Quote:
Originally Posted by stanwelks /forum/post/14288306
1. will brick and mortar stores such as Best Buy, Circuit City, price match websites?
Generally, no. They might price-match a website of a big chain, but not the kind of place you linked to.
Quote:
2. Does anyone know anything about this store:
http://www.zoommania.com/descript.asp?prodid=TH50PZ85U
No, but it doesn't look good on RR:
http://www.resellerratings.com/store/Zoommania
Quote:
3. How do you check the reputation of an online store?
You can try searching for the name of the store on a search engine, along with terms like "complaints" or "reputation".
You can see if there have been complaints filed against them with the Better Business Bureau, AG's office in their state, etc.
ResellerRatings (see link above) is a website pretty much just for this purpose. Other sites (like CNet and PriceGrabber) also sometimes include store rating information. One issue with sites like these is that lately, really shady stores have taken to posting fake positive reviews every now and then so they don't look so bad. Try to actually read the reviews -- if all the positive ones are vague or oddly written, and there are lots of detailed horror stories with negative reviews, that's a very bad sign.
Based on the reviews at RR, I can pretty much guarantee that they will not actually sell you the TV at their advertised price. They will try to bait-and-switch you to one of the much more expensive "packages" listed on that page, or stall for months, claiming that the item is suddenly out of stock. This is blatantly illegal, of course, but often difficult to prove.
In general, if you see an online seller that is selling an electronics item for WAY less than what other online sites have it for, that deal and/or seller is probably no good.