This past holiday season, Cabela's had a huge banner on their website called, "Red Hot Holiday Sales". When I clicked on this advertisement it listed many items that were included in this sale. I thought the prices were VERY good, so I placed multiple orders on items listed in this window. I also added other items to my shopping cart and went about my day. When I "checked out", it listed some of my items on "backorder" which felt fairly normal, and asked me if I wanted to keep these items on my order. I chose to keep the items on my order and my order was processed. Time passed and my order arrived. The items that were on "backorder" were not included in my order, but were referenced as "backordered". The items didn't show up for Christmas, so I told my family that they were on "backorder" just like Cabela's had told me.
On January 19th I received an email saying that my order was "cancelled" and that if I had any questions I could call customer support. I promptly called support and they said that I would not be getting the items, and that I would not be charged for the items. UNFORTUNATELY, these items were parts of matching sets where parts of the sets had been given as gifts and the missing parts were promised. This didn't just happen on one order, it happened on multiple orders. I feel as though I was duped by a Cabela's. They ran a sale on items that they DID NOT HAVE and when they called the items "backordered" they knew they were not going to get any additional items. The fact that they used this technique on year-end items that were discontinued by the manufacturer, shows that they NEVER put the items on BACKORDER with the manufacturer. Now, I see that they no longer carry the items I ordered, but they are advertising next year's model. Which are twice the price as the items I ordered.
I believe that Cabela's intentionally misrepresented the inventory of these deeply discounted items to lure shoppers to their site, where shoppers would also buy other items. If it happened to me twice, it had to happen to others! I also know that I could have bought these items on sale at other retailers, but because Cabela's perpetrated this deception through the middle of January, I missed the opportunity to buy from their competitors.
Sounds like deceptive and misleading advertising via the internet and it was perpetrated by a major retailer.
Let me know if this is an isolated instance or if it has happened to others?
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