Reader Gets RC Helicopter For $6 After Incompetence Discount
S. is living the dream. My dream, at least. The dream of using one's grown-up status and money to buy an awesome toy that our parents wouldn't buy us in our childhood. In S.'s case, it was even better, since a strange pricing system error meant that he got a $6 remote control helicopter.
I wanted an RC Helicopter for no reason other than not having been allowed to have one as a kid. I went to WalMart and ended up choosing the $59.95 Air Hogs model. When it came time to check out, the cashier scanned it and it rang up $59.95 AND $5.88 1-year protection plan. I told her I didn't want the protection plan, just the helicopter. She tries to void the $5.88 charge but the system will only let her void the $59.95. She canceled out the entire transaction and tried again. It still rang up both items and would only allow her to void one.
She called the Customer Service Manager over. The manager tried it as well and it kept forcing the protection plan when the helicopter was rung up and absolutely would not allow the $5.88 charge to be removed - even with a manager's override. They also tried ringing up a second Air Hogs that was priced the same and it also rang up with the protection plan. I told them not to worry about it as there was a Radio Shack across the street that had the same model at (amazingly) the same price.
The customer service manager told me to wait, rang up the helicopter (which rang up with the protection plan of course) then voided it (the system would ONLY allow the helicopter to be voided and not the protection plan) and asked how I was paying. I looked at the total.... She charged me only the $5.88 protection plan and voided off the $59.95 for the helicopter. I told her she didn't have to but she said it was fine. This is perhaps the best $5.88 I've spent in a long time. Thanks, WalMart!
Most excellent. Now, make sure that you have a lot of fun with that helicopter!
(Photo: Locutis)
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Comments:
why does this kinda stuff never happen to me when I make frivolous purchases?
curse you OP, curses!
Rockin. I love it when stuff like that happens. I was trying to buy a small pink carebear for my neice for Christmas. The bear had no tag and it was the only one left. After trying to figure out the price and seeing her line starting to back up, the cashier rang it up as 1 dollar and let me take it.
That's nothing compared to the deal this guy got, but I just felt like sharing.
He can't mention the specific wal-mart where the purchase was made because if he did then she would be fired for trying to offer some customer service. Remember, it's wal-mart.
Sweet.. you should have bought two dude.. one for me
@Kimaroo - 20% More Kitty Added!:
I think it does say a lot, for both you and the OP.
Most people here might be freaking that this guy got 90% off. I think the real story here is that there's still employees who will take the initiative, (and have been empowered to do so,) to err in the customer's favor when an in-house obstacle comes up.
Lesson for companies: People remember these things, and it's a lot easier to return and spend more at a place that gave you a free ride once upon a time, than to tick'em off with a ridiculous story of incompetence.
It's not the ~55$ that'll keep him going to that Wal-mart, any more than the few dollars that Kimaroo saved. It's that someone could acknowledge the issue, and rectify it without further inconveniencing the customer.
This EXACT same thing happened to me at K-mart. I was trying to buy a shade-gazebo-camping-tent thing and it kept ringing up with the $5 protection plan and she finally voided the tent off and charged me $5. I told her it was wrong but she said in a funny voice, "You're holdin' up the line!" I laughed and paid her. if I could have tipped her I would have.
Strange world we live in, no?
@Several: I shop at Wal*mart pretty oftin and at the store I frequent I've had shockingly good service. So yes, I do keep going back.
I first thought the one in the picture was purchased for $6. That looks like a $500 heli in that pic.
Times may have changed in the 4 or so years since I worked at Wal-Mart, but I can't believe that the manager couldn't ring up the item manually. You tell it the department and type in the price and a short description. That's what happened with Kimaroo up above. Additionally, all cashiers had that ability, not just managers.
That being said, the manager still did right by the OP, and probably did what she knew how to do with the skills she had. I don't shop at Wal-Mart for other reasons, but I'm happy to hear when someone gets good service from them.
something not shitty happened at walmart? lies!
Human nature is funny... we get excited and giddy when an error like this works in our favor, but when we get hit with an inappropriate charge, we're outraged-- outraged !
Still, have fun with the helicopter.
I told them not to worry about it as there was a Radio Shack across the street that had the same model at (amazingly) the same price.
Not so amazing, actually. One of Wal-Mart's key business strategies is to reel the suckers in with a sub-par unit sold at a mild loss, then through merchandizing tricks, tempt their shoppers into "upgrading" to a higher margin version that - surprise! - costs the same (or more than) competing retailers.
Of course, their loyalists only remember the "great deal" they saw prominently advertised, and not the fact that they ended up buying the seductively placed, more expensive, one next to the flashing lights and twirling spotlights.
First off, yeah totally awesome getting such a sweet deal.
But, what happens when you get selected for a receipt check and there's no helicopter on the receipt? Prepare for incompetence round 2...
@nycaviation: If anyone is to be fired, it is the people who set up the computer programming and/or data that prevented the proper voiding in the first place. The manager should be commended by upper management for keeping a customer happy in the face of an obvious error at corporate headquarters.
Of course corporate management may well fire the manager for not making some weasely excuse for the problem that would make it not look like a corporate problem.
Given that they get more credit for selling protection plans than actual product, apparently the manager figured she (her store) would get more credit for selling the protection plan alone. Trouble is, the inventory will end up wrong.
