This was my second time B&H photo, and I had a terrible exprience this time. Initial error could happen, but following customer support was not acceptable.  
 
I ordered a headphone as it was advertised that it was in stock. However, I received an email saying that the merchandise is not in stock due to a system error, and it said I should contact them by phone or a email to cancel it. I followed the instruction and requested a cancellation, but B&H didn't respond for a day, and it came back saying the item was shipped. However, based on USPS's derlivery tracking, the shipment was received after the customer support email. I told the customer support that it was wrong, and this should be resolved, but it came back with a response saying "You should always CALL" and didn't try to resolve the issue. Actually, the first email I received said call or email them...

Have not received my order yet, has not shipped, ordered on 12/3/06, it's 01/19/07 today and still have no idea when will ship. Everytime I request status am told they will recontact buyer to see what is taking so long. Will not give me any idea when they plan on shipping. They charged my card on 12/3/06!!

I placed an order on January first on thier web site. The item was in stock. The credit card was charged immediately. The item was never sent. I did not receive any information from them about what happened. They still did not return money. I had to call them today (a week after the order was placed) to beg them to return the money. The customer servise personel was very rude.

Based on the excellent ratings this company has received, I ordered a 42-inch plasma TV from B & H, including paying extra for their white glove in-home delivery - total out-of-pocket over $1400. The TV was delivered a week later, which I considered excellent, however when it was unpacked it turned out to have a shattered screen. I called B & H customer service while the delivery man was still here and was told to refuse delivery and that after B & H received the TV back I could either re-order or get a refund and I was told it would take about five days for them to get it back. The delivery man told me it would be shipped back to them that very evening. Nine days later, after hearing nothing from them, I emailed customer service. Two days later I was sent an email telling me my inquiry had been forwarded to "the appropriate department for review and processing" and I am still waiting, five days after my initial inquiry and two weeks after sending back the TV, to hear from them. If the TV could get here in a week, could it really take two weeks + for them to get it back? They have now had my money for over three weeks. I understand that the damage to the TV was not their fault, these things happen. But it was not my fault either. How long am I expected to wait empty-handed while they hold on to my money? I notice they seem to respond to poor reviews on this forum faster than they are responding to my email.  
Update 1/8/2007. In spite of Henry Posner's claim below and the email B&H sent four days ago, I still have not received my refund. I have had to file a dispute with MasterCard to get my money back from B&H. Damage to the TV was not their fault, but holding my money for four weeks and counting after the TV was returned to them is. Beware when purchasing big ticket items from this company.

This review was modified by its author, w84mike, on 1/8/07 10:42 AM.

Ordered a HD DVD player from this company. It was a new product that had not been released. B&H website said the product would arrive in 15 days. 15 days came and went so I called to make sure nothing was wrong with my order. The gentleman I talked to had no idea when the product was going to arrive. I asked to talk to a manager that may know. Another gentleman came on the phone and told me the product would be there by the 15th of December cutting it very close to Christmas considering they would not ship the product until the day after ground. Well the 15th came and went and on the 17th another phone call and I was told I would not get my player until the 28th of December. Well Best Buy had the players and every website was selling them in stock. I asked to cancel my order and was told my credit card would take over 7 days to credit so I would still not be able to buy the player elsewhere. It took two complaints to the bbb to FINALLY get the player shipped. It has STILL not arrived and it missed Christmas. I was not offered free shipping or overnight shipping. I ended up not saving any money because their shipping charges are very high. I have been burnt. I will warn everyone not to use this website.

First-time (non-U.S.) overseas buyers BEWARE. Their verification procedure is very strict and complicated. And their communication is slow too.  
 
They deducted money from my cc and refused to ship out my order. I only discovered it when I received my cc bill. They said they need my bank approval ... they got my money in their account for more than a week and still require my bank approval?????????  
 
If they have doubts on my credibility and my order, then they should have rejected my order straight away. Why treat it so trivially, deduct and refund money into my cc as and when they pleased?  
 
And because of this, I incur a few hundreds dollars loss due to foreign $ conversion rate. B&H said it is not their responsibility and refuse to refund me further.  
 
But I won't have incur have this loss if B&H is willing to ship out my order. In the first place, B&H shouldn't have deducted money from my cc liberally if they can't confirmed shipping.  
 
I'm sad that such a reputable big store, make my first time shopping experience with them a nightmare.  
 
This is too expensive a lesson to learn. I end up with nothing (no camera or lens) but money-wise poorer. I hope others won't be as gullible as me, believing in all the good reviews.  
 
 
7th December  
Losing US$330!!!! is no joke. Who am I to claim compensation from? So I have to pay for my folly for trusting B&H and all those great reviews?  
 
B&H should acknowledged that they shouldn't have deducted money from cc and held it for so many days, then refunded because their Verification dept won't proceed with my order.  
 
Overseas buyers, don't trust B&H with your order. You are better off buying from elsewhere, even if the prices are higher. The frustration dealing with B&H is too much and the money loss is even worse.

This review was modified by its author, Asianbuyer, on 12/6/06 10:07 PM.

Nightmare! I got gray market merchandise that was advertised as covered under a manufacturer's warranty. There was no warranty card or serial number. I sent it back and got another just like it. B&H insisted that the product was genuine but offered no proof. They claim that they identify all gray market items, but this expensive item (nearly $400!) was advertised as the real deal -- it could easily have been a knock-off. NY camera merchants are infamous for bait & switch and B&H is no better than they have to be.

I ordered a silver XTI body only from B&H in the night. They charged my credit card immediately. However, they cancelled the order the next day while still holding the charges for at least 3 days!  
The price is around 20% lower than regular price. I am not sure if it is really a price mistake or what. But the experience is certainly no good.

