Gloating ethics

[Lee Gordon]

[Enoch Root]

I think a paper ad always has the out: printing "not responsible for typos"[1] somewhere in the ad. It's commonly used in the local free computer magazine, for example.

1] Something like that, anyway.

er

[Morris Dovey]

| Anyway, I feel sort of bad about it.

So? What would it take (have taken) for you to feel better about the situation?

-- Morris Dovey DeSoto Solar DeSoto, Iowa USA

[Toller]

It is unethical when you do something wrong; hack into their system, deceive them somehow, return something after sending in the rebate... If you have done nothing wrong, it is ethical.

It is their responsibility to get their systems to work, not yours.

I got my 5 Besseys today in 3 boxes and 2 tubes. Somebody should be fired for that, but it is not my fault.

[Swingman]

Check your credit card statement. Mine has six, like dated, Amazon charges on it ... one for each clamp, and a mysterious $1.06 for who knows what.

Maybe the extra 120' of bubble wrap?

[brianlanning]

I'm not sure what the chain of events was. I can't check woodnet from work. All I know is that some people had their orders cancelled, and mine wasn't. It could be that amazon intended to allow it for some people, or it could be that they didn't catch mine in time.

I posted somewhere else in this thread that I called them. The guy told me that there was nothing wrong with the order so I guess I'll forget about it.

brian

[stoutman]

What is "x-no-archive:yes" ??

[bob]

What you did is called STEALING. The $80 rebate was for orders of $420 or more. Even if the code did work for an $89 item, it was WRONG to do what you did.

[Connor Aston]

Right its like this . . .

1. Someone decided to start selling books online.
2. Turns out to be a great success.
3. So now we can sell anything and make money (Good luck to them for the great idea in the first place).
4. We employ the best brains to program and develop our site.
5. Just like any other business they make mistakes. (If WE cut a plank in the wrong place do we ask our customer to pay?)
6. With all the combined computing power and programmers at Amazon.com if they get it wrong we'll that just tough sh*t

When this shows on a report somewere it will be a hard lesson. And I hope they can fix it because I would'nt like it happening in my business. But maybe if I sold tools to woodworkers online. I might go to the odd newsgroup to see them gloating about the success of shopping with me. And maybe fix it.

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[Phisherman]

Why? Amazon has some outstanding deals--I've purchased books, tools, machines, etc at very good prices. I offer local stores equal money for the same goods--some take it, others refuse. Having a gloat is just telling everyone they found a good buy, and chances are that they are smart shoppers. I wish our "ethical" government had gloats!!!

[majik]

I ordered a Unisaw about ten years ago from a national woodworkers catalog. At the time they were about $1200.00. When it hadn't arrived in three weeks I called to see what was going on. They said they had no record of an order. After checking with my credit card company to make sure I wasn't charged for it I reordered it. Yep, you guessed already. Three weeks later on Wednesday, I got my new saw. Three weeks later on Thursday I received another new saw. Call to the credit card company first, only one charge. After at least six different phone calls to the company, I spoke to a vice president of the company. You guessed again he told me to consider it an early Christmas present. I guess a big company like that just can't be bothered with a trivial $1200.00.

[Swingman]

Had to laugh at that one. Times don't always change, except maybe in magnitude and morality. I spent the best part of the year between 6 and 7 looking over my shoulder and pretty sure I was either going to jail, to hell, or both.

I had ordered Roy Rogers, Dale Evans, Trigger, Buttermilk, Pat Brady and his jeep, Nelly Belle, and Bullet, all for 50 cents and a box top from Post Toasties cereal. When I didn't get my order in the promised "allow three weeks for delivery", I wrote a complaint letter, the first of a lifetime's worth as it turned out. The next day the package arrived, and three weeks later the second box, in response to my block printed letter.

In my 6 year old mind, raised with a strict brand of morality that was a lot more prevalent in those days, that was outright theft and I figured I was done for, one way or the other ... but I did gain a respect for the power of words on a piece of paper, even by a six year old.

[Stephen M]

When I say "you I don't mean personally"

Ther are a couple of scenearios laying around here so let me be clear on the one to which I was referring.... Using a SAV500 coupon on a $119 item. *If* you *know* that the coupon is intended for a $500 purchase you are taking advantage of their mistake. I see this as pretty much the same thing as getting change for a 20 when you gave the cashier a 10. Yes, I think knowingly pocketing the extra 10 in unethical.

If you say "lookie what I got... and extra $10" this is unwise as can reflect poorly on your character (at least in a forum of strangers).

My 2 cents

[Stephen M]

Someone opens a corner grocery/convenience store

They are just scaping by.

Doing their best to sell the lousy old inventory that come with the store because they have no extra capital to write it off and replace it.

It's a family business

It's a manual business. The owner is working, as always, a double and mis-labels cans of dinty-moore stew as .19 rather than 3.19. Is it ethical to wait until the owner's 14 year old daughter is helping out on the cash register to buy up their entire inventory of stew?

You be the judge.

But size of the retailer should not be a parameter any ethics function that returns a "right or "wrong".

-Steve