I do have my own set of “Walmart shopping rules”. I always use either a credit card or use my
debit card as a credit card because it seems much easier to get credit for
things you return. However, you have to
watch out for one of the ways I think Walmart adds to their fortunes. One needs to pay attention to their pricing
since it always seems as if at least one item per trip came up with different
pricing and it may only be a few cents but you multiply that by millions of
purchases and it adds up. They also
often price the same item differently in various locations in the store. I have even seen the same item on the same
shelf wall with the one placed higher up with a higher price and the same item
placed lower on the display and it is a few cents cheaper. I think they also bank on folks not going to
the trouble to return things of small value which add to their coffers but for
me, it adds up to wasted money on my part and dissatisfaction as a consumer
especially if a product is defective. Because
I hate being held up in a checkout line, if I have any doubt about the price of
something, I check the price at one of the price scanning stations so I have no
surprises when I check out. I also keep
Walmart receipts until I am sure I have complete satisfaction on every item I
bought. I am usually in the store at
least once a month so just keep a little Walmart return pile for the next time
I go.
If I am in Walmart and happen to be in the right frame of
mind when I pass either the $5.00 DVD or $7.96 Blu-Ray bin, I will give myself
about 5 minutes to stand and dig and see if I can find anything I want. When I was in around Halloween, I found a
movie I hadn’t found anywhere so grabbed the $5.00 DVD of “Gone In 60 Seconds”. I
didn’t even open it until my Thanksgiving vacation and about 10 minutes into
the movie, there was a high pitched sound and the screen went all wonky with
horizontal lines of color that reminded me of a computer monitor dying.
My cardinal rule for returning things is BE NICE to the
store personnel. You get nowhere by
being a dick with any customer service issues.
Just be calm and state your case and have a frakkin’ receipt.
Anyway, earlier this week, I was going to make a Walmart run
and took the defective movie back with my receipt but was told I could not
return it because it had been opened. I
explained I did understand their policy on returning opened videos but this
movie was defective to which she replied they still couldn’t take it back
because people will buy a movie, take it home and download it and then return
it. I told her thanks for the idea
because that it would have never occurred to me to do that, especially for a $5
movie but if they would give me a $5 store credit that would be fine as I came
in to buy other things anyway. She didn’t
seem to comprehend so I asked her to please call the manager. Of course, the manager comes roaring up with
a bad attitude but I calmly explained that the movie was defective and more than
going to the trouble to return a $5 movie, it was more about the principle of
buying a defective item and that the situation had created a Catch-22 (she just
blankly stared at me after the remark) so I explained that a movie was bought,
it was defective but because it had been opened, I was not allowed to return it
because it had been opened therefore the product was defective but if I had not
opened the movie, I would not have discovered it was defective. That seemed to make sense to her and she gave
me the store credit but explained that due to the store clientele they get I
should understand where she was coming from which I did.
I was in no mood to dig through the movies but passed a
holiday display of movies and ended up with a Blu-Ray copy of all three
theatrical releases of “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy for $7.96 and of course
about $50.00 of other stuff I felt “I had to have”.
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