Online shoppers fail to snap up a bargain on latest iPhone

Customers have expressed outrage at online store Souq.com after trying to purchase the new iPhone for the discounted price of Dh999.

ABU DHABI // Frustrated shoppers who tried to snap up a cut-price iPhone online claim they were unable to complete the purchase.

The iPhone 5s was being offered on shopping website souq.com for just Dh999 on Sunday – close to a third of the Apple website's price of Dh2,599.

The deal was advertised as available between 9am and 11am on a “first come, first serve basis with limited stock”.

But shoppers who were online for the deal’s launch were told it had sold out in minutes, or had problems completing the transaction.

Souq.com’s Facebook page was inundated with customer complaints.

One wrote: “This is completely funny … iPhone 5s … sold out after 10 sec ... come on.”

Another read: “I’ve tried so many times and today, I thought it was my lucky day wherein I’ve been at the delivery page already when I found out that the item I put on my cart was not there! How could you make such things like this?”

One customer, Darren Kenton, contacted The National to complain.

“They advertised for a deal which ran out in less than two seconds. In the moment they put the offer of iPhone 5s Dh999, I clicked to buy,” he said.

“It went to my shopping cart, I go to it to pay and I see all is normal – the item is there with the correct price. When I click to continue to pay, I get a message telling the item is sold out. It was in my shopping cart then disappeared.”

Souq.com responded to many of the queries and complaints online with the same response: “Please be informed that the wow deal is 100 per cent realistic but unfortunately the offer doesn’t last for long time, since many customers were chasing it at the same launch time. It was only valid for a very limited quantity.

“We will do our best to increase the offer quantity limit next time. Regards.”

The chief executive of souq.com, Ronaldo Mouchawar, said there were usually between 100 and 150 phones up for grabs through these offers.

“It is sometimes frustrating to some members but if you look at our ranking in the UAE we are the 10th most popular UAE site in terms of traffic so it is a very popular platform and we understand some members are unable to buy these items,” he said.

“But we feel it is better than not having these type of deals, we feel that running them is still better for our members.

“Once we confirm these purchases then we ask the customer to post a message to our Facebook page to say they got the item.

“We run a lot of these deals, and we were overwhelmed with the response. But there are limited quantities so not everyone who visits the website will be able to purchase the item.”