Raincheck @ Coles supermarkets
October 28, 2006 8:58 pmToday’s SPOTD was actually several days ago but only discovered today. I recently used a raincheck ticket at my local Coles supermarket since, well, they’re a terrible supermarket and always run out of food on the shelf by about mid-week so you need to get a raincheck in order to get the items you want. This is, after all, the same Coles that led me to receiving payment for ranting about how terrible they were (see a previous SPOTD report - 3rd March 2005). Anyway, the raincheck was obtained a few weeks ago and I bought six of the items at the reduced price this week when doing my groceries. Alas, I only thought I was getting them at the reduced price…
The checkout operator looked at the raincheck ticket presented to her before scanning any items and then entered a key sequence into the console that we interpreted as “the next six items are at a reduced price”. However, as discovered when looking at the receipt today (a few days later) I noticed that had not happened at all. Evidently I’d made the foolish assumption that she might be competent at her job but it seems she scanned the first item of the six as “6 items at $2.50 each” then the remaining five items as “full price as well as the other items” which meant that even though 6 items crossed the scanner we were charged for 11.
Due to the timing of the grocery shopping being at the end of the day and the pressure of others in the line behind us, I didn’t notice the ~$30 discrepancy in the bill (it was a big bill anyway!) and paid. Coles now owes me $28.95 which I am certain will lead to fun getting back…
Categories: SPOTD
2 Responses to “Raincheck @ Coles supermarkets”
Having spoken to the store manager he has advised me to speak to the customer service desk next time I am in store and receive a refund. It sounds promising but then again it did take me several minutes to get the customer service person to create the raincheck receipt in the first place so there could be another SPOTD report in the future.
In yet another stellar example of creative checkout operation by a Coles employee I received a refund for the five items I should not have been charged for PLUS a sixth item. The woman at the customer service desk seemed to understand the situation quickly enough and then said “Okay, so I need to refund you for six of these items then.”. I (being the honest dolt I am) replied that she only needed to refund me for five of them and she then realised her mistake.
And a minute later processed the refund for six items.
I decided that she’d been told once and if Coles wanted to refund me for “time and suffering” then that was her problem.
Care to comment?