reflections on daddy-hood and other random things

Tuesday, March 14, 2006

Say please, or Refund Please, rather

I learned about this seemingly too-easy-to-be-true tip from I Will Teach You to Be Rich, an often amusing blog on financial matters. If Amazon lowers the price of something you bought within 30 days of the purchase, it'll refund the difference at your request. Now of course you say, "Gil, who has time to keep checking for price changes when there are diapers to be changed and bottles to be washed?" (A brief piece of advice concerning washing those bottles: if you happen to discover a bottle of formula left sitting around that appears to be full of cottage cheese, I would advise you just to toss it in the trash.)

Well that's exactly the service that you can get for free at http://refundplease.com (Note: the url has changed from the original posting above. Amazon must have complained about the use of their name in the domain name.). I have tried this service, and it actually saved me money.

Our recent purchase of a vacuum cleaner at Christmas was the Eureka Smart Boss from Amazon. With the $25 off special for home & garden purchases, it was a deal not to be beat. And by the way, if you're in the market for a great sucker without feeling like a sucker yourself, don't splurge on those $400 English vacuums. This Smart Boss is the way to go. Great sucking at a great price--even a HEPA filter.

Anyway, I felt so good about this purchase. I knew I had gotten the best deal around. However, I ran across this refund site and thought I'd give it a try. I simply entered the Amazon stock number, the price I paid, the date of purchase, and my email address. I didn't think anything would come of it. I knew I had already gotten a rock bottom price.

Or so I thought. A couple of weeks went by and I got an email from RefundPlease.com that said Amazon had lowered the price by around $15 or so. I emailed Amazon's customer service, politely requested the refund of the difference, and I got a nice email back saying they had just credited my card. Of course this works for books and most anything that Amazon sells.

Wow. If only changing diapers could be this easy.

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