> If I had exactly 100 widgets to sell, I can't take payment for 105 in the hope that at least 5 people won't show up to collect their purchases. That would be

> If I had exactly 100 widgets to sell, I can't take payment for 105 in the hope that at least 5 people won't show up to collect their purchases. That would be straight up fraud People do this all of the time... It's called accepting orders prior to manufacture. Most of the time it works out. When it doesn't, you deal with the consequences. And even if you lied to the customer, you just tell them you had manufacturing delays. And either refund them, or up-sell them to another product. The only reason we don't see this behavior in the news is that companies typically don't physically assault customers who have bought widgets that can't be delivered.