Anti-Hot Deal: Amazon's minimum free shipping now $49 for everything except books!

[TwiceOver]

I have sometimes notice a book will be like:

Seller 1 $15.00 + $3.99 shipping
Seller 2 $15.04 + $3.99 shipping
Seller 3 $15.08 + $3.99 shipping
Amazon Prime $18.99 Free shipping

Just a coincidence!

Except that $3.99 shipping is usually slowest available. So even shipping isn't apples to apples.

 

[stlc8tr]

Since Amazon doesn't have "price alert" notifications, though, "saving for later" does have the benefit of showing price changes for those things as well as the ones in the "active" part of the cart at the top of the page. By keeping things I have even a slight "current interest" in buying there and then checking the cart frequently, I've been able grab things that that have dropped, however briefly, to dramatically low prices...

Just use camelcamelcamel for Amazon price alerts.

It's not perfect as there are some false alarms but it's still very handy.

 

[Mike64]

Just use camelcamelcamel for Amazon price alerts.

It's not perfect as there are some false alarms but it's still very handy.

Are they really "false alarms" as in incorrect price quotes (not sure how that could happen?), or just notifications that miss getting to the recipient during a brief price drop?

 

[Carson Dyle]

Are they really "false alarms" as in incorrect price quotes (not sure how that could happen?), or just notifications that miss getting to the recipient during a brief price drop?

More often than not, they never see the brief price drops. I put things into the 'Save for later' and usually check my cart two or three times a day, just to see if anything has fallen a lot. I catch a lot of things that camelcamelcamel never does. If I'm not mistaken, they rely on members to report the prices, so its easy to understand why.

 

[stlc8tr]

Are they really "false alarms" as in incorrect price quotes (not sure how that could happen?), or just notifications that miss getting to the recipient during a brief price drop?

Sometimes I get a notification of a price drop and when I check, the price wasn't at the lower price. Not sure if the price was raised or if they simply whiffed.

AFAIK, they either automatically scrap or use a feed of some sort. In any even, it's easier than always checking for price drops. I don't have that much free time.

 

[Mike64]

AFAIK, they either automatically scrap or use a feed of some sort. In any even, it's easier than always checking for price drops. I don't have that much free time.

I can't imagine they have access to a "feed" (wouldn't that require Amazon's cooperation?)? I don't constantly check my cart throughout the day either (not that 2-3x is constant anyway, in this age of portable devices) but then, if I want something badly enough to even consider doing that in the first place, I usually just suck it up and spend whatever I have to after having checked out historical pricing and looking for the lowest current one I can find...

 

[Mike64]

AFAIK, they either automatically scrap or use a feed of some sort.

If I'm not mistaken, they rely on members to report the prices, so its easy to understand why.

Apparently they do their own checks, though since it doesn't seem to be with the broadest of brushes, I'm not sure the term "scraping" quite applies...

According to this page, the most frequently they check Amazon (US) for any product that anyone's tracking at the time is every 5 hours (which jumps to 2.5 days for products not actively being tracked.) That's much too infrequently to catch some of the shorter-lived (often dramatic) price drops I'm (and I assume Carson is) talking about...

 

[Mike64]

It would appear that Amazon is doing behaviorial psych experiments on its users (though less covert/sophisticated than Facebook's), or maybe "it" just had some sort of collective psychiatric "episode"...:hmm: In any event, the previous format showing the ratio of unhelpful to helpful ratings is back...

A-a-a-nd they're gone again.../:hmm:/ If Amazon were a flesh&blood person (rather than a Citizens United&dollars person), right about now I'd be thinking that psychopharmacological intervention should probably be the next step, but as it is, I really just can't imagine what someone out there thinks they're doing?