I’ve installed the trial version of Parallels for Mac. It looks good in general and I was considering buying a $99 license. However, during checkout I’ve come across a price manipulation. After entering details and turning to checkout I got a price which is ~35% higher than the one placed on the main website. Moreover, it is converted by default to my local currency. It seems that this is made intentionally, looking for the people who won’t notice price difference. The most interesting that Parallels support told that this difference is related to VAT and is determined by my location. But the thing is that VAT in my country is 20%, not 35%.All in all, this looks like a marketing trick or price fraud. And I will have to search for alternatives.-------UPDATE:We've discussed the matter with Parallels Team. It turned out that increase over $99 original price tag is applicable only to non-US customers and is established by Parallel's payment processing partner. Such increase consists of two parts:– VAT being individually calculated depending on client's location– Currency conversion fees that are calculated by payment processing partnerThe second item is quite interesting because even if I turn off conversion to my local currency at the checkout, it still shows increased price in USD.And it still looks really unusual when VAT is claimed to be individual across different locations. I've purchased quite a lot of software licenses online and this pricing case looks strange.All in all, my final price is still $135 which makes the product less attractive.
