Went shopping for a new hardware store item online this morning, and decided what I wanted. Same exact model number, $794 at Bunnings and $849 at Mitre 10 where they claim to beat a competitor price by 15%. Off to Mitre 10 we go, where it is in stock and $849 on the ticket.

While I'm still in the aisle with a salesman, I mentioned the cheaper price at Bunnings. He said, "Yep we'll beat that." Should be hassle free, right?

Up at the customer service desk, he does a competitor website lookup and tells the staff member at a sales terminal it's $794 there. She replied it's $794 here too. I looked a bit puzzled. "We have it the same price here," she reiterated.

"But it's not the same price. It's a higher price in the aisle and on your website," I said.

She started muttering some jargon about "off promo" and something else I didn't quite catch. He said, "we'll do you a deal". Okay then. After some entering data, he informed me "the best deal we can do is $790."

Wow. A whole $4 cheaper than their sale price that only they can see. I said nothing, and just gave a slight "really?" look. (I've almost never bothered with price beating offers before, but I wasn't born yesterday.)

One brief pause later, "We will honour the fifteen per cent because we didn't have the sale tag up yet." Riiiight, that must be it. No sale tag. Not on your website either. (For what it's worth, an online price history chart shows the competitor price had dropped from $849 to $794 more than a week earlier - but I hadn't checked that at the time.)

Paid $675, happy with that. But I can't help but wonder what price I would have seen on the little screen if I'd kept silent about competitor's price until they handed the Eftpos keypad to me.

Anyone else here had a price beat guarantee met with a "we've already got the same price" claim that they found a little hard to believe?