RobertB, I would like to return to the infamous Fry's lowest price days.
Just a few questions - not that you can believe that, seeing as I always write long articles where others could say the same in one sentence
1) You told us they knew you were advertising these days here and probably other places too - have they warned you or gave you any reason to think it's against their strict policy before the rebate's days?
2) Have there been any official warnings from Fry's that they may react this way before they really did?
3) As I understood it, normal price is 239$, but instead of lowering it, they increased it to 269$, is that correct?
4) The rebate is being paid not by them, but by Astak, right?
If the answers are "no - no - yes - yes", I would have thought very strongly about consulting your company's lawyer if it was perfectly legal to "punish" Astak this way. In fact, anyone who bought the device these days paid slightly more then usual - I don't know how the rebate is being aplied for, send to the users, and all (never saw it in our shops), but it has to have some additional cost, it takes more time, etc. Fry's simply used the advertisement their business partner - Astak - paid for (you work at Astak, you get salary = even on free forums, it has some cost if you spend your work time writing here). Not only they used it, knowing perfectly well that they intend to make this advertisement not true by *their* choice. They had bigger profit, but that's OK - I seriously doubt there is a legal way to stop them from increasing the cost when they want to - but they did it in a way that their business partner actually *paid* the cost, in both stricly cash sense and "trustworthyness" sense, and that's something that may not be completely legal, if there was some formal agreement between you and Fry's about the rebate.