Dell Taiwan gets sidelined after second 'bargain' incident

After a second run in with low, low, low prices on particular products at Dell Taiwan, Dell has shut down that country's online store until it can sort things out. Apparently this time it was the Latitude E4300 which would go haywire with particular CPU configurations. Dell is offering a 20,000 NT (about $600 US) discount to those who ordered the mis-priced PC, but apparently that only just matches the regular street price in Taiwan for the computer so people are naturally up in arms. We're not sure what they're so grumpy about: sounds like a paradise on earth to us.

[AJ in the East Bay @ Jul 6th 2009 9:29AM]

Must...go...to Taiwan.

[OneLove @ Jul 6th 2009 10:04AM]

"smoke weed" , "smoke weed"

[OneLove @ Jul 6th 2009 10:07AM]

this was supposed to be the clock article? wtf?

[Sanskrit @ Jul 6th 2009 10:15AM]

@OneLove

"this was supposed to be the clock article? wtf?"

It's obviously the Dell Taiwan site at work.

[Techie @ Jul 6th 2009 12:18PM]

That's some good fried rice their eating over there....

[Toink @ Jul 6th 2009 9:29AM]

Must be a disgruntled DELL employee doing it on purpose

[Quantumphysics @ Jul 6th 2009 9:29AM]

I miss Crazy Eddie.

I think its funny that all the major corporations that were out at the time, namely the Wiz, did what eddie did and matched prices if you got a better deal from Pc Richards.

[archer823 @ Jul 6th 2009 9:31AM]

Ah the good old days of Tri State electronic retail giants. The Wiz. Crazy Eddie. Is PC Richardson still around?

Best Buy is just souless compared to these shops where towards the end it just felt like you were being hard sold on even a set of batteries.

[Dunhill @ Jul 6th 2009 4:18PM]

yea PC Richards is still around.

its their....100 years or something anniversary

[Sam @ Jul 6th 2009 10:30AM]

P.C. Richard is definitely still around; they actually just purchased a bunch of ex-Circuit City sites around the tri-state area.

[niloc @ Jul 6th 2009 9:31AM]

So Dell Taiwan is selling their PC at $600 more than street price? Meh.

[Chiu @ Jul 6th 2009 1:35PM]

Dell is selling E4300 for US$1845, $600 more than the street price in Taiwan, and $600 more than the official price in US, Japan, and China.

I'm NOT sure you can call it a paradise.

[Jason @ Jul 6th 2009 2:39PM]

It's only fair to compare price for the models in similar configuration. For the same configuration of E4300, Taiwan is probably $100 - $200 more expensive than USA. Not sure where to find the street price for E4300 in Taiwan though.

[Chiu @ Jul 6th 2009 10:36PM]

Fair point!

The Taiwan lowest official price is about $1847.7
The US official price for a nearest configuration is $1508, with extra WWAN support and a better Hard drive, which is $340 cheaper.
The Hongkong official price with a better hard drive is about $1345.7, whis is about $500 cheaper.
The price is about $1386 on internet, but you could probably get a better price from non-authorized retailers.

[Chiu @ Jul 6th 2009 11:54PM]

US price should be $1698.
HK price should be about $1403.

[Chiu @ Jul 7th 2009 12:05AM]

I was wrong again.
US price is $1607 without tax.

[Vic De Zen @ Jul 6th 2009 9:31AM]

I'm surprised we have yet to hear news about someone stepping down from the company for these price misprints.

[OneLove @ Jul 6th 2009 9:35AM]

I cannot tell a lie, it was me. Sorry.

[rock99rock @ Jul 6th 2009 9:36AM]

Im not surprised. They screw something up daily here, too.

http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=411606&t=1058540 - Just from my own experience.

[tmarks11 @ Jul 6th 2009 10:28AM]

The only bad publicity is no publicity at all.

Somebody in the corporate ladder is probably taking full credit for these "mistakes". Thousands of customers right now are trying every possible combination of CPU/Screen/Accessories, hoing to trigger the jackpot.

[poppadot @ Jul 6th 2009 2:11PM]

because they work in marketing

is marketing ever really held accountable? Dilbert says no

[guises @ Jul 6th 2009 10:14AM]

The only surprising thing here is that the Taiwanese government is making them honor these obviously mistaken prices.

