Nowhere in my post was I trying to make any sort of legal argument.
I purchased the domain at $31. They claimed this was a glitch and refused to honor the price they charged me. They then said the 'real price' was $3900. Once I agreed to pay this, the price then magically ratcheted up to $8000. At no point was I ever made aware that I was involved in any sort of negotiation. I bought the domain as a 'Buy now' and in my documented conversations with the support agent, they said I could proceed with purchasing it at $3900. Not once was I ever informed that I was now involved in an auction-style negotiation where my agreement to pay the $3900 was going to be viewed as merely a bid vs an agreed upon price.
Do you think the seller would have jacked the price up to $8000 had Namecheap not revealed my interest and intent in buying? Absolutely not. Now I have no leverage or negotiating power since Namecheap revealed my hand to the seller.
If it weren't for the alleged glitch, I could've just bought the $3900 domain as-is and I'm pretty sure it'd be active in my account right now vs the situation I'm now embroiled in.
Legality aside, Namecheap really screwed me over.
As far as Namecheap not owing me anything: really? They, at the bare minimum, owe me a refund of the $31 I paid two weeks ago for the domain they still haven't delivered to me.
Hm, interesting idea to consider. I definitely don't want to come off as litigious. I have no interest in threatening anyone, I just want this all to be resolved and to get my domain name.
Huh. Interesting. Thank you - I didn't know that. I can no longer find this post at all unless I go through my profile, so I figured it was manually removed/downranked.
Looking through the comments I don't see anything that strikes me as terribly controversial, so now I'm curious about what's being detected...
This post made it to the front page, but it looks like it's been removed and isn't being shown. Would anyone happen to know why that is? Assuming it's because I created a new account to post this, but I'd hope that my post wouldn't be completely deranked just because of that?
It's a reasonable question. I've been on HN since 2019, but can't remember my old password and I guess I never added an email so I'm unable to recover the account.
To answer your original question: not much. They've claimed that the $31 price I paid was a 'glitch.' They said that while they understood it's frustrating, they won't do anything to remedy the situation besides refund me my $31. They said their refund process takes ten business days. It's been well over that and no refund in sight. But to be honest, I'd much rather get access to the domain I bought than a refund.
Their most recent message to me was asking if I want to proceed with buying the domain at the new $8000 price. Since I guess I have unwittingly been forced into a negotiation even though I used 'Buy Now' and the original funds I paid have already left my bank account, I don't have any faith that Namecheap won't allow the seller to continue to ratchet up the price.
I purchased the domain at $31. They claimed this was a glitch and refused to honor the price they charged me. They then said the 'real price' was $3900. Once I agreed to pay this, the price then magically ratcheted up to $8000. At no point was I ever made aware that I was involved in any sort of negotiation. I bought the domain as a 'Buy now' and in my documented conversations with the support agent, they said I could proceed with purchasing it at $3900. Not once was I ever informed that I was now involved in an auction-style negotiation where my agreement to pay the $3900 was going to be viewed as merely a bid vs an agreed upon price.
Do you think the seller would have jacked the price up to $8000 had Namecheap not revealed my interest and intent in buying? Absolutely not. Now I have no leverage or negotiating power since Namecheap revealed my hand to the seller.
If it weren't for the alleged glitch, I could've just bought the $3900 domain as-is and I'm pretty sure it'd be active in my account right now vs the situation I'm now embroiled in.
Legality aside, Namecheap really screwed me over.
As far as Namecheap not owing me anything: really? They, at the bare minimum, owe me a refund of the $31 I paid two weeks ago for the domain they still haven't delivered to me.