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One Red Hot Mama

By Jules Fox, SDBM Member

I was seeing red.   What I thought I had read was all in my head.  What I was seeing was red, I say red.  Lucy Ricardo red. 

The apprehension had been simmering for quite awhile. It was time to venture into new territory.  The truth is when I see electronics my heart skips a beat. However, webcams never got my heart pumping. I  thought that they were unnecessary, over-priced and quite frankly, weird.  Others had tried to sweeten the deal to lure me into this voyeuristic nonsense.  I repeatedly declined. No, I flat out refused. 

Then in full color I saw REBATE.  I saw a price to good to be true. Webcam: $30.00 off with rebate.  Sunday morning the game was on.  I mean, the game to price match and make sure that I got thee best price.  This is when I started seeing red. Circuit City. Staples.  Free shipping. Rebates. $30.00.  My heart raced.  Flipping pages.  Logging into all my online sources of electronic consumer information. I got lost in the frenzy.  The clock was ticking.  Things to do, places to go but I couldn't let this 'deal' get away.  I was falling desperately into the seduction of this little webcam.  What am I doing?  What did I just do?  I made my choice.  I hit the submit button and the fix was in.  Order confirmation followed.  Full price listed with rebate. On Tuesday, D-day, that baby is mine.  I won the prize.

Tuesday, 2pm.  UPS delivered for Circuit City.  ”Brown“ came to my door.  My man who always delivers me my bargains.  The little webcam was ripped from the box upon delivery.  The invoice flew out of the box and floated to the carpet.  Brimming with joy, I took a glance at the invoice. $59.99?  What?  $59.99?  My heart was pounding and I was red with embarrassment.  I don't want this thing for $59.99!  That’s 60 bucks.  Not 20 bucks.  I was sick to my stomach.  I ran to the laptop.  Looked up Circuit City.  Looked up Staples.  Circuit City- $59.99.  Staples $19.99 after rebate.  My heart sank.  My well-polished skills for price matching let me down.  What happened?  Then it struck me.  Both stores use red in their ads.  Both have red logos.  I got confused thinking I was ordering from one rather than the other. 

Fast.  Pronto.  Save face.  Get to customer service.  Beg.  Plead.  Do it now.

Houston, I have a problem.  The box is now open.  It was now considered ”used.“  Is that going to cost me?  Staples has a 100% price match policy but couldn't match it because of the rebate.   NO!  I was seeing RED again!  It was a dizzying, panic red.  Could they take it back even though it was opened and I had already cut out the UPC code?   Staples needed the UPC code intact.  Mine was intact as I had made sure of that in order to get the rebate.  Was redemption in my future? 

Enter Customer Service Representative, Nate.  My beloved Nate... hooked me up.  He figured out a way to get my mistake credited without raising red flags.  Yes, I had cut the UPC out hastily just to get that rebate in my hot little hands, but it was done without messing up the numbers.  Whew!  Nate, my hero, credited my account and it was to be picked up from the house on Wednesday.

Next, off to Circuit City, to pick up the webcam for $19.99 after rebate.  I am back in business.  Redeemed.  All this for something I did not want.  What a girl will do for a bargain.

Big Red flag:   Read the small and big print or else you’ll not only be seeing red, but you’ll be in the red.