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Ask HN: Why don't Amazon, Target, Walmart implement product queueing?

For products like hand sanitizer and masks, why can't there be orderly queues, with quotas, so that everyone can be treated fairly? As a software engineer, I find myself seriously considering writing scrapers to watch over the product pages and notify my wife when something is in stock. It's madness for her to be clicking a dozen pages throughout the day to try and "snag" a couple of these in-demand products. It seems so easy to grab a couple of engineers and implement a rudimentary pre-order system (pretty sure they already have pre-ordering of some sort). Anyone with the inside knowledge know what's going on? Is this a political issue?

PaulHoule 6y ago
You mean I would go on the web site and say I want product X and then I have dibs on the Nth next one to be available, say three hours or three weeks later?
- cloudartisans 6y ago
  Let's say I want this hand sanitizer: https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B01HEUD8YS https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B01HEUD8YS I should be able to purchase a quantity of 1-2, even if it's out of stock. I'm completely fine with being number 527,374 in line, but I want to be sure I will get it and only have to do this once. Instead of refreshing this page 20 times a day for a week, in hopes of hitting the several minutes when it becomes available and then inevitably sells out. This is especially true for masks--impossible to be a good citizen and buy them, when there is no sane way of buying them and you have to jump through the hoops above. I really don't want to write a scraper because it seems unethical, to get a "leg up" on the non-tech savvy people.
caryd 6y ago
People would forget and abuse the return policy. Also, they constantly change prices so you would either get screwed or lock into a price the seller doesn't want to offer for a billion orders.
- cloudartisans 6y ago
  I'd be ok with the changing prices--I use Amazon's subscribe and save, and the price fluctuations are reasonable. If memory serves, if the price is totally out of whack or the item is out of stock, I get a notification about it. I've also never had to return a subscribe and save item, but I imagine if the policy was the same with these "pre-orders," there wouldn't be an issue, since subscribe and save has been in place for decades.
WheelsAtLarge 6y ago
https://www.nowinstock.net/ https://www.nowinstock.net/ This site does something similar to what you want.
- cloudartisans 6y ago
  Thank you; for me, it's an ethical issue to use something like this. Some old lady who's not tech-savvy would "lose her spot" to me. I'd like to understand why the ecommerce giants can't institute a "fair for all" system.

PaulHoule 6y ago

You mean I would go on the web site and say I want product X and then I have dibs on the Nth next one to be available, say three hours or three weeks later?

cloudartisans 6y ago
Let's say I want this hand sanitizer: https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B01HEUD8YS https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B01HEUD8YS I should be able to purchase a quantity of 1-2, even if it's out of stock. I'm completely fine with being number 527,374 in line, but I want to be sure I will get it and only have to do this once. Instead of refreshing this page 20 times a day for a week, in hopes of hitting the several minutes when it becomes available and then inevitably sells out. This is especially true for masks--impossible to be a good citizen and buy them, when there is no sane way of buying them and you have to jump through the hoops above. I really don't want to write a scraper because it seems unethical, to get a "leg up" on the non-tech savvy people.

caryd 6y ago

People would forget and abuse the return policy. Also, they constantly change prices so you would either get screwed or lock into a price the seller doesn't want to offer for a billion orders.

cloudartisans 6y ago
I'd be ok with the changing prices--I use Amazon's subscribe and save, and the price fluctuations are reasonable. If memory serves, if the price is totally out of whack or the item is out of stock, I get a notification about it. I've also never had to return a subscribe and save item, but I imagine if the policy was the same with these "pre-orders," there wouldn't be an issue, since subscribe and save has been in place for decades.

WheelsAtLarge 6y ago

https://www.nowinstock.net/ https://www.nowinstock.net/ This site does something similar to what you want.

cloudartisans 6y ago
Thank you; for me, it's an ethical issue to use something like this. Some old lady who's not tech-savvy would "lose her spot" to me. I'd like to understand why the ecommerce giants can't institute a "fair for all" system.