The Connecticut Attorney General has at least confirmed parts of serious fraud allegations instigated against Best Buy last month
Connecticut’s daily newspaper, The Hartford Courant, reports that Best Buy confirmed that its stores run a secret, employee-only intranet site. The clandestine site is identical to the Best Buy website accessible on the Internet, save for one large difference; prices. The secret intranet site is said to have discourage customers from buying products that were advertised at cheaper prices on BestBuy.com.
The Courant specifically mentions that walk-in customers in Connecticut Best Buys were shown the secret intranet site when the customers asked to price match items on the public website. This intranet portal, which looks identical to the public BestBuy.com site, displayed higher prices on several items. Thus, customers that attempted to price match items from the website were foiled.
Early last February, Best Buy spokesman Justin Barber denied the existence of any such website. Despite this, in response to George Gombossy’s investigations and reporting, the State of Connecticut’s Attorney General Office announced they would begin an investigation into whether Best Buy actually maintained a secret website in order to trick customers and elude discount prices.
According to The Courant, the Connecticut State’s Attorney General Richard Blumenthal ordered the investigation on February 9. Last Wednesday Blumenthal stated that Best Buy had confirmed the existence of the intranet site, however, it failed to provide a solid reason for its existence and purpose.
In an interview with Gombossy, Blumenthal stated, "Their responses seem to raise as many questions as they answer. Their answers are less than crystal clear."
The most troubling part of the ordeal is how customers have been blocked from buying products at prices advertised on BestBuy.com. In some cases, customers hoping to buy certain products discounted on BestBuy.com have been led to believe the price listed on the intranet website, which is higher than the discounted price, is the real price. In other cases, the intranet site has also been used to make customers believe a sale has ended, although on the BestBuy.com website the sale is still shown as active.
In a statement written to Gombossy, Best Buy stated "Although we have an intra-store Web site in place to support store operations (including products and pricing), we are reminding our employees how to access the external BestBuy.com Web site to ensure customers are receiving the best possible product price."
Our intention is to provide the best price to our customers which is why we have a price-match policy in place, prices and offers may vary between retail and online, our stores will certainly match BestBuy.com pricing as long as it qualifies under the terms and conditions of the price match policy."
As a company, everything we do revolves around our customers' needs and desires. It is never our intent to mislead them as their loyalty is incredibly important to us.”
|