December 15, 2010

Best Buy Admits To Misleading Customers With Kiosks

Article on Best Buy settlement when they ran dummy pricing on the internet kiosks (pricing on kiosks was higher than the web). We wonder if this was company wide initiative when they did it, or they targeted regions/zip codes.

StorefrontBacktalk � Blog Archive � Best Buy Admits To Misleading Customers With Kiosks

EXCERPT

Written by Evan Schuman
December 15th, 2010

After more than three-and-a-half years of courtroom battles with the Connecticut Attorney General’s office, Best Buy on Monday (Dec. 13) admitted that its in-store kiosks tricked consumers out of Web price-matching and agreed to pay consumers in that state $399,000.

The chain also said it would stop showing higher prices on its in-store kiosks and would “conspicuously disclose to consumers” if the kiosk was displaying lower prices. Although the settlement is unlikely a cause for celebration at Best Buy, the chain actually fared quite well and will sustain little pain from it.

Editor’s Note:

Page 1 of this Best Buy Kiosk Deception Settlement Special Report covers The Overview Of The Case, Implications.

Page 2 covers The Different Web And In-Store Pricing Quicksand.

Page 3 covers How Little It Will Help Consumers

Why little pain? A $399,000 settlement is not a huge deterrent for a $50 billion chain, but it might become more annoying if it spreads to many other states. (If every other U.S. state and Washington, D.C., reached a similar settlement, it would still only be $20 million. At this stage, though, three years after Connecticut filed its charges, it’s unlikely any other states or territories would begin actions.)


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Posted by staff at December 15, 2010 03:24 PM