price fluctuation thing drives me up the wall. It's gotten to the point where if it's something I don't need right away I let it sit in my cart for awhile to watch what happens to the price. Even after purchasing it I'll put it back in my cart and occasionally check on it as well to see if it drops so I can claim the difference. Kind of a PITA

Cardsfan111

I have noticed as well that Amazon will sometimes drop their prices to match/compare with a particular week's sale at a major B&M, such as Best Buy. I wouldn't be surprised if you find that title was on sale somewhere else that week for $9.99

fumanstan

Yeah, seems normal. Maltese Falcon was 9.99 a week ago and is back up to it's normal price of $21.99.

Just a sale.

dino88

strange seeing someone complaining about a sale, especially when they were on the lucky end of the deal

clckworang

^^ So true. This type of thing does happen quite a bit. Amazon usually tries to match sales prices from retailers like Best Buy. Just be happy that you got a good buy.

Cheato

To reemphasize: this happens *all the time*. Amazon doesn't do price-matching per se, but they frequently drop prices (quite dramatically sometimes) to be competitive, and then raise them back again when they don't have to beat/match the competition anymore.

I came into this thread because of the title, thinking Amazon had just increased prices across the board.

Rogue588

DDD.com does the same thing.

But how bout this..

I was thinking about selling a DVD set on Amazon. A HEAVY one. But they said they would only give $3 shipping credit. I emailed them telling them that this was a collector's set and weighed MUCH MORE than $3 would cover. Their response?

Adjust my selling price accordingly.

tonyc3742

You definitely have to keep an eye on Amazon's prices, they do change almost at random. The video games Condemned and Condemned 2 were 19.99 for over a week, then with no notice they're up to 29.99 and 39.99.
Priceprotectr.com has saved me some money when the price has dropped in the following 30 days after purchase, be glad you got in at the right time.
Their Marketplace shipping rates and commissions are insane too. 15%, plus flat listing fee, plus "variable fee", for selling a DVD, but you get 4.00 shipping credit (regardless of the size of the package). Thanks.

ShadyLPete

I noticed this today. Earlier this week i pre-ordered The Office Season 4 and it was 29.99 when i ordered it. Today its up to 30.99 and of course i'm still paying 29.99, but odd. Why would they raise it up $1? lol

JoeySeven

I don't buy many DVD's from amazon,but is there a way to search for the on sale or low cost videos on Amazon?
Sorry if I'm high jacking your post. :-)


I got this one for a good price.
American Psycho (Uncut Killer Collector's Edition) $4.99

and yes I'm cheap or always looking for a good deall

Joe Doe

The Cow

dvdpricesearch.com gives you many search options.

Cardsfan111

There's a DVD deals tab near the top of the movies/tv section of Amazon's site. As far as the random low priced titles, I'd follow the point I made earlier...Amazon's temporary price drops usually reflect a similar sale at a B&M. American Psycho is on sale at Best Buy this week for $3.99...it's that same price right now on Amazon. And this means if you did pay $4.99 for it, you should e-mail them and ask for a refund of the $1 difference.

big whoppa

Yes, it's in their FAQs. Crazy policy. You really need to know the exact shipping costs so you don't get burned.

jeffbase34

No big surprise. Best Buy had these two disc movies for 9.99 that week. Amazon just can't stand to have someone beat them on a sale. Lawrence of Arabia was also 9.99 that week.

calhoun07

A store puts something on sale one week, charges regular price for it every other week of the year.

We need to have a thread on this?

JoeySeven

thanks... :-)
looks like what I was looking for.

Thanks again

Email sent to Amazon

I want my one dollar!

or else Evil

Josh-da-man

I've seen this happen as well.

Here's a weird one.

Not long ago, I was book shopping on Amazon. There was this one book I wanted, and I put it in my cart. This was a hardcover book, about $25 list, and Amazon had it at a 34% discount at around $16.50.

I can't remember the exact title of the book (it's one of five that I can think of), but it wasn't a bestseller or high demand item by any means. It was the kind of book that a bookstore might have one copy of that sits on the shelf for months until someone weird like me buys it.

Anyway, I put the book in my cart and didn't place my order right away. I left the Amazon site for a couple of hours, and then when I returned to the site and clicked my cart it gave me that message that one of the items in my cart had changed price.

That one book had gone up to about $19. A low-demand book jumped up in price by two to three dollars in a matter of hours.

I have to wonder if Amazon isn't using some kind of algorithm to set discounts. Where they have a bot that watches how many times a certain item is viewed, or purchased, or put into a cart, or put in a wishlist, and then begins to adjust the discount as it becomes more popular. I can't think of any other explanation for the random price fluctuations.

Numanoid

My local grocer was selling bags of potato chips on Labor Day weekend - buy one at $3, get one free. I went in last week and they were $3 per bag! That's 100% markup!!1! WTF?!

Cheato

That's nothing. I was in a 24-hour supermarket at 2AM, and they were going around changing the price tags WHILE I WAS SHOPPING. Some items I had in my cart suddenly weren't on sale anymore. Can you imagine? I bet they were watching with their security cameras and saw that I had those things in my cart...


Just in case: