$69 iPads a Big Whoops for Sears.com?

Sears.com accidentally sold 16GB iPads for $69 on its site last week, according to CNN. And one customer said she was shocked when Sears cancelled the order after it was approved and confirmed by the merchant and by PayPal.

If you were the merchant in this situation, how would you handle it?

Here’s the statement Sears posted on its ecommerce site Friday:

“We want you to know that, unfortunately, today one of the Marketplace third party sellers told us that they mistakenly posted incorrect pricing information on two Apple iPad models on the Marketplace portion of the website. If you purchased either of these products recently, your order has been cancelled and your account will be credited,” the statement said.

Based on what’s available at Sears.com, that’s a $1,000-per-iPad mistake. And yes, if you go to the product page, you can tell which iPads are being sold by third-party vendors through Sears.com’s marketplace.

I’m sure Sears was doing what it could to protect the seller, which is a noble thing to do. Maybe though, Sears should have just stopped further sales of the $69 devices and paid the vendor for its mistake.

Then again, I do not sell on marketplaces, so I don;t know if this was a simple error or if it took a lot of work for the vendor to get the pricing wrong.

But something to think about: The customer is always right.