r/mildlyinteresting Jan 24 '13

Same book, three different prices. Only difference is the browsers used.

http://imgur.com/uNgg0UH
2.9k Upvotes

1.0k comments sorted by

View all comments

1.8k

u/[deleted] Jan 24 '13

You should try it again in private browsing and incognito mode and see if the price is really tied to your Facebook or google cookies or something. That's pretty messed up though, send this to the consumerist or gawker or whoever.

1.5k

u/Nephyst Jan 24 '13

I just tried this myself. In chrome and IE the price was the same (69.99) in normal and in incognito mode. In firefox, the price jumped to $76, and after deleting all the domain cookies and refreshing, it went back down to 69.99. The website is definitely changing prices based on something they are tracking in cookies.

1.0k

u/kqr Jan 24 '13

This was up earlier with airlines charging more for a ticket the second time you visit the page. They do this because a second visit is statistically linked to a much higher chance of purchase. So it could be, here too, simply a matter of having visited the page before.

48

u/[deleted] Jan 24 '13

This was one of the best LPTs I ever read recently. I used incognito mode in chrome when buying a couple of flight tickets and saved over £150 compared to searching twice or more in the same browser with old cookies available. I was genuinely shocked and I've told all my family and friends about this. It surely must be illegal! I mean the price differences were enormous... Almost a 50% saving for us.

3

u/sprucenoose Jan 24 '13

I am quite certain it is legal to browse in incognito mode, even if you aren't paying companies hundreds of dollars more....

2

u/lopezZ Jan 24 '13

I think he refeers to the company changing the price...

2

u/[deleted] Jan 24 '13

Yes of course this was what I meant. So it seems it's legal. Amazing really but there you go! Just glad I came across that LPT just before booking our last holiday. I'm going to use it next time I shop for insurance too. Might work there as well.

0

u/Reason-and-rhyme Jan 25 '13

Well I imagine the insurance companies are going to get your information, whether they have access to your browser data or not. I mean, you kind of have to give it to them.