Introduction
As I wrote yesterday, I had bought nearly $15,000 worth of stuff WITHIN 2 WEEKS from a certain merchant…. well, that merchant was from my current favorite store, Bloomingdale’s. They have no tax to WA state and they often have large portal bonuses. I’m sure everyone here agrees that $15K in 2 weeks was a little…extreme. I agree. But in my defense, I also didn’t realize at the time how much I was buying. I was buying and they were shipping. I guess the first warning sign was when they started to call me up the day after placing an order. The first time I got the call, I thought…this can’t be good. But they only wanted to verify my address. SAVED!
Cancelled orders
Then they started to randomly cancel orders. I thought it was a limit issue, but I think it was due to stock availability since subsequent orders worked just fine.
Price-matching an item
Then during the middle of last week, they had a huge sale on an item I had ordered. I bought it for $69.95, but it was further reduced to $49.95. I emailed them asking for a price match. Then when they responded nearly a day later, the sale had ended and the rep had the nerve to say, “I looked at the price history, and this item has never been $49.95.” I angrily replied and said something to the extent of, “Uhhh this WAS ON SALE WHEN I SENT THE PRICEMATCH REQUEST. It’s not longer on sale TODAY. See Slickdeals thread here.” Then 24 hours later (it seems they only check emails once a day), I get an email saying the price match was approved when this 2nd person checked the price history. Now conspiracy theorists may say this may have did me in since it brought eyes on my order and account. This also happened right before Kohl’s banned me as well; an item kept going OOS and I had to keep emailing to get my expired Kohl’s Cash as merchandise credit. If you ask me now, knowing what I know, I would have NOT asked for the pricematch.
Oh oh the dreaded email
At this point, I had stopped ordering for a couple of days since the 16% portal ended. Then this past weekend, they had 12X United. Well, I still had a ton of gift cards to use, so I figured I’d lock and load some more. As soon as I submitted my order, I get this email:
I called them up, and the CSR told me it was system rejected. He put me on hold to find out what happened, but when he came back, he said he had no idea, but I think we both know he knew. He said I could go buy in store. Yeah, that’s no help.
Address Ban or IP Ban?
So I did what any reasonable person would do – I tried to place a new order using my wife’s name. When I left out some cardinal directions in my address, I got an address verification error. HOLY CRAP! Did they just ban my address? I slowly put the cardinal directions one-by-one in and it worked. Speaking to a friend, he believes they use the USPS address verification system. Anyway, I was able to submit the order, but sure enough, my wife got the same email. At this point, I’m not sure if it’s IP banned or if it’s address banned. My hunch is it’s address banned since they are using a sophisticated address matching system.
Recalled Orders
On Sunday night, I was checking my arriving UPS packages. I noticed that out of the 5 packages coming on Tuesday, 1 of them had a status of “Exception.” When I clicked on it, it stated that the shipper is recalling the package. WHOA. Now that’s taking it to a whole new level. I get it that you want me to stop buying from you, but to recall an order that had already shipped out, that’s taking things to a whole new level. I must have really pissed them off. But honestly, I don’t see why they are mad. Either program your stupid web site or eCommerce system to limit orders, or stop deep discounting your items that gives resellers an arbitrage opportunity.
Conclusion
Regardless of the type of ban, I’ll let this one cool down a bit before I get back on the horse. The question that I may never be able to answer – did the pricematch lay eyes on my account? Would it not have mattered anyway since I’m sure someone must have noticed $15K worth of orders in 2 weeks? We may never know.
And this, friends, is why reselling just sucks…
Philip, I had read you and BH’s back and forth about reselling. I didn’t want to butt in since I think the debate would require a sit-down over drinks so each side could give arguments and counterarguments. At the end of the day, people do whatever is comfortable for them. Reselling is only 10% of my MS anyway although it would seem like ti’s 90% if you read my blog regularly.
Reselling for profit is very interesting. Reselling at or near breakeven for MS is foolish IMHO
I imagine it’s a combination of volume and number of identical items that flagged you. Totally agree that it is ridiculous to ban resellers – it’s their own fault that they don’t limit the number of an item that can be purchased on these sales if they are intended to be loss leaders.
You get portal payout for GC purchases?
1. You get NO portal payout for BUYING GC from Bloomies
2. You DO get portal payout when USING GC from Bloomies
3. For #1, other retailers work. Check FM’s lab for that.
That is tough, I was already slowing down my reselling due to your other bans lol. I might slow them down even further. I wonder if it is the Gift cards you are using that got you flagged. Where they purchased from gift card resellers like cardpool? I have issues in the past with them, seems like every gift card order had a few that didn’t work. Makes me wonder if the GC sellers obtained them fraudulently.
No, I don’t think it’s the gift cards. It may be the 2 x orders of 12 toasters. Haha. I think going forward, it’s prob better to order 4 orders of 3 toasters instead of 2×12. Reason I say that is because that’s what they “recalled.”
You’re right about the Cardpool GC’s. Raise GC’s seem to be “clean,” However, there is something fishy going on right now with Macy’s and Bloomie’s online gift card balance check (been down for a week now), and you have to call in.
does shopping portals still pay out for Physical GC purchased at Bloomingdales? Actually Why not try opening a PO BOX lol.
Nah, I don’t think they do. As for 2nd comment, $14 a month. =)
It’s likely an address ban. I had a friend who was ordering and selling tons of items on Bloomingdales as well. All her orders started to get rejected systematically. We thought it might be an IP address ban, so she tried to place the same order from my house to her address and it didn’t work. I was able to place the same order successfully. The workaround has been to place orders and ship to non “banned” address.
Thanks for that info. That helps when I decide to jump back on the horse. Do you know if she could still user her Bloomingdale’s card to ship to a different address? I know it sounds ridiculous, but sometimes you save an extra 10% for using your Bloomie’s card.
This is rough. They might be flagging your address, your IP, etc… And maybe even the gift card that you used for those orders (i.e., online orders that use those GCs might be flagged). Address and IP can be solved easily (get new mailbox address, private VPN service, or mess with router MAC address), not sure what to do about the GCs if they flag them. Perhaps sell them?
Yeah, I tried new GC’s so they didn’t “link” the GC’s.