Lifehacker (among others) informed me of a deal I had to jump on. Staples ran a “today only” special today where you can buy Quickbooks Pro 2009 for $160, and get a $160 rebate. Normally this is a $200 product. I currently use the free Quickbooks Simple Start version but it is missing a couple of features I want. I don’t need them enough to warrant spending $200 for them, but I would use them if I had them. Unfortunately when something seems to be too good to be true, usually it is.
My brother would also like to get the software for his business, so he went to a local Staples store to buy us each a copy. He got in there and there was only an “out of stock” sticker on the shelf. He inquired and they refused to sell it on back-order or issue a rain check. He called me and let me know, so I called the store closer to me. They said they don’t have any, and they even called the other stores in our area (about a 50 mile radius) and none of them had any. I explained why we needed it today and he said there is no way to get it today since the offer is “while supplies last.” I even checked on the Staples.com website and it says “Out of Stock.”
Staples has always been one of the few big box retailers where I’ve never had any issues like this. They have been out of stock on items in the past in the store, but they’ve always offered to let me go ahead and purchase it, then they even shipped it to my house at no additional charge. Because of their willingness to do the right thing I’ve always tended to use Staples rather than Office Depot or Office Max.
Staples definitely dropped the ball on this one. If you’re going to advertise something that will have a huge acceptance rate, at least make sure your stores and/or rain check policy can handle it. They had plenty of the more expensive multi-user and add-on (website, etc.) versions, was this meant to be a legal form of bait and switch? I will definitely be considering the other local office supply stores when I reach the point that I need to purchase Quickbooks at full price, and probably for my office supplies in general.