Jobs' Mob has missed another opportunity to have a PR victory. A man from New Zealand is challenging Apple over an online deal that he claims the company unfairly backed out on.

On 10 October, Adam Crouchley spotted that some Apple accessories on the company's website had been reduced from as much as $89 to just 83 cents. To make sure there was no error Crouchley used Apple's live chat function to contact customer support, who confirmed that the prices were genuine. He spent  $35 and got about $1600 worth of gear.

After placing his order, Crouchley got a confirmation email saying that some products had already been shipped and others saying that his credit card had been charged for his purchases. However two days later Apple came back and said the order had been cancelled because there was a problem with the price. He was told that Apple would honour the part of the order that had already shipped.

Apple could have just shrugged off the whole thing but instead it  intercepted the courier package instead to make sure the whole order was cancelled. Now Crouchley is taking Apple to the Disputes Tribunal in December in a case that Apple is unlikely to win.  It will also then have to deal with a highly public mess where it clearly turned over one of its own loyal customers.