04-06-2012, 09:39 PM | #46 | |
monkey on the fringe
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My preference is to avoid Amazon whenever possible. Last edited by tubemonkey; 04-06-2012 at 09:53 PM. Reason: typo |
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04-06-2012, 09:45 PM | #47 |
Wizard
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The system is in an unstable state right now. Brick and mortar shops providing free showrooms for lower cost online stores can't work over the long run. Sure, consumers are taking advantage of the battle, but it's not going to be better for them when this shakes out. In the end, you're going to have to rely on word of mouth for making blind online purchases, because online reviews are even less trustworthy than online wikis. If Best Buy's floor experience sucks, it's because they've cheaped out as much as possible to compete with the online vendors. Tech-savvy sales reps and friendly, knowledgeable advice isn't going to help their bottom line, but just make it easier for those who want good advice before shopping at Amazon. God knows where this goes when rising fuel prices put a damper on low-cost shipping. Probably massive central shipping depots where you line up to pick up your orders. I can't really think of anything cheaper than that.
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04-07-2012, 12:33 AM | #48 | |
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People think just because a country or American state doesn't have any power over Amazon, residents of that country or state are not required to pay required sales taxes. That's not true. They are still required to pay the taxes. If we don't want foreign countries or states forcing us to be their agents when we do business with their residents, we can hardly pressure Amazon to. |
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04-07-2012, 02:42 AM | #49 |
Basculocolpic
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I get charged a sales tax too by Amazon. Unless it is an excuse to pocket more money, seems to me they have accepted that they need to pay sales taxes to the states of their customers.
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04-07-2012, 02:57 AM | #50 |
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I don't get charged. It is a state by state thing...some states have pushed hard for it.
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04-07-2012, 03:15 AM | #51 |
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04-07-2012, 03:54 AM | #52 |
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Amazon doesn't ever pay the sales tax--the buyers do. Some states have jurisdiction over Amazon (either because of a physical presence there or by negotiation or court order) and are able to require Amazon to collect that tax from the buyers for them at the time of sale, rather than waiting for the buyers to pay it when they file their tax returns.
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04-07-2012, 04:19 AM | #53 |
Connoisseur
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04-07-2012, 11:37 AM | #54 | |
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04-07-2012, 01:06 PM | #55 | |
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A store selling wide-screen TVs from multiple manufacturers might not have space (or money!) to display one of everything, and has no access to training to explain fine nuances of differences between them. Desktop copier/printer/scanners are another problem. They take up a lot of table space, need to connect to a computer, and often have multiple options--TWAIN vs ISIS drivers for scanning; different print drivers for PCL or PS; single- or double-sided copying; collated or not; ink cartridge prices & availability; ADF or flatbed only; and so on. Most customers won't know these options exist, but some will, or know about at least some of them, which means the sales staff needs to know which options are relevant to which devices. Small devices are even worse... why are some 4gb USB drives $15, and some are $35? Or rather: how would a sales person learn & explain that difference to a customer? Apple can absorb the cost of training sales staff into their overall business model; a third-party store doesn't get to push those costs back to the manufacturer. |
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04-07-2012, 03:12 PM | #56 | |
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It is a subtle distinction but one big enough to drive through literally tons of merchandise. Entrenched powers in most states have tried to force out-of-state vendors to collect state taxes but it's pretty solidly established at the federal level that they can't. There has long been an effort to establish a nationwide sales tax on internet sales which would be uniform and relatively cheap to implement and Amazon has stated they would be happy to comply with that one. If it ever gets passed. Nobody is holding their breaths, though. "National sales tax" is just a bit *less* popular than "Health care death panels". |
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04-07-2012, 04:14 PM | #57 | ||||
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On another note, not related to any one person's post, when I lived in the NY/NJ/CT metropolitan area, NY City vendors were constantly peppering the airwaves with their low prices and the fact that out-of-state or even up-state folk who wanted to purchase their wares could benefit from a tourist trip by adding on savings of not having to pay any sales tax on their purchases from the trip. It was a BIG, repetitive major marketing endeavor which must have been successful because it was as ubiquitous as used car commercials. At a later time, iirc, the no-sales-tax became a promotional rather than full-time thing. Where the city would tax people most but not all of the time, having sales-tax vacations (my word) where for that weekend only, people from the greater area would want to come in to take advantage of the no tax. Not sure how welcome/well-received those advertisements would have been from a non-NY state perspective, or viable even, if the reductions in bottom-of-the-bill purchase prices would have been if everyone were expected legally to go home and calculate the tax they would have paid and then send a separate check for the tax to their home state. |
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04-07-2012, 04:18 PM | #58 | ||||
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And probably the biggest advantage to Amazon is that you really can get what you want. One of the frustrations of going to a place like BB with the intention of purchasing a particular model that you read a great review of is that they don't have that particular model in stock. (Although they often, conveniently, have the next model up in stock.) Shopping online means you can get exactly what you want. Even if you live in the sticks. And it also means that you can get an HDMI cable for $5 instead of $30. Quote:
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04-07-2012, 04:32 PM | #59 | |||
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04-07-2012, 04:47 PM | #60 | |
Wizard
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On a related note, many independent booksellers complain about customers asking their staff for recommendations then announcing that they are going home to buy the books on their Kindle. I think the showroom effect is real, for electronics and for books-to the greater glory of Amazon. I agree with you about the sucktitude of BB's customer service. When I go to a BB, I usually can never find a salesperson to answer my questions. |
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