From KABC
“The ridiculously simple way to increase your Amazon holiday sales!” says the Repricer Express website, a London-based service that is said to be the cause of thousands of Amazon.com products mistakenly marked at only a penny.
Inside an Amazon fulfullment center. A glitch that affected Amazon.com sellers allowed users to order items for only a penny. AP Photo
According to The Guardian, at approximately 7:00pm Friday night in London (1:00pm EST, 11:00am PST), Repricer Express–an automated service many third party Amazon sellers use to keep their prices competitive against each other–malfunctioned. Subsequently, it marked thousands of toys, clothes, cell phones, furniture and numerous other items for one penny, and many users dashed to cash out on the ultimate bargain sale.
Though the glitch only lasted for about an hour, many sellers were horrified to find Amazon users had ordered thousands of their products marked at a fraction of their cost.
Martin Le Corre, head of MB Housewares, told The Guardian that he received a call from one of his competitors, asking ‘do you realize all your listings at a penny?’ Within an hour, Le Corre said he received more than 1,600 orders.
“People were buying 10, 50, 100 copies of everything,” said Le Corre, adding that the actual cost would exceed over 100,000 pounds ($156,232). One user purchased 95 board games, retailed at 12.99 pounds ($20.29), for $0.99 each. “We can’t even work it out.”
Read the full story HERE.