People are always going to make mistakes like this, there's no way to insure perfect accuracy all the time. Protections are in place to prevent a bait-and-switch style scam, but apparently enforcement in Taiwan has no flexibility to allow for honest mistakes. This is a legislative oversight.

[EI8HT @ Jul 6th 2009 10:22AM]

with all due respect, i would have to disagree. i honestly think many times they do it on purpose to draw attention (i.e. free advertisements from slickdeals, fat wallet, etc.) then, once they have people interested in their products, they ask them to drop their shorts and pay full price. i don't think i've ever come across a price mistake, for example, on apple's website, probably due to the fact that they try to hire competent people.

[Kevin Wang @ Jul 6th 2009 10:23AM]

Actually the story about the government ordering Dell to honor the placed orders was misleading. The only people that gave the "order" was a consumer advocacy group and not a governmental organization, and basically they only said that consumers have the right to sue if Dell decides not to accept the orders already placed.

[EtherGnat @ Jul 6th 2009 11:52AM]

"i don't think i've ever come across a price mistake, for example, on apple's website, probably due to the fact that they try to hire competent people."

Oh please, tell me your joking. Dell has thousands of items on their web site, with prices that change regularly. Apple offers a small fraction of that amount, and almost never changes their prices. I'm sure Apple would make an occasional mistake if they had as much going on as Dell too.

[EI8HT @ Jul 6th 2009 6:23PM]

@ gnat:
dell has pricing errors practically every day of the whole damn year. like i said, if they want to change the prices for their crappy products every other day then they should hire someone who has the i.q. of a 10 year old to make those changes. i say screw 'em...if it was once in a while it would be understandable but their incompetence is a joke. they deserve to honor their price mistakes.

[Kevin Wang @ Jul 6th 2009 10:19AM]

I'm from Taiwan, and we're currently really pissed off by how Dell mishandled both mispricing incidents. Both times Dell let the wrong price stand for more than 8 hours, and when people tried to call their 24-hr support line, turned out that line wasn't even staffed. Now they're offering discounts for their online store, which is closed for hell knows how long, and the discounts are only good until July 31, and for only the mispriced models, and even after the discounts, current street prices are still substantially lower. I'm surprised that nobody's getting fired or stepping down, and even more surprised that there hasn't been any disciplinary action from Dell HQ.

[Paul Lee @ Jul 6th 2009 10:28AM]

I can tell that you're really pissed...

Calm down dude, ever thought about stop buying DELL?

[Richard @ Jul 6th 2009 11:52AM]

Hi Kevin Wang from Taiwan,

Why is it that you feel Dell OWES you something?

[shania.esrevni @ Jul 18th 2009 6:57PM]

good point richard.

[John @ Jul 6th 2009 1:16PM]

So, you're saying you're dumb enough to find a huge, unmentioned discount on an online store not once, but TWICE and not realize that it's a pricing error that is not going to be resolved in your favor? I suppose you feel cheated when the bank misplaces a decimal on your deposit then takes the money back too.

[tliu79 @ Jul 6th 2009 1:23PM]

@ Richard

It's called offer and acceptance which creates a mutually binding agreement. Assuming Kevin Wang actually bought a computer online. It's a contract, hence, they owe him something.

What exactly is your big gripe over someone complaining about an offeree essentially backing out of a deal.

When a seller mistypes a price on ebay and someone buys it, do you think "It was a typo" is going to excuse them from going through with the deal?

[John Stracke @ Jul 6th 2009 1:23PM]

@Richard: well, it owes customers honesty, at least.

[EI8HT @ Jul 6th 2009 6:49PM]

@ richard

you don't mind if we call you by your nick name do you...eh dick?

