Update on Buy.com

Monitor-Gate

The whole Hitachi "monitor-gate" fiasco a few months back was an overblown example of why we were wary of Buy.com. Back in February 99, Buy.com had a typographical error listing a Hitachi 19inch monitor for only $162.50. Buy.com received over 1600 orders in a matter of days. They actually shipped out the 143 monitors they had in stock at that price, but refused to honor the rest of the orders. Frankly, it's surprising they even honored the erroneous price for the 143 they had in stock. Because many people already had bad experiences with buy.com, the Hitachi incident was the straw that broke the camel's back. The public was furious. Other respectable online retailers would have gotten away with canceling all the orders, but they didn't have Buy.com's tarnished reputation.

It looks like Buy.com is cleaning up their act for their upcoming IPO. They no longer charge your credit card at the time your order is placed. Now they charge your credit card when they ship your order just like all the other retailers. They also eliminated that ridiculous 15% restocking fee when you cancel an order for a backordered item (which, by definition isn't even stocked). Their shipping & handling prices have also fallen to somewhat reasonable levels. We're glad to see Buy.com has adopted more respectable business practices. Some of our friends and coworkers have even started buying from buy.com again, but many of us still choose to shop elsewhere. Why forgive bad experiences when we can still get good deals from MA Labs?

Buy.com is good for products that are in stock. If you live close enough to one of their many warehouses, your order can arrive as early the next day even if you choose ground shipping. Unfortunately, buy.com still seems to be having problems with out-of-stock items. Their inventory indicators are often inaccurate on hot items, and in a recent Viper 770 special, people had to wait almost a month for their orders. If there's a cheap price on a hot product, expect to wait a while for it to arrive. If you're still reluctant about ordering from buy.com, but you can't resist the prices, you can always get other online companies to match prices for you. Many may not be able to match the prices, but they'll come close and you can save on shipping and maybe sales tax.