Zhu Zhus Tar-jay

I got an email confirmation from Target informing me that my Zhu Zhu Pets have shipped. I must admit, after the clusterfarkas with Medco earlier, and reading Target's little disclaimer about how the prices you see on their site isn't necessarily what you'll be charged depending on the price of the item during shipping, that's a relief.  Target has had a history of mispricing things on their site, leading people to think they're getting a great deal, then canceling people's orders.  (Sound familiar?)  The 2 big one that comes to mind is the Britax Marathon misprice fiasco of 2008 and a more recent one involving their store brand of diapers which happened around the 2009 holiday season.  Although considering the Zhu Zhus were Target's Deal of the Day, technically I shouldn't have been worried, but once bitten twice shy, ya know?  I took a screen shot of the Zhu Zhu deal, prepared to plea my case if necessary...not that it would've done much good I'm sure. They'll just argue that it was a misprint of some sort.

Here's Target's policy on pricing, copied and pasted from my order confirmation:

When will I be charged?
We cannot confirm the price of an item until your order enters the shipping process nor will we charge your credit card until your order enters the shipping process.

When will my order be confirmed?
Please note that your Order Acknowledgment email means that your order request has been received. It does not mean that your order has been shipped or that the price of an item has been confirmed. Despite our best efforts, a small number of the items on our Web site may be mis-priced. As part of our shipping procedures, we verify price before an item is shipped out. If an item's correct price is lower than our stated price, we charge you the lower amount and ship you the item. If the item's correct price is higher than our stated price, we will cancel your order
and notify you of such cancellation via email.

I really really do not like this kind of price guessing game policy.  Consumers very often base their decision to purchase something on the price of that item displayed.  They get excited over it. Some people tell their kids about it. Kids get excited over it. Kids don't understand such Fizzbin-esque pricing that leads to the cancellation of their goodies, and really, adults shouldn't have to deal with this kind of guessing game and lack of control over their purchases either.  I guess it's kind of similar to going to a physical store and an item ringing up the wrong price, but the difference with that is, if the merchant cares about their customers' loyalty, more often than not they will give it to the customer at the price they expected to pay based on what was marked on the shelves.  You don't really get a chance to dispute it with an online order because the CSR will simply tell you, "sorry, can't help you. The order has already been canceled and there is nothing I can do about it" because there is no face to face interaction with the customer. It's easier to tell someone "you're shit out of luck, sucks to be you" when you're not in front of them.

One little nice surprise though was the total came out to be a little less than I'd expected and told when I placed the order. Apparently, Target's website miscalculated the sales tax by a few cents. Not a big whoop, but still, paying less is always a nice treat, even if it's just a few cents.

Now let's hope I catch UPS before my kids do, unlike earlier when the UPS guy handed my kids the box of costumes that arrived today, which they promptly ripped open. Good thing it wasn't a surprise!  The Zhu Zhu Pets, however, are supposed to be a surprise for their birthdays.