At a time when consumer protection laws seem stronger than ever, you’d think securing a deal would be simple. However, when it comes to saving a few dollars, businesses aren’t afraid to exploit gray areas in policies, forcing people to navigate frustrating loopholes and delays all by themselves, without the help of institutions.

For Reddit user Scary_, scoring a heavily discounted doorbell camera seemed like a straightforward win—until the delivery took an unexpected turn. What began as a great bargain spiraled into a drawn-out struggle with bureaucracy, with the order stuck in the warehouse for days—or at least so the company said.

Sometimes, buyers find deals that seem too good to be true

Image credits: Getty Images / Unsplash (not the actual photo)

But when they do, sellers may go to great lengths to avoid honoring them

Image credits: Mikhail Nilov / Pexels (not the actual photo)

Image credits: Scary_

Image credits: Kaboompics.com / Pexels (not the actual photo)

Online shopping is a double-edged sword

It feels good when companies cannot shift the blame to the buyer and have to face the consequences of their mistakes—satisfying even. For example, a Mexican man named Rogelio Villarreal noticed that luxury jewelry maker Cartier accidentally listed gold-and-diamond earrings for 237 pesos ($14), instead of the correct price of 237,000 pesos ($14,000).

Naturally, due to the big price difference, he had spent even more time than our Redditor trying to secure the deal. There were months of back-and-forth during which he said Cartier offered him a consolation prize instead of the jewelry—until Mexican officials backed his position that the company should honor the advertised price.

Villarreal finally got the earrings in April—at his price.

However, it’s important not to let the convenience of online shopping override your ability to make thoughtful decisions—it can be overwhelming for our brains.

Both shopping and the internet can be addictive, and combining them creates a dopamine rush, says Dr. Elias Aboujaoude, a clinical professor of psychiatry at Stanford Medicine—who studies compulsive buying disorder, or shopping addiction—and director of the Stanford OCD Clinic.

“Online, the urge to shop can be satisfied much more quickly, making it more difficult to resist.” Anxiety and depression appear to intensify those effects. “One thing that can certainly make it riskier is something like untreated depression, because people are looking for a quick, temporary boost to their mood.”

As the story went viral, its author joined the discussion in the comments

And the reactions just continued to pour in

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