This article is more than 1 year old

Kogan plugs 'cheap stuff' bug

Customers get hug

Technology e-tailer Kogan has pledged to honour hundreds of hugely discounted orders that were placed while a bug afflicted its Website.

For nearly two hours Kogan’s online shoppers were able to punch in several promotions simultaneously, combined with free shipping, which resulted in over 500 orders of Kogan’s set top box and PVR (among hundres of other items) being sold for only $9.

The super sale loophole went viral after being posted on deal aggregator OzBargain at 9.15am.

It was estimated that the total loss of revenue due to the bug was in excess of $AU46,000.

Kogan founder and CEO Ruslan Kogan said, “this was a bug that we were unable to plug until 10:39am, resulting in hundreds of Kogan products being sold at well below cost price.”

In true Kogan style, the chief executive used the tech snafu to set an industry example, snipe at competitors and create more PR.

“We know we could hide behind our terms and conditions to get out of having to honour these transactions. Indeed, this is what many of our competitors have done in the past. But, we believe the bug in our website was entirely our responsibility and as a result will be honouring every single purchase made this morning at a significant cost to our business,” he said in a statement.

Uncharacteristically Kogan refused to comment further on the event.

Last month Kogan rival Dick Smith suffered a similar meltdown allowing its New Zealand online customers to make transactions for zero dollars, but charged for delivery. Dick Smith did not honour the purchases, instead contacting the rogue shoppers to confirm cancellation or request payment at their correct price.

Since the publicity resulting from the bug is worth more than the money lost due to the bug, there has been speculation that this was strategy rather than accident. ®

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like