I should have prefaced by saying "Should be once it's in the cart..."
To me it's just the way business "should be" conducted... I would never buy from a store, on-line or brick & mortar, who did that to me... changed the price once I picked it off the shelf or placed it in a cyber shopping cart... Again, I believe price changes should be made advertised as the supply price is changed for the new stock, not once someone decides to buy it & especially not stock that was already purchased by seller at a previous lower price... That smells of rotten business. Now if it was an obvious Oops on the sellers part by leaving a zero off like say a ball that all other shops are priced at $135.00 & it was accidentally marked as $13.50, then I see a legit reason for the seller to pull back & say wait a minute that's not the real price...
I don't even like gas stations changing price on gas that's already in their underground tanks. It should be changed once that tank is refilled by the supplier.
I agree that prices shouldn't change from what is posted/advertised, however it happens all the time whether online or at brick and mortar retailers. Stores such as Target and Walmart sell several thousand products in their stores, so it isn't surprising when the price on the shelf doesn't match what comes up at the checkout. They will usually honor the posted price if you call them out on it. Some supermarkets locally here will actually refund you double the difference of a mispriced item and give you another of the same item for free if you catch them in a mistake.
Having also worked on the other side of the fence, I have gained an appreciation for pricing challenges faced by companies and fully understand circumstances in which pricing errors or even price quotes simply cannot be honored due to the potential for significant loss. The pricing at our company is real-time based on current supplier pricing, however that does not prevent issues. If the pricing data supplied by the supplier is wrong, then we have an issue. If we sell based on the incorrect price, and go back to the supplier to get them to honor it, they may say "no" which then puts us in a tough spot with our customer. We either take the loss, take reduced profit, find another distributor with stock and negotiate with them to sell to us at the same pricing as the original supplier, propose an alternative product that we can sell at the same price, or ultimately cancel the order and apologize to the customer for an error that really wasn't our fault in the first place.
I would love to get an understanding of the pricing parameters in which the bowling equipment industry operates as it relates to the distribution channel, profit margins, shipping and delivery, direct vs. indirect distribution, etc.
