Many Carts / No Order / One 'Customer'

[talerco]

I get emails about abandoned carts so I can try to adjust shipping costs when needed.
This happened this weekend as well as a couple weeks ago.
Someone - 'John Smith' - puts 1 small item in a cart / gets to the shipping portion / and then deletes that item and adds another - same thing - 1 item - never finishes He did this maybe 20 times over a short period. Then again a day later.
I guess I don't care if someone wants to spend their time doing this - BUT - it occurs to me that there might be some devious reason.
Does anyone know what information someone might be able to gain by doing this? Basic question - Why do this?
Thanks, David
SunOrganic Farm

[ILoveHostasaurus]

Could it be a competitor checking your shipping prices on a per-item basis to try and figure out your overall price for an item, and/or your negotiated shipping rates?

[SunCam]

I have seen something like this. Every month or so a customer reports that they have put a product in the cart and when they click "Checkout" the cart empties. They endure this for a few cycles and then call us. We tell them to use "Incognito Mode" in Chrome and the problem is solved. In most retail stores, the customer would just walk away frustrated, but we sell courses that are mandatory for professional license renewal so walking-away is not an option. We have never been able to solve the mystery but it is infrequent enough that we have learned to live with it.

[talerco]

SunCam - I don't think that is our problem - nobody has ever reported that. But, I'll be alert for it.
ILoveHostasaurus - I thought maybe a competitor but our shipping prices are pretty upfront and available. He puts a 1 pound package of X in the cart and then deletes that and puts in a 1 pound package of Y. Maybe just bored - but a pretty lame game in my book. He has an email address and I sent him a note saying that shipping would be much better if he has several items instead of 1 at a time. No reply.
Thanks, both