[johnp@dell @ Jul 8th 2009 8:26PM]

Suffice to say we’ve have been humbled by this situation, we've apologized for it and we're certainly learning from it. Clearly we did not act fast enough. We're also listening to our customers and respect their point of view

[katiecheng @ Jul 6th 2009 10:23AM]

i ordered 12 22" LCD monitors for like $30 each last time...I got bunch of those $30 coupons :P

[glamajamma @ Jul 6th 2009 10:45AM]

+1 for Crazy Eddie

[rsm @ Jul 6th 2009 10:48AM]

If Dell has Crazy Eddie working for them -- they're in big trouble!!! Seriously though -- seeing Crazy Eddie again brought back memories -- those wacky commercials -- and of course, those big time consumer rip offs. Also, reminded me of "That's the story," JGE Electronics -- which was another big rip off parlor. How they got away with it so long is beyond me.

[John Stracke @ Jul 6th 2009 1:31PM]

For those who don't know the story: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crazy_Eddie

[erikraf @ Jul 6th 2009 12:18PM]

is it just me, or the guy looks like Biff from Back to the Future? =)

[digitallysick @ Jul 6th 2009 3:03PM]

So Taiwan is the only country that really cares for consumer protections and fairness? nice

[winst @ Jul 6th 2009 3:40PM]

I read the original article in Chinese... It is a class case of "lost in translation" + "bait and switch"

Dell originally posted LCD monitors for $15 each (with limited supply). After 14,000 orders, Dell decided that it does not want to honor the sale and refused to give refunds. Instead, it offers $30 coupon for the next purchase. Dell still want to keep the $150 for the monitor.

This past Sunday, Dell offers E4300 at deep discounted, refused to give refunds and instead, give $600 coupons toward the next purchase.

In the US, it is called "bait and switch" and it is illegal. Taiwan has similar laws, but because it is small and the Dell officials in Taiwan are incompetent, Dell Taiwan took a hard line and refused to give refunds. That's why the consumer agencies and the government agency stepped in.

[Falcon @ Jul 6th 2009 4:44PM]

Below is what you DON'T know:

E4300 DELL USA $1344-$1515 (about NT44352-49995)
DELL JP 11980-12980 (about NT41393-44843)
DELL HK 9700-more (about NT41516-more)
DELL CHINA RMB9499-more (about NT43695-more)
DELL TW NT60900-more (about $1845-more)

[Upallnite @ Jul 6th 2009 7:51PM]

The problem here is..... His prices are insaaaaaannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnee !!!

[Michael Zupcak @ Jul 6th 2009 8:05PM]

If you want a good story, read about Crazy Eddie, and watch the episode of "Masterminds" named after him (torrent available)

[oplz @ Jul 7th 2009 12:42PM]

Taiwan's Comsumer Protection Commision plans to have an investigation on whether this is a intentional act for advertising Dell's label in Taiwan.

Recently, few similar mislabeling price cases happened in Japan, Hong Kong and Mainland China (on IBM, HP, and Dell). IBM and HP honored all orders. Dell, again, refused to do so and provided 25%off discount. Some took it, some not and went to court instead. Dell lost the case and was forced to honor the orders. It all depends on at which point the contract is considered complete, in other words, when both sides reach an agreement on the deal. If it goes to when buyers hit “confirm” button, then even those tiny waiver text cannot protect Dell from this mess…It cannot against the low, or at least Taiwan's law in the case. I will be happy to see this case brought to the court.

Don't take it for granted that the US way is the best and correct way to deal with things. I am in Boston, not sure if Taiwan is a paradise, but difintely there're something done better than here. People in the US are educated in a very capialism way. The US has the most screwed helath insurance in the world which is hold by few monster companies. When people in other place like Taiwan take it for granted that government take care of their health. Americans still have no idea what they could have and keep defending their screwed system, claiming it's better than their neighbor Canada and Cuba. Just try to top being so considerate to those companies...they are not the weak in most cases.

The bottom line is, it’s not consumers’ job to judge if the price is “reasonable” or not. Any price made by companies should be considered as a result after profitability calculations. A line should be drawn, to make sure companies won’t abuse it for marketing, promotion or other mal-intentions. It’s also sellers responsibility to protect themselves from any mistake made by themselves, such as price mislabel. It’s not consumers business to be so considerate to those companies and worry about if they can take the hit.

I am not saying Dell should honor all orders in this case. But to let it get away like this is simply not right. Dell lost almost nothing so far, by giving alway those no-one-will-use coupons. Dell needs to learn the lesson by paying a mugh higher price.