A WALMART customer has taken advantage of a clever, but potentially risky, online shopping hack, scooping up items ranging from shoes and cookware to furniture at more than 90% off.
Austin, 24, is a member of a popular online chat group, and uses the platform to rack up savings by optimizing on retail promotions and glitches to score products for dirt cheap.
Members of online deal chats take advantage of promotions and glitches at retailers including Walmart[/caption]
A Walmart website glitch a few years ago saw customers in an online group chat racking up the savings[/caption]
Austin, who works in entry-level sales, takes advantage of the deals and steals from the popular and active deal chat RebelDealz to stock up his home and make some money by reselling the products on platforms like Facebook Marketplace.
Such deal group chats are becoming increasingly popular, with members of these communities – often found on social media or messaging apps – sharing secret details regarding sales, discounts, and special offers from retailers and restaurants.
RebelDealz, for example, has racked up a following of hundreds of thousands of couponers and clearance hunters, with Austin seeing the chat on Telegram grow from 20,000 to 80,000 members in just a year.
The chat frequently posts hidden markdowns and limited-time discounts, said the member, who asked to omit his last name for privacy.
For example, deals are posted when a company needs to get rid of a lot of product quickly, or even a special promotion, such as alerting chat members of a promo on X where the first 500 or so users to comment under a post can score free food.
Other times the deals are zip code specific and require members to mark the product as a gift in order to be eligible for the discount, said the user.
Payments from class action lawsuits are also shared in the chat.
Austin emphasized that the chat is constantly active and sees a new deal posted every few minutes, meaning that it takes a watchful eye – and quick fingers – to catch the really good ones.
He cited several examples of wallet-friendly deals, such as a $54 kids’ playset for more than 50% off or a pricey makeup vanity for just $12.
Austin has also seen a $90 Bogg for just $28 and even a $3,000 riding lawnmower from Home Depot for just $300, among hundreds of other deals posted on the daily, emphasizing that speed and consistency are key in scoring the best discounts from deal chats.
While some of the markdowns are intentional, other times they are true pricing errors due to a data entry error, tech issue, or glitch in clearance tagging.
The biggest deal was roughly three years ago when a huge Walmart glitch impacted the chain’s site, with members racing to make purchases because a significant portion of the retailer’s inventory was mistakenly discounted by at least 90%.
“People were getting $60,000 worth of stuff,” said Austin, noting that even big ticket items from vacuums and TVs to mattresses and computers were accidentally marked down.
He scooped up around 30 items during the glitch, including products for himself, friends and family, and to resell, such as robot vacuum and mops, trash cans, cube organizers, wine fridges, outdoor sets, and more at a significant discount.
Deals for days
When Walmart’s website glitch took over the retailer’s site around three years ago, one member scored roughly 30 items at a steep discount.
Here are some of the items he purchased:
- Robot vacuum and mops:
$400$14 - Trash cans:
$80$6 - Cube organizers:
$45$3 - Wine fridges:
$200$20 - Outdoor sets with bar table and chairs:
$120$15 - Ottoman:
$70$4 each
“It was one of the craziest things I’ve ever seen,” said the member. “I thought I was going to be a millionaire if it was like that every day.”
A lot of the items even ended up being free, he said, because Walmart attempted to cancel the orders but did so after the goods had already shipped, so customers were refunded but kept the items.
Austin recalled that the retail giant even tried to get postal carriers to halt all the orders across the country due to the glitch, but was denied.
Because Walmart’s system was so overwhelmed, Austin said that the chain accidentally overshipped many items to himself and fellow community members, sending them multiples.
It was one of the craziest things I’ve ever seen. I thought I was going to be a millionaire if it was like that every day.”
Austin
DEAL DUD
While many of the eye-catching Walmart deals were honored despite the mis-pricing, that is not always the case.
When huge pricing errors occur, retailers generally fix the issue quickly and cancel many orders afterward, with online orders especially at risk because the system has time to catch the error.
Under Walmart’s price-error policy, for example, the company states it will cancel orders if it detects listing or price errors, meaning that some items bought at a deep discount might be delivered while others won’t.
This means that when you spot a deal that seems too good to be true when online shopping, it’s possible that a retailer will not honor the savings.
“Retailers are almost never legally required to honor prices that are clearly the result of a website glitch,” Chad D. Cummings, commercial law and tax attorney and CEO at Cummings & Cummings Law, told The U.S. Sun.
“In both Florida and Texas where I practice law, courts will not enforce a sale contract if the listed price is so far below market value that a reasonable buyer should know it is a mistake,” with retailers often not legally “locked in” until the product ships.
Additionally, shoppers who take advantage of retail glitches in online group chats face reputational, legal, and digital forensic risk, according to Cummings.
“If you coordinate in a deal-hunting chat and push the glitch too far, you might end up banned, flagged by payment processors, or even investigated for fraud,” he said.
“What feels like a clever hack can quickly turn into a digital paper trail with real consequences.”
The U.S. Sun reached out to Walmart for comment but has yet to hear back.
Aside from deal chats, shoppers have taken advantage of a number of other strategies to stretch their dollars.
For example, one shopper saved over $100,000 in 10 years by “extreme couponing.”
Meanwhile, another college student makes $1,000 a week right from their dorm – it takes no effort and only a few minutes.
Austin purchased items such as cube organizers, cookware, and robot vacuums during the Walmart glitch[/caption]
Austin has scored thousands of dollars worth of items at a steep discount thanks to deal chats[/caption]
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