I in the market for a small business server to use in the home. I figured I would start with Dell as a first place to look. Good benchmark to go off of. I get to their site and see some great prices. Combine that with their 'award winning service' and things are looking good. However, here's what I found:
I went to the front page for a particular system. It had a price of $1599. I selected the "Customize" button so I could see what was in the system and possibly change a few things. When the customize page came up the price was now $2068. Okay annoying, and I was thinking they just changed the configuration or something. But no. It turns out all the nominal choices (no extra cost) were selected. So there was NO WAY to get the price down to the $1599. Fishy..yes. Frustrated...definitely.
I checked further by going to product pages for several products. Each of them was the same way. The price on the "Customize" page was not the same as on the front page for the product and there no way to customize it to the lower price. One for example was off by $1599!!!! (PowerEdge4600)
I even figured: "Maybe they add a bunch of sale discounts and incentives in the final 'sales cart.' Nope. I will say that the featured desktop ad laptop had no price variance. I did however try configuring several desktops and laptops in their line up and could not get the advertised price from the front page.
What is going on here. In the average online buyer that naive?? Do people really buy systems this way?
I went to the front page for a particular system. It had a price of $1599. I selected the "Customize" button so I could see what was in the system and possibly change a few things. When the customize page came up the price was now $2068. Okay annoying, and I was thinking they just changed the configuration or something. But no. It turns out all the nominal choices (no extra cost) were selected. So there was NO WAY to get the price down to the $1599. Fishy..yes. Frustrated...definitely.
I checked further by going to product pages for several products. Each of them was the same way. The price on the "Customize" page was not the same as on the front page for the product and there no way to customize it to the lower price. One for example was off by $1599!!!! (PowerEdge4600)
I even figured: "Maybe they add a bunch of sale discounts and incentives in the final 'sales cart.' Nope. I will say that the featured desktop ad laptop had no price variance. I did however try configuring several desktops and laptops in their line up and could not get the advertised price from the front page.
What is going on here. In the average online buyer that naive?? Do people really buy systems this way?