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Hamleys attacked by virtual Vikings

Published on 19th December 2006 by Ryan Garside

Vikings are notoriously smelly and scary. These guys aren't real vikings, they just dress up and pretend.

The world famous, London based toy store Hamleys, recently took a big Christmas hit when its online store accidentally started charging people 60 per cent less than the marked price.

The Register reports that the original spot was made by a site called HotUKDeals. Users were entering a code into the buying field and then getting the massive discounts. The Register reports that one lucky chap managed to get a £13,000 snooker table for just over £5,000, another chappy in the HotUKDeals site picked up 2 Hornby Train Set for £154 - they should have cost him £350. Others were able to pick up discount toy cars and even a table tennis table.

Hamley's were understandably not in the best of moods. On top of the fact that the site was hit by a wave of virtual Vikings, Hamleys website ended up going down due to the overwhelming amount of people logging in. This meant that the company missed out on a lot of full price orders that may have been placed. Chief Executive Nick Mather said:

"We addressed this issue immediately and it was resolved within 24 hours. We would like to apologise to customers who were unable to access the website and place orders during this time."

Hamleys added that they would send out all the orders made, even if it was virtual Vikings taking advantage of an exploit.

Wish you had taken advantage of this offer? Or are virtual Vikings bad people? Let us know in the forums.

13 Comments

Discuss in the forums Reply

mclean007 19th December 2006, 10:46

No harm in a bit of pillage. I'd have taken advantage if (a) they had anything I want to buy and (b) I'd known about it.

Good for Hamleys for doing the right thing and honouring the erroneous transactions - must have cost them a fortune!

I get the feeling there may be some rolling heads in Hamleys' IT division...

whisperwolf 19th December 2006, 11:07

I get the feeling the heads will roll in the legal department for not putting in place the standard T&C's most stores like amazon and woolworths use.

mclean007 19th December 2006, 11:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by whisperwolf
I get the feeling the heads will roll in the legal department for not putting in place the standard T&C's most stores like amazon and woolworths use.

Not sure I follow. Are you suggesting that they have to honour the mispriced sales because they didn't put the right T&Cs in place to disclaim liability for mistakes? Maybe that is the case, or maybe they would rather take one for the team, suck up the losses and ship the items than face the negative publicity consequences of reneging on sales. In any event, the legal people almost certainly are not to blame - had their input been requested, they would certainly have put the appropriate disclaimers in place.

blackerthanblack 19th December 2006, 11:40

I think that in the UK a store has the right to charge full price if something is advertised for less and it is a genuine mistake. Not sure if this applies online as well but i would have thought so.

This kind of makes me think that I might use this store in future if they honour this rather massive mistake. A lot of much bigger companies probably (and have I'm sure) would tell us where to go.

ShaqArif 19th December 2006, 11:54

I think this is what the 'E&OE' on terms and conditions usually means - 'Errors and Omissions Excepted'. So if they do screw up on the pricing and it was a mistake, then legally they can charge full price. But I guess as Mclean suggests, they probably wouldn't want the negative publicity that goes with it...

specofdust 19th December 2006, 12:27

I'm not sure about this, morally speaking. I know most people are just going to say "Hamley's fault, so screw 'em" - but I kinda have the feeling that it's not really the right thing to be doing.

I guess Hamley's probably didn't lose all that much money, but I'm still not sure the people abusing the codes were doing something just.

whisperwolf 19th December 2006, 12:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by mclean007
Not sure I follow. Are you suggesting that they have to honour the mispriced sales because they didn't put the right T&Cs in place to disclaim liability for mistakes? Maybe that is the case, or maybe they would rather take one for the team, suck up the losses and ship the items than face the negative publicity consequences of reneging on sales. In any event, the legal people almost certainly are not to blame - had their input been requested, they would certainly have put the appropriate disclaimers in place.

Well it would be the first company ive ever seen that would willing to honour a 24 hour period 60% discount which stripped the vast majority of its stock of best selling lines for both its online and instore business, as they use a central warehouse, with 1 week of sales left before christmas, just to avoid at worst a front page article in the daily record (as happened to woolworths £150 tv offer) quoting how a secretary is really upset as she ordered 5 tvs and woolys won't send them boo hoo.
Would have been much easier for them to just do the standard cancellation email with please refer to our T&C article 3.

JonDixon 19th December 2006, 13:48

Gr8 advertising for hotukdeals. Been a member of that site for 6 months now. Saved £200 on new lcd tv, £100 on dell laptop and £100 on cross trainer to name but a few items Ive bought.

Got on great with the hamleys deal. Got a Brio train track for my son and barbie stuff for my daughter. Just a shame they don't do xbox 360 gear.

Although everyone got a decent deal on the hamleys site, their prices were quite high compared to their competition such as toys-r-us.

Tyinsar 20th December 2006, 01:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by specofdust
I'm not sure about this, morally speaking. I know most people are just going to say "Hamley's fault, so screw 'em" - but I kinda have the feeling that it's not really the right thing to be doing.

I guess Hamley's probably didn't lose all that much money, but I'm still not sure the people abusing the codes were doing something just.

Seconded

JonDixon 20th December 2006, 07:00

Just an update it seems that hamleys are not honoring some of the orders after all. Ther have been some cancellations of orders even though they've taken the money.

specofdust 20th December 2006, 10:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by JonDixon
Just an update it seems that hamleys are not honoring some of the orders after all. Ther have been some cancellations of orders even though they've taken the money.

Well, I'm almost surprised at myself for saying this, but - Good.

whisperwolf 20th December 2006, 12:10

Ah, so I take it the delay in canceling orders was due to them trying to decide if multiple voucher use could be classed as a mispricing/ fraudulent issue covered by the T&C. According to the guardian they are offering a 25% discount instead. However the letters have started rolling in with people upset that little jimmy won't be receiving his £15,000 snooker table and spoiling his first christmas.

specofdust 20th December 2006, 12:17

Maybe Jimmy should be smart and pay full price then, instead of attempting to rip off a big faceless corporation.

Whining gits.