Epson Discount Lives On in Google Ad

At what point does a mistaken price published on the Internet become false advertising? That’s the question one reader is asking about a price that’s been wrong a long time in a sponsored link on Google for an Epson scanner.

“I am interested in purchasing an Epson V700 flatbed slide and negative scanner,” the reader wrote. “Well, I was interested at any rate — I may be changing my mind now. Not being able to find anybody selling it locally, I did a search on Google to see what the prices were on the Internet. When I entered ‘Epson V700’ as the search query, at the top of the search page above the free results was a yellow ‘sponsored link’ ad from Epson.com listing the V700 for under $500. So I’m thinking, great, I can get it directly from the manufacturer so there won’t be any gray market warranty problems, etc. I clicked on the link and went to their site, but there the V700 is only available for $50 more — $549.99.”

Since $549 wasn’t as good a price as the reader had seen elsewhere for the scanner, he decided to keep looking. But every time he did a Google search for the scanner in the ensuing weeks, the Epson.com ad promising a sub-$500 price would be at the top. And every time he clicked on the link, he would see the actual price atEpson.com was $549.99. “Finally I called Epson hoping to be told how I could purchase the scanner at the advertised price,” the reader says. “The person I was passed to said he was not aware of the V700 for under $500 and that I should never trust anything I found on the Internet. He seemed to be saying that Epson is not responsible for the ads that appear on Google, and no matter what is advertised, there is no way to hold anybody to it.”

After the reader wrote me about this, I decided to see if I could duplicate his experience. Sure enough, searching for the Epson V700 on Google yields a results page with a sponsored link at the top saying “Professional results for under $500 at Epson.com.”And the Epson product page it links to does indeed list it for $549.99. I was luckier than the reader though when I called the Epson pre-sales support line to ask where the under $500 price was. The Epson representative knew immediately what I was talking about. “Last month we had an instant rebate of $50 on that product, which is why the ad still says under $500, but that rebate no longer applies,” the Epson rep told me.

There may have been an instant rebate at some point, but the reader is certain it was more than a month ago. “I’m sure the discrepancy between the prices has been there at least since August, and maybe even June or July,” the reader told me. “And in any case, why is it taking them so long to correct the sponsored link? Isn’t it in their control?”

Of course, Epson could indeed change its Google AdWord ad anytime it wants. (It will be interesting to see how long it takes them to correct it after this appears.) In fact, it looks like Epson might be changing the ad copy regularly. As I’m writing this, I just ran the Google search again and now the Epson sponsored link reads “Professional quality scanning for only $499.99 – Ships for Free!” But it’s still the wrong price, so we must assume it’s that way deliberately. Makes sense I suppose — no doubt a healthy percentage of potential customers attracted by the false price on Google wind up buying it on Epson.com anyway. When you come right down to it, it’s simply another variation of the old bait-and-switch ploy.

And what about Google in this? After the reader was first told by Epson that it was really Google’s fault, the reader tried to find a way to contact Google — never an easy task. “I finally found a webform and wrote Google about the situation and asked them to confirm how a sponsored link works,” the reader says. “No response — I guess Google can’t be bothered. So maybe I’ll look for a Canon scanner instead. One thing that guy at Epson told me is true though – you can’t trust what you see on the Internet, particularly if it’s from Epson.”

Have you run into any false advertising on the Internet recently? Post your comments on my website or write me at Foster@gripe2ed.com.

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