Rizna Mutmainah
Money & Banking

Big W customer gobsmacked over $4000 shipping fee

A Big W customer was only trying to buy an outdoor play set for her kids but got the shock of her life when she saw the "ridiculous" shipping fee that was over three times the cost of the play set. 

The Singleton mum had added the $1,200 item to her cart while shopping online and was about to check out when she was greeted with a $4,466 shipping fee. 

"How in God's name can they charge $4,466 for delivery! Big W are slowly losing my vote!" the outraged mum wrote on Facebook, even swearing off the department store for the apparent money grab. 

According to the Big W website, the play set is sent via Plum Play, a "trusted partner", and not by Big W stores, and because the woman lives in a rural area, she initially believed that was the reason for the extortionate shipping costs. 

A few other shoppers criticised the high fee. 

"That is fricken ridiculous!!!! No one would pay that," one said. 

"Jesus, are you ordering a few pallets of bricks? No way normal merchandise would cost that much to send," another wrote. 

A few others questioned the weight of the item and where she lived, while others tried to buy the same item and got even higher shipping fees. 

"It jumped a few grand for a couple of ks for me," one wrote, with the cost of standard delivery for the play set at $7,858. 

Some reported fees of up to $50,000, but most were $7,000 to $10,000. 

The department store has addressed the issue and told Yahoo News Australia that an "error on the website" was to blame. 

They have since corrected the delivery charges which should have been about $100 for the woman's location. 

"We were made aware of a delivery calculation error on our website which has since been resolved. We apologise for any inconvenience this has caused," a spokesperson told the publication. 

Image: Getty

Tags:
Finance, Money & Banking, Big W, Shipping Fee