I know there are many retail beefs on here and low and behold this is another one.
If our return policy states you must have a receipt to return an item that means YOU MUST HAVE A RECIPT. Yelling, screaming and threats and about legal action will make me laugh on the inside and depending on your level of insanity on the outside as well…
Also, for the record being from out of town (truro, bridgewater, CB etc.) does not change the policy and also doesnÂ’t make me feel sorry for you, cut it out already. Coming back to attempt to return the item the same day from another staff member while I am still in the store is going to get you nowhere either except politely asked to leave. We are a chain of stores and trust me I personally did not decide our return policy so if its that much of a big deal, call the people who actually have some say and leave the store manager who has no control out of it. For the record we do make exceptions to the rules but it will never ever ever be for the person yelling and always for the nice polite understanding customers who has shown at least a small amount of respect for the person at the cash.
—mgr
This article appears in Feb 19-25, 2009.
Heh. This happens all the time where I work. People play the ‘out of town’ card, and expect me to bend over backwards to help them. Ya, I don’t think so. No reciept? The best you’ll get is a gift card/store credit.
I love it when people say “I will never shop here again”. It makes me glad that I’ll never see their faces.
A little off topic (sort of), anyone see that Documentary on the crack-head couples living in New York? “Dope Sick Love”.
Anyways, they would root through the garbage bins out front of department store (MalWart), find receipts, go back inside the store, find the item on the receipt, go to customer service and “return” the item back for cash.
Wow, that’s pretty clever. Far cleverer than people pitching fits to get what they want. I think the cashier should be able to use a fire extinguisher for protection.
I used to work for the chain Tommyboy referenced. We were trained to watch for people who come in the store with nothing and a few minutes later are at the refund counter with a huge cart filled with items looking for refunds. Happens all the time.
My favourite customers were the one’s who came to my store with a receipt from another store (such as Zellers, or Canadian Tire) and demand a refund. Even when the items still have the stickers from the original store on it. And, they pulled the “out of town” shit all the time when. Then, when they finally realized they were wrong, they would ask us to go to said store and get the refund for them.
Customers are morons!
I remember this; and it’s the reason I got out of retail. I used to love the excuse of: “well, I’m from the valley and I don’t get to Halifax all that often” or “30 days isn’t enough time to test a product”, whine, whine, whine. Think it’s bad in places like Wally-Mart? People get violent when they’re told that a 2000 dollar TV that they bought 4 months ago isn’t returnable because they don’t like it anymore or there is one burnt pixel, which isn’t covered by any warranty or return policy. I was actually punched by a customer for telling him that his 6 month old, receipt-less, defective product was not returnable. People are so pleasant.
Tommyboy, that happens all the time. I supervised at Shoppers for 5 years while going to university and I can’t tell you how many times that happened. The pisser of it all was that my bosses would do the returns…over…and over…and over…
That’d majoriy suck if I bought a $2000 tv and 6 months later I had a burnt pixel and/or it was defective! But if it’s defective, isn’t that what warranties are for?
Anyway, most stores are quite reasonable when it comes to returns. I can only think of two retail outlets that i won’t buy anything from anymore because their return policies are ridiculous. One’s a store that sells DVDs and CDs another’s a women’s clothing store. Their policy’s *awesome* — once you buy it, you can only exchange it within 7 days. That’s it.
It’s rare that I return something, but I like knowing that option is there, and it also makes me feel like they have a more customer-friendly business philosophy.
And do people REALLY think that yelling and screaming will get you what you want? Be assertive, fine, but no one’s going to want to go out of their way for you if you treat them like dirt. Trust me, a hostile customer screaming in my face REALLY encouraged me to go that extra mile for them. *eyeroll*
Working with the public sucks.