Saturn: german retailer service rant

by kai on 17/04/2005



Sometimes, I’m really sick of the way how retail companies in Germany try to fool their customers. Brand-new example: I’m going to buy a new laptop. After a long decision process, I’m going to get myself a Toshiba M30X-167.

I found this one with a small retailer in Duesseldorf for the price of 1399 Euro. The drawback – store is closed on a Saturday. As I was in downtown Essen on Saturday I decided to walk over the few steps to the Saturn electronics retailer market to just have a look for the laptop and how much it was over there (comment: yes, I just wanted to try to get it on Saturday instead of waiting until next week…). They sell it for 1699 Euro, but – and this is the point in this post – they offer a service called “Tiefpreisgarantie”. It’s some sort of offer to reduce the price of goods they sell to x Euro if you’re able to prove that you would get it for x Euro at another store in your region.

Well, knowing that I went to the sales guy and told him that I’ll be able to get this laptop for 1399 Euro instead of 1699 Euro and asked him for the Tiefpreisgarantie. He didn’t communicate at all with me, got bloody angry on me and barked that he’s not willing to reduce the price to 1399 Euro, no way, he would have to sell the laptop below the manufacturer’s price etc. Blablabla…

Interesting is: He didn’t even try to cope with my request, I got no chance to show him the offer itself (which is online, but they have a retail store where they sell all laptops for the same price), I didn’t get a chance at all. What I should have done, but I was to lazy: complain about this guy with the service manager or the head of this Saturn store. But my very personal conclusion is: I won’t buy there anymore as they’re even not able to fulfill their service offers BEFORE you buy – wonder what happens after you gave them money…

{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }

Danny April 17, 2005 at 12:00 am

Wenn Du kaufst dann kriegst Du es auf jedenfall zurück!
Ärger Dich nicht, viel Spass mit dem neuen Laptop :o)

Danny

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Andi April 18, 2005 at 12:00 am

I had the same problem with my logitech keyboard. The shop near saturn had it for less than 30 %. But I didn’t get the lower price and the sales-man was also angry.

So – I think there is no difference between the Austrian-Saturn and the German-Saturn. The Tiefpreisgarantie is only a fake – a marketing fake.

cu
Andi

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Christoph Guse April 18, 2005 at 12:00 am

Hallo Kai,

ich schreibe mal auf deutsch, ist ja eher auf Deutschland bezogen.
Es ist doch absolut nichts neues, daß Saturn und Mediamarkt nicht gerade billig sind. Die verkaufen häufig Auslaufmodelle zu nem normalen Preis, zu dem du das Nachfolgemodell in einem Fachgeschäft auch kriegen würdest. Zugegeben, ab und an haben die Lockangebote, die preislich wirklich attraktiv sind. Aber hast du dir schonmal angeguckt, was die für Computerperepherie wie Netzwerkkabel, Netzwerkkarten usw. nehmen? Da schlackerste aber noch mehr mit den Ohren, hier haben die teilweise Margen von mehreren 100%.

Viel Spaß mit dem neuen Notebook. Das sollte ja schnell genug sein, daß da auch Flex drauf läuft 😉

Gruß
Christoph

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Thorsten April 18, 2005 at 12:00 am

Hallo, das Verhalten ist typisch für den Metro-Konzern. Meines Wissens gehören dazu Saturn, Media Markt, Real, Galeria Kaufhof, Praktiker und Extra.
Ich vermeide die mittlerweile auch wo es geht.
Vielleicht hilft aber eine Mitteilung über das Verhalten an die Wettbewerbszentrale.

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amar April 19, 2005 at 12:00 am

I was reading this since it said “RANT” :). Then I tried to read the comments and upon realizing that they are in German thought of using Google translation tool, but I odn’t think it translates it very well. Check it out for fun at http://translate.google.com/translate_t. Probably you guys will enjoy it more than me since you understand the original text.

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