3 ms·

I always tried to do this.

jrockway 14y ago
Why? I'd rather pay market price + x% rather than the constant $x where $x = max(market price) + y% that "honest" retailers would give me.
- lignuist 14y ago
  Yes, it's most likely not rational, but to me it feels like being tricked, if the price changes every few minutes. I prefer a little reliability.
  - mef 14y ago
    Where's the trick? Retailers have always changed their prices for items over time based on external factors, it's just happening faster now.
    - lignuist 14y ago
      "it's just happening faster now" That's the point. Let's say I call a shop, asking for a price of a product. They tell me a price of X, so I take amount X with me and go to the shop, just to see that the price eventually has been changed to Y (eventually higher than X). I'm missing reliability here. Sure, prices are changing all the time. That's just normal, but i would prefer stable prices for at least a time window that allows me to think about my decision before i buy.
      - jrockway 14y ago
        You are overthinking the purchase of toilet paper. (It makes sense for Amazon to think about the price, they are going to sell it thousands of times at that price. But you only buy a case of toilet paper once a year, and it's going to cost you at most $30, so it's not really worth your time to figure out how to save eighty cents.)
        lignuist 14y ago
        Maybe I'm overthinking it. Still: in the sum of all the purchases I do over the year (obviously not only toilet paper), this 80 cents can make a significant difference, if I have to invest the time only once, to find out, how I can fix my behaviour and just follow that pattern afterwards.
        dredmorbius 14y ago
        The problem is that the way the game is rigged, you can't decide only once. You've got to consciously compare every time you shop. The cognitive weight of that decision making is higher than a consistent and satisficing heuristic (shop somewhere that doesn' tplay mindfuck with prices and prices fairly).
      - andrewem 14y ago
        Way back, maybe around 1999?, I was in London and there was an internet cafe called easyInternet [1]. They had this weird gimmick where the price per hour to use a computer with Internet access would fluctuate according to market conditions. It didn't seem to change that much, but it was way lower than its competitors, so that's the one I went to. I found it to be just an irritant, and would happily have paid slightly more to not have to think about the price changes. [1] I think this is the group of companies that owns/owned that: http://www.easy.com http://www.easy.com
- dredmorbius 14y ago
  1: it's a constant feeling of being gamed. I'll avoid retailers, say, that insist on "loyalty cards", I mean, data tracking cards (or just push them hard) on this basis. I once played the game with register discount coupons -- buy an item, and get a "buy 3 get 1 free" coupon. The next time it was "buy 5" (or some n > 3) get 1 free. The challenge kept escalating (I played 3 rounds). My take-away: this company was playing psychological mind games with me, was tracking my purchase decision (via UUIDs on the coupons, despite my paying with cash and not using a data tracking card. 2: The products offered at such discounts are generally higher price and offer little if any utility, or just plain crap (e.g.: processed foods you're better off not eating). You're better off buying store-brand, generic, or raw produce. Decision: shop somewhere that doesn't play mindfuck with you, and/or is conveniently located (time + travel expense + product wastage are significant procurement expenses), and offers a consistent fair price. Extending extreme effort to shave a fraction of a percent off price (or spending several pounds to save several pence) really doesn't pay.

Why? I'd rather pay market price + x% rather than the constant $x where $x = max(market price) + y% that "honest" retailers would give me.

lignuist 14y ago
Yes, it's most likely not rational, but to me it feels like being tricked, if the price changes every few minutes. I prefer a little reliability.
- mef 14y ago
  Where's the trick? Retailers have always changed their prices for items over time based on external factors, it's just happening faster now.
  - lignuist 14y ago
    "it's just happening faster now" That's the point. Let's say I call a shop, asking for a price of a product. They tell me a price of X, so I take amount X with me and go to the shop, just to see that the price eventually has been changed to Y (eventually higher than X). I'm missing reliability here. Sure, prices are changing all the time. That's just normal, but i would prefer stable prices for at least a time window that allows me to think about my decision before i buy.
    - jrockway 14y ago
      You are overthinking the purchase of toilet paper. (It makes sense for Amazon to think about the price, they are going to sell it thousands of times at that price. But you only buy a case of toilet paper once a year, and it's going to cost you at most $30, so it's not really worth your time to figure out how to save eighty cents.)
      - lignuist 14y ago
        Maybe I'm overthinking it. Still: in the sum of all the purchases I do over the year (obviously not only toilet paper), this 80 cents can make a significant difference, if I have to invest the time only once, to find out, how I can fix my behaviour and just follow that pattern afterwards.
        dredmorbius 14y ago
        The problem is that the way the game is rigged, you can't decide only once. You've got to consciously compare every time you shop. The cognitive weight of that decision making is higher than a consistent and satisficing heuristic (shop somewhere that doesn' tplay mindfuck with prices and prices fairly).
    - andrewem 14y ago
      Way back, maybe around 1999?, I was in London and there was an internet cafe called easyInternet [1]. They had this weird gimmick where the price per hour to use a computer with Internet access would fluctuate according to market conditions. It didn't seem to change that much, but it was way lower than its competitors, so that's the one I went to. I found it to be just an irritant, and would happily have paid slightly more to not have to think about the price changes. [1] I think this is the group of companies that owns/owned that: http://www.easy.com http://www.easy.com
dredmorbius 14y ago
1: it's a constant feeling of being gamed. I'll avoid retailers, say, that insist on "loyalty cards", I mean, data tracking cards (or just push them hard) on this basis. I once played the game with register discount coupons -- buy an item, and get a "buy 3 get 1 free" coupon. The next time it was "buy 5" (or some n > 3) get 1 free. The challenge kept escalating (I played 3 rounds). My take-away: this company was playing psychological mind games with me, was tracking my purchase decision (via UUIDs on the coupons, despite my paying with cash and not using a data tracking card. 2: The products offered at such discounts are generally higher price and offer little if any utility, or just plain crap (e.g.: processed foods you're better off not eating). You're better off buying store-brand, generic, or raw produce. Decision: shop somewhere that doesn't play mindfuck with you, and/or is conveniently located (time + travel expense + product wastage are significant procurement expenses), and offers a consistent fair price. Extending extreme effort to shave a fraction of a percent off price (or spending several pounds to save several pence) really doesn't pay.