A few people who ordered products on the Best Buy web site hoping to have those orders fulfilled before Christmas got some coal in their email this week. The New York Times reports that Best Buy unexpectedly canceled some orders made in November and December on the retailer"s web site. The move caused some of the customers affected by the cancellations to make their displeasure known on the Best Buy support forums. Some accused the retailer of ruining their holidays due to not being able to get their promised product orders shipped before Christmas.
Best Buy issued an official apology today, via a statement from its PR rep Susan Busch:
What was wrong is that there was an unacceptable delay between order confirmations and cancellations, and for that we are very sorry. It’s important to note that this was a rare situation based on a high volume of orders over a short period of time.
Busch also said that the cancellations affected less than one percent of the orders made on BestBuy.com. Those that did have their online orders canceled will be given electronic gift cards as compensation for the incident.