I got the answer I needed about a week and a half ago. I've been beating my head against the wall with Walmart for well over a month and have made AT LEAST 100 phone calls in that time trying to get to the bottom of this. They ended up canceling my order after over a month of zero shipping progress even though I was promised by at least a dozen employees that would not happen unless I canceled it myself. I ended up finding one locally and paid full price just in case the pending order was canceled. But then two days after it canceled, a second one popped up in a local store that was also showing available to be ordered online and picked up in-store. That got my curiosity kicking into overdrive. I posted this exact message on the SlickDeals page for the item, but I feel it's relevant to post it here also. I have concrete proof that Walmart was screwing with me the entire time. It also reveals how scary their system really is. My post pasted from SD:
"So I found out something truly interesting. I found a unit at a store about an hour away from me because it was listed online. So I decided to bark up the tree again to see if I can order it and match my original online order price that was discounted. I started with a supervisor and asked to reorder the canceled order. He said he couldn't do that (which I already knew). So I said "I thought you'd say that. I managed to find one locally and bought it for the full price already. Can you adjust the price?" He couldn't (again, I already knew this). So I said "I also thought you'd say that, so I already did some homework and found one available to order online and pick up at a store. Surely you can match the price to a new order placed, right?" He reluctantly agreed and detailed exactly how. I place the order, he goes in and adjusts the price immediately after it's placed, and problem solved. So I do exactly that. He adjusted the price and I got an email confirmation of the adjustment. Less than 10 minutes later, the order was canceled.
"Your order was canceled due to unusual activity
Hi OilMagnate,
We're sorry, we canceled your recent order for your protection because it was flagged by our credit and fraud team. You won't be charged for this order."
So I tried again when I called back with a different rep. Same result 10 minutes later. Then the third time, I spoke to new supervisor who recommended I use a different name, phone number, credit card...everything different (the irony!). Same result. So I called and got extremely ****** off and demanded I speak to the "credit and fraud team" since they are canceling my orders. They told me it doesn't exist!!! I got irritated, hung up, and tried again. Four reps told me they don't have a fraud team! It's a **** good thing I didn't actually have a fraud issue! Finally I got through to someone in that department. I started off irate, but quickly reeled it in when I discovered she spoke perfect English (I then knew I ended up somewhere special). She asked for all of my information, asked how I was placing the order (which device, which card, which account, which IP, the list went on...), and at the end she said to use all of my normal stuff exactly as I told her and it would work because she manually changed things on her end to "unblock" everything. I just need to wait 1 hour before trying again. I then vented and explained that there is a really serious problem when I can't reach a fraud team, was specifically instructed by a supervisor to circumvent your fraud measures, and have to call a hundred times and jump through hoops just to receive my item. It was an awesome phone call, one that I hope corporate listens to. I gave it two hours just to be safe, and placed the order again and had them adjust it again. An hour later...canceled, same reason. At this point I decided to go for broke to call Walmart out on their bull****. I placed the order for full price, no adjustment, no phone call...just a normal order. This way if it went through, I now have the proof Walmart was ****ing with me the whole time. The next morning, sure enough, "Your order is ready for pickup."
So I called back one final time and was a ROYAL ****head, and I didn't feel bad about it because I now had the proof it was all a facade. I got a supervisor and explained a long, long tale of a month's worth of information, anticipation, aggravation, and how many wasted man hours they spent all because there was some employee or bot canceling the orders because it was under some threshold. I didn't ask questions, I had demands. I said "you WILL adjust this order to my original order total before I drive an hour one-way to do Walmart's job for them (shipping it to my door), you WILL compensate me for doing the job Walmart failed to do ("find one of these PCs anywhere to fulfill the [original] order" as a supervisor told me before), you WILL compensate me for all of the lies your employees told me ("your order will not be canceled unless you cancel it yourself"), and you WILL compensate me for all of the countless hours I've wasted calling you guys over 100 times in the last month."
I was truly amazed after 20 minutes of non-interrupted listening when she deviated from the script and she [sincerely] wholeheartedly agreed with me. Without wasting time, she looked up my original order for the amount to adjust, then agreed to apply an extra adjustment for a total of $230 (plus tax!). She genuinely apologized, and asked if that would be an appropriate amount for the frustration Walmart caused. I agreed, because she didn't really have to do anything at all. After another apology, she asked if anything else could make this situation any better. I declined, but made it a point to mention that I appreciated her truly listening and taking a month's worth of heat Walmart built up that was 100% not her fault. I apologized to her personally and explained that I knew basically not to shoot the messenger/middleman, but unfortunately Walmart doesn't have a good chain of command to relay issues to. Long story short, I TRULY hope corporate listens to that call, because I **** all over Walmart in great detail, called them out for every ounce of shady **** they tried to pull, and made it clear that the person handling the call didn't deserve the treatment that was directly caused by her employer's business practices. It's not her fault, but her company chose to make her the highest reachable recipient for the **** that rolls uphill. One of my absolute finest mic drop moments tearing into a company because I had the proof they were the ones doing something shady...borderline fraudulent ("credit and fraud team" that doesn't exist).
Hopefully someone learns from this post in the future. If you get a discount on an order, be prepared for it to be canceled. Then reorder it, wait for the "ready" email, and have them adjust it before picking it up. Problem solved.
In the end, after my 5% back, I will be under $800 out the door for this PC. I'll take the W and completely avoid Walmart going forward."