For all those who love to scour a market for the best bargain, you’re about to get VERY excited.
Amazon are introducing a new ‘Make an Offer’ button, which means users can negotiate the price of an item with a third-party marketplace seller.
The feature means bidders can argue a better deal on more items than just collector’s goods, which have already been operating under the bidding option.
The service will be an opt-in program, meaning sellers don’t have to participate and must enable the feature so shoppers can see it for their items.
A spokesman for Amazon said they hope the new initiative will encourage online retailers to lower their prices, although critics warn that some may simply inflate their prices to allow for a ‘loss’ and allow for more bargaining room offers from customers.
So how will it work?
When a seller signs up to the new program, Amazon will include a small button saying ‘Make an Offer’, where the user will be prompted to enter an offer price and send it to the seller.
The seller will then receive the price by email and can decide to accept, reject or counter your offer. Amazon deny this will encourage auctioning for items, as sellers will only enter one-on-one transactions over items.
If a transaction is approved, Amazon will then allow you to add the item to your cart at the agreed upon price.
So happy shopping. But maybe hide the credit card. This could get dangerous…
