BestBuy.Com

[veil]

Another non-existent midnight sale!  Got an email ad today, promising an online sale at midnight Eastern Time with 5 "Early Reveal Prices".  I wasn't interested in those 5 items, but clicked through to TVs, and found a TV I did want.  It was confusing whether $249.99 was the "midnight" price or not, so I called the Best Buy 800 number.  A nice guy named Matt spoke to me for at least 10 minutes, and put me on hold to check something, and told me: the price would be lower than $249.99 at midnight, I wouldn't be able to add the item to my cart before midnight, and this wasn't a sort of "Black Friday" sale where they'd run out of the sale items right after midnight.  Again, this guy put me on hold to CHECK whether he was right about what he was telling me.  So, midnight comes, the TV never goes on sale, and it's immediately "sold out".  I called Best Buy, got some clueless woman who told me the sale hadn't started yet--that it would start at midnight CST (which is not true--just read the ad!), transferred me to a supervisor, then disconnected me.  Called back; finally got a "supervisor" an hour and a half after the alleged sale started.  He was unable to explain what had gone wrong, why I'd been lied to, why the sale had never happened.  I actually had been thinking Best Buy was decent.  It was only tonight, given this experience, that made me do a web search for "best buy online sale scam" that led me to this site....

[Yellowsubmarine]

The guy on the phone was wrong. If you're talking about the COBY TV, its days 249.99, save $120, so 249.99 was in fact the sale price.

[Yellowsubmarine]

Oops the COBY is $259.99, my mistake. If its the $249 Dynex, its listed as On Sale, Reg. Price $349.99

[btsloane]

Customer no service indeed.

I also received the email yesterday advertising the midnight sale. In the email the ad said the sale would start at 12 ET / 9 PT. I have been in the market for a new ipod dock and new computer monitor, so I thought I would stay up to see what was offered.  I jumped on the site around 11:10 PM central time (which is 12:10 ET) and kept getting the same preview page as I had seen earlier in the day with the email blast.  By 12;25 ET, I decided to call customer service and see what the problem was and maybe to just get some information on what products were indeed on sale.  3 customer service reps and 20 minutes later, I was finally told that, although the email clearly stated 12 ET, the sale was not actually starting for those in the central time zone until 12 Central.  I thought that strange, but by this time it was already 11:45, and so I decided to wait 15 more minutes.  Well at 12:15 central time, there was still no change to the sale's website page - still only listing a preview to the upcoming sale.  Again I called customer no service and was told the wait time would be less than 10 minutes.  18 minutes later, my call was answered - I was promptly put on hold and then eventually was disconnected while being transferred.  I must say that I remember a time when Best Buy was my absolute favorite place to frequent - but the service and support has continually declined over the last 2-3 years.  I am extremely upset.  And, although I would like some explanations, I no longer feel that finding any of Best Buy's illusive midnight sales are worth it.  Chalk me up as one more lost customer to Amazon.

BTS

[btsloane]

Customer no service indeed.

I also received the email yesterday advertising the midnight sale. In the email the ad said the sale would start at 12 ET / 9 PT. I have been in the market for a new ipod dock and new computer monitor, so I thought I would stay up to see what was offered.  I jumped on the site around 11:10 PM central time (which is 12:10 ET) and kept getting the same preview page as I had seen earlier in the day with the email blast.  By 12;25 ET, I decided to call customer service and see what the problem was and maybe to just get some information on what products were indeed on sale.  3 customer service reps and 20 minutes later, I was finally told that, although the email clearly stated 12 ET, the sale was not actually starting for those in the central time zone until 12 Central.  I thought that strange, but by this time it was already 11:45, and so I decided to wait 15 more minutes.  Well at 12:15 central time, there was still no change to the sale's website page - still only listing a preview to the upcoming sale.  Again I called customer no service and was told the wait time would be less than 10 minutes.  18 minutes later, my call was answered - I was promptly put on hold and then eventually was disconnected while being transferred.  I must say that I remember a time when Best Buy was my absolute favorite place to frequent - but the service and support has continually declined over the last 2-3 years.  I am extremely upset.  And, although I would like some explanations, I no longer feel that finding any of Best Buy's illusive midnight sales are worth it.  Chalk me up as one more lost customer to Amazon.

BTS

[veil]

That was exactly the same disappointing experience I had--on the site at midnight, preview prices only, product I wanted was NEVER available at the sale price, endless amount of time on phone with "customer service", got disconnected, employees gave incorrect information, etc.  The sale was FICTICIOUS.

[Ryan-BBY Senior Social Media Specialist]

Hello veil -

Sean from our Social Media team, will be reaching out to you regarding your concern. Thank you for your continued patience!

[Audio-Depot]

How long does BestBuy expect to keep their customer base while continually advertising these fictional midnight sales and backing it up with clueless customer service?*

*Its not the employees fault that BestBuy does not communicate sales, etc with them, so please remember not to take your frustrations out on them!

Even the stock-picking newsletters are saying don't invest in BBY; that the poor instore and online customer service is a clear sign that the end is near for Best Buy.  That will be a sad day.  Or perhaps, given the circumstances, that will be a good day!  But still sad for the un-employees.

[Sean-BBY Senior Social Media Specialist]

Hi veil,

Thank you so much for posting on the forums about the Midnight Sale that you were looking to participate in and were running into some issues.  I’d be upset as well if I waited online for the sale, only to not be able to get the television I was looking at, not to mention also that the price didn’t seem to change.

I am sorry to hear about this experience and I can imagine it’d be disappointing, especially after calling and trying to verify what the previous price was.  I appreciate the feedback regarding the sale and unfortunately I don’t have an explanation as to why you were unable to look at or participate in the sale.  I am making sure that your concerns and experience are being logged here in our corporate office and will be forwarded along to the online team.  In addition, I will be sure that any miscommunication that was provided over the phone is being logged as well.

Again, thank you for reaching out to us about this and if you have any other questions, please let me know.

Regards,

[btsloane]

So I guess case closed??? While I agree with you regarding the need for these problems to be fixed going forward, I feel that more than just a "we will look into it attitude" is warranted. I do not believe, as you suggest, that what happen to me last night is uncommon. All you need to do is bump around this very community forum to see that there have been many ongoing problems with these recent "Midnight Sales". Of course you will get so much more if you just google "best buy midnight sale" along with words like "horrible, fake, hoax, and joke". Oh well, I wasted too much time last night to continue to spit in the wind today. I, like many others who have posted prior to me, will most likely not shop in-store, nor online with Best Buy from this point further.
BTS

[btsloane]

I would furthermore like to suggest that others who have similar complaints go to The Consumerist website.  It is a good forum to raise issues that you have with select businesses that you feel need to be addressed.

www.consumerist.com

bts