It looks like Newegg, a reputable online retailer for electronics, has pulled a fast one on buyers in its latest sale. The company is currently offering a huge sale through the use of its new financing partner, Zip. By using Zip, shoppers can buy now and pay later at no additional cost. Allowing them to break payments down into multiple portions to make their purchase more reasonable over time. Also, by selecting this option and using the code “ZIPFEST12“, shoppers can save 12% on their purchase with a max discount of up to $100.
Sounds great, right? To no surprise, it didn’t take long for shoppers to realize they could finally save some cash on the Xbox Series X by using this feature during the purchase of the console. Bringing the price down to $439 (from $499) and breaking it out into four payments using the Zip promotion.
However, Newegg apparently realized that the console was no longer profitable (not that there is much margin at all, to begin with) and quickly raised the initial price of the console to $599 on its website. With the discount, placing the price of the console at around $527, making it more expensive than the normal MSRP. Talking about a little game of bait and switch.
At the same time, the company is more than happy to brag about the 12% promotion on the product page and listed it as a promotional item within search results. Meanwhile, shoppers can find the console via other retailers for the normal price of $499. Long story short, Newegg clearly doesn’t plan to sell many of these.
It’s somewhat surprising to see this happen at Newegg of all places. Through lottery attempts and other means, the retailer has tried hard to make product available to customers even in the most complicated supply chain situations. Most of us here spend a lot of money at Newegg and have done so for years as it is a great source for building a new PC or buying various parts. Hopefully, this isn’t a new practice that can be found there.