"Hey, we're short one helicopter and we've got an extra protection plan lying around"
@Liam Kinkaid: Problem is, if no one's had to do it in a long time, people may no longer even know how to do it, or realize the function exists anymore. It's like when you present a traveller's cheque to a store. With the advent of widespread credit and debit use, next to no one uses the things anymore and cashiers often have to call over senior staff and get out all sorts of POS terminal manuals to figure out what buttons to press to even accept them anymore.
Wal-Mart keeps their labor costs low by not paying their workers, falsifying timesheets, using gov't healthcare instead of providing their own, etc. that $60 is money well spent to get this guy to come back and buy more plastic crap from China.
@Corporate_guy: And don't hold your breath waiting for this to be fixed. They figure they reel enough people who never notice the added charge (or don't care) to make up for the one or two that do and complain about it. I've had plenty of things ring up the wrong price where nothing was done about it (came up the same wrong price the next time as well...even when the cashier filled out one of those correction slips)
@sbcpunkrocker: Yes, WalMart is the nations largest employer and we all know they don't pay the workers...
@Trai_Dep: I kind of figured that "amazingly" was sarcasm, but perhaps not.
I used to work in an independent camera store. Our camera prices were a dollar or three more than Walmart's. Our battery prices for those same cameras were usually at least $5 cheaper. Walmart is only a deal if you compare prices with competitors and selectively purchase the cheaper items.
@Kimaroo - 20% More Kitty Added!: yeah, I've mentioned this before too, it's never the service at Wal-Mart that creates a bad experience for me, it's the other shoppers.
I wonder if they could have just rang through the entire thing and just did a refund for the $5.88. Not ideal, but maybe possible.
In the past Walmart's reliance on fast inventory turns generated weird low prices as they obsolete one item for a nearly similar item. I needed some some safety relfectors for a small utility trailer and found a pack of adhesive versions discounted for about $1 versus a different sku (that probably replaced the $1 version)was $8-$9. It was a no-brained and discounted so I bought it...
A while back, the local walmart had Congo Tetras as fish of the month for $6.50. I wanted one, but didn't want to pay that much. when Congo Tetras are small, they lack colors and are ugly. I waited a few months, and the fish somehow lived. I decided to get one. They no longer had the pricing info, so they gave me all 8 Congo Tetras for free.
@dvdchris: I'm not 100% sure, I'm not positive... but maybe, just MAYBE.. the pic.. just MAYBE!!... MIGHT not be from the actual person. MAYBE.
@GitEmSteveDave_NowDoesSurnames: Canadians... Chinese...
Polar Bears... Pandas.... Look, they BOTH have bears, right?
Oh wait. Grizzlies! Canada has two bear-types* to China's one.
They win. H̶a̶n̶d̶s̶ Paws down.
* wink!
@zentex: I bought a Blu ray burner at Frys 6 months ago, should have been $279.99 and it rang up as $49.99. Went back and bought 4 and I am going to use them for christmas presents this year. Thats the only stroke of luck I have had with retail purchases.
@pb5000: I can agree with that.. but it seems those dang annoying shoppers are EVERYWHERE. It doesn't matter whether you're at Wal*Mart, the gas station, or somewhere expensive like the Houston Galleria.
They're eevverrryywhere.
@baristabrawl: Awesome.. I bet you saved a bundle on that one. Maybe companies should learn that forcing their replacement plans are costing them money in a way they hadn't thought of.
I used up my stash of road flares last year saving some lives, so when I stumbled across some at my local Walmart, I grabbed them. They're sort of hard to find.
These particular ones were on an end-cap in the back of the store where they put discounted merchandise and other things they want to get rid of. I figured the price couldn't be tooo bad, and anyway, I needed flares.
At the register, the flares would not ring up. Not in the system. They looked like very old stock, probably had been removed from the computer. Who knows. Anyway they refused to sell them to me. Tossed them to the side and told me I was holding up the line.
So goody for this guy who got his helo. Sometimes people win.
No one got fired. Management was there and unable to solve the problem. He probably authorized the cashier to do this, if not this time some previous time.
@pb5000: last time i went into walmart, there was a Crazy Black Lady™ screaming at the pharmacy tech... probably a dozen people (including an employee) watching from a distance... i walked out and got what i needed from the RiteAid next door. (cops were parked in front when i walked by again)
My mother was at Macy's looking for an immersion blender. They only carried one model and only two of them were left on the shelf. It's a KitchenAid, nice (I have one), and normally $70. She brought it to the counter and when the employee scanned it, the system reported that it wasn't in there. She called the manager who was surprised they were still on the shelf and hadn't been sent back. Apparently that store was no longer carrying them. He told the lady at the counter to charge the clearance price of another item. It rang up $2. $2 for a brand new, $60 item that my mom was specifically shopping for. How often does that happen?
@nycaviation: A lot of stores give managers some leeway with this sort of thing. I used to work at a small record store chain where we always erred on the side of good customer service when it came to returns, improper pricing, or slightly blemished merchandise, and were *encouraged* to do so.
Honestly, that tiny amount of money from that one transaction doesn't tend to matter much in the long run. The positives tend to outweigh the negatives in terms of store loyalty.
I think that specific WalMart needs to be mentioned here. That was an above and beyond decision.