Amazon shoppers are being urged to check the small-print of anything they order online after being hit by unexpected delivery costs.
One customer said she was left horrified when finding cheap Cadbury chocolate on the retail giant's website - only to spot how expensive the shipping fees were.
Heather Teece went to purchase a bar of Cadbury chocolate, which had been reduced from £3.49 to 41p, to find that the price of postage was an unbelievable £31.99.
Heather claims the postage appeared to be free for one bar.
But, when she added another bar to meet the minimum order requirement, the postage changed.
People have been left out of pocket when they realised how much they had paid for postage, reports Manchester Evening News.
Heather told the Extreme Couponing and Bargains Facebook group: "Got really excited when I saw the price of the big bars of dairy milk on Amazon..... It was minimum 2 buy.... Look what shipping jumped to."
Amazon has thousands of items on offer, many of which are available via Prime.
The retailer itself is not responsible for the prices its third party sellers charge, but does have systems in place to try and prevent this from happening.
The chocolate bar Heather spotted has now been removed.
Many shoppers shared their own similar stories on the original Facebook post that Heather published.
Jennie Halligan said: "I got caught out by this too but with some fabric softener. It said prime delivery but afterwards it was £50 delivery.
"I’ve sent it back for a refund and complained but it cost me £13 to send it back."
Rebecca Henry wrote: "There’s been loads of 41p items this week with 31.99 postage."
Laura Overton replied: "I had this with some deodorant. 41p instead of £4 but you needed to buy two.. then when you went to check out postage jumped to £29.99."
Becky Smith said: "They did this with se body spray I was looking for.. On my account its was showing 41p a tin (spend so much more to get free delivery).
"Tried it on prime, was available on prime and stated free delivery until my dad went to check out and they asked for 35.99 postage. Luckily he noticed before purchasing so obviously we never bothered..."
Lily-Rose Jenkins said: "What the actual f*CK. How can they get away with that?? Imagine if you didn't notice the shipping cost."
Catherine O'leary said: "They’ve been doing this with so many Items recently! I spoke to customer service and they just said it’s a 3rd party seller so nothing they can do. Definitely naughty!"
One person warned that the website eBay were known for having similar small-print catches.
Gaz Bartlett said: "It's quite easy really, people on eBay do it too.. it's so Amazon/eBay don't take a big percentage of profit.. as they don't charge anything from the delivery cost just the product price.
"That's why you'll see stuff selling on eBay for 1p-99p with high delivery cost.”
An Amazon spokesperson said: “We work hard every day to provide customers with low prices, vast selection, and fast delivery. Sellers set their own product prices in our store and we have policies to help ensure sellers are pricing their products competitively, including shipping costs.
"We actively monitor our store and remove offers that violate our policies.”
