Best Buy to make price-match guarantee permanent starting in March

Best Buy announced it's putting in place a permanent policy to match prices of online competitors such as Amazon.com.

By Salvador Rodriguez

Feb. 18, 2013 12 AM PT

<i>This post has been corrected. See note below.</i>

This post has been corrected. See the note at the bottom for details.

In an attempt to live up to its name, Best Buy has announced it will permanently match the lowest price that consumers can find on items on the Web and at other local retailers.

The big box store said it will institute the low price guarantee on March 3 in an effort to fight “showrooming,” which is when consumers come to stores to check out items in person but then purchase them over the Internet.

“Best Buy will price match all local retail competitors and 19 major online competitors in all product categories and on nearly all in-stock products, whenever asked by a customer,” the company said in a statement.

Best Buy has had a similar policy for appliances and electronics since the holiday shopping season that will be replaced by the new low-price guarantee that ends March 2.

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The guarantee will apply to items found on Amazon.com, Apple.com, Bhphotovideo.com, Buy.com, Crutchfield.com, Dell.com, Frys.com, hhgregg.com, HP.com, HomeDepot.com, Lowes.com, Newegg.com, OfficeDepot.com, OfficeMax.com, Sears.com, Staples.com, Target.com, TigerDirect.com and Walmart.com.

The company said the guarantee will apply to purchases made in its stores, on BestBuy.com, at Best Buy Mobile stand-alone stores and for purchases made over the telephone.

However, the guarantee will not work for items from marketplace vendors, such as EBay.com, and Best Buy will not match the price of a competitor after a purchase has been completed.

The company also announced that if it lowers the price of an item within 15 days of a consumer purchase, the buyer will be able to return and get a refund to match the lower price.

[For the record, 3:29 p.m. Feb. 18: An earlier version of this post incorrectly said Best Buy’s holiday shopping season price match ended Dec. 24. That policy was extended and won’t end until March 2.]

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