I placed an order last night around 1 am to purchase Canon rebel XTi. The price stated $569 and I placed two orders right away, order#1005545657 and order#1005545598.  
 
I called customer service and they said the rebel XTi black will be on back order and the silver one will be ship the same day. If they think it's a price mistake, why didn't the customer representative tell me that my order will not be shipped due to price mistake?  
 
They don't honor the price of what they stated in their website. I don't think it's a price mistake, more like great discount/offer. They charge my credit card for 2x$583 (camera + shipping) already and did not refund it, saying that we need to cancel the order or pay the price that B&H wants us to pay.  
 
Now I left with 2 charges of $583 and no cameras, no tracking number, nothing. All I got is an E-mail from B&H basically saying that if I want to order, I need to pay to whatever they want to put or cancel it.  
 
Since I had limited budget and I had bought 2 lenses to accompany the cameras from other retailers, in a sense B&H doesn't give me any choice but to return the 2 lenses and buy their body without any lens (how am I going to take picture?). I am willing to pay, but I have a limited budget right now and the price was stated clearly $569 (both black and silver), if they make mistake, how can it be on both models (since they both have different SKUs)?  
 
I felt kind of dissapointed, I bought some stuff from B&H before and I was never dissapointed. I used to envy B&H as an honorable web store but not at this point in time. They will probably become more like Dell, put customer last and money comes first.  
 
If they can honor their price as most good companies do, I can probably give them 3 thumbs up and be their loyal customer.  
 
 
 

I, along with many others, were victims of a "misprint" on B&H's website. Truth be told, the misprint was a special promotion and the coupon code for that promotion made it out to the internet. Several people were shipped the item anyway, however, most were sent an insulting e-mail asking them to still purchase the item, only slightly discounted (20% off originally, down to 4% off)

B&H advertised a special promotion on their Canon EOS Digital Rebel XTi Camera for 569.99. Given that this was without the lens, it was not a stunning price but still less than the competition. I do not know much about cameras, so I spent quite a bit of time researching and finally decided to pull the trigger. About 12 hours later I am told the order is cancelled due to a 'typographical error'.. but the thing that really gets me is that they charged my credit card anyway.  
 
My local Target and Petcos and Supermarkets don't have price errors - neither should you. But more importantly, you should not be charging credit cards for items you don't ship.  
 
Very unhappy that you wasted an hour of my time, and the refund on my card better show up quick.

Poor Customer Service. They take orders for a product for almost a full day at one price, then send out emails to some people telling them that the item is no longer in stock and that there order is on hold. Then they send out another email stating that the price was a mistake and they will not honor it. But they ARE honoring some of my friends orders at the supposid mistake price. Thats a poor way to handle your loyal customer base.

How to piss customers off, the BHPhotoVideo way:  
 
BH refused to honor the price they listed on their website for 15 hours. They were terribly slow to respond to inquiries and eventually slapped the customers in the face.  
 
1. Have a price for an item on your website for 15 hours (the XTi for $569).  
 
2. Take hundreds if not thousands of orders over night, and for 6 hours during normal business hours on Friday.  
 
3. Ship out some of the less popular silver models to customers for the $569 price.  
 
4. Send out emails to everyone else telling them they'll get the XTi but it is temporarily out of stock.  
 
5. Hours later, change your mind and send out emails telling the back-ordered items have increased in price.  
 
WTF?  
 
 
If it was a typographical error, why ship out a bunch of the silver models. They would have been able to search for the PEE06 ordered items and cancel them. I know they have every right to cancel orders due to typographical erros (as does every other website), but i'm not 100% sure that was the actual cause of this. Why take a lot of orders and not correct it right away... I wonder if the orders that contained high margin accessories were also cancelled. Either way, if they had the right to or not, they have a lot of explaining to do to a lot of upset customers.  
 
When Dell and other websites have price mistakes, they compensate the customers for their lost time and frustration with some kind one time use coupon.. something to "make it right." BH photo just tries to upsell you... laughable.  
 
If BH Photo spent half the time on real customer service that they spend on monitoring and denying negative reviews on reselleratings, they could avoid this all together. Good to see BH can't reply to my emails, but they can deny my claims here on reselleratings. They rather "appear" to have good customer service here.  

This review was modified by its author, USFmarine, on 11/4/06 9:37 PM.

Ordered the Rebel XTI for a great price, turns out it was miss-priced, so a day after my order is processed, I get an email saying they made a mistake, but would sell it to me at the full price $200 dollars higher. Problem is I wasn't sure I could afford to upgrade to this camera from my current Cannon Rebel XT unless I could find someone to buy my XT, so I ordered it with that plan in mind. Over the weekend I sold it to my brothers in-laws for $400, which worked out for both of us. But when I got home tonight and read my e-mail, I got this message. Now I'm stuck without a camera, or I have to see if I can get my old one back. Customer care wasn't too concerned. They assured me I could get my old one back, no problem, but they couldn't even offer me a better price then general public to make up for the mistake. Didn't seemed to concerned about my problem, so long as their mistake didn't cost them.

This review was modified by its author, MandolinJimmy, on 11/6/06 2:48 PM.

I ordered a digital camera on 10/13/06 with UPS 2 day air, but UPS deliverd as 3 days ground.  
I was very disappointed.  
B&H said they'll ask UPS for a refund. But so far I haven't heard anything from B&H.  
I'm waiting to see how B&H can let customer happy.  

This review was modified by its author, qianr, on 10/27/06 8:58 AM.