Don’t get out of the United States much do you?
In the Middle East, the de facto rule about prices is that posted prices are fixed in stone, while prices you have to ask about are open to haggling (or even haggling-encouraged, in many cases; that is, they’re adjusted upwards to compensate for haggling). I suspect the farmer’s market world may be similar. (Glad Sofaspud backed me up here–I don’t actually shop at farmer’s markets much.)
In California, retail stores are required to sell you an item at the labeled price. So if that fish-splooge (whatever that is) doesn’t have a tag of its own denoting that it’s $67.88, and all indications are that it costs $9.99, the store must sell it to you for $9.99. I don’t know where you live or how it works there, but here, the county Weights and Measures department conducts sting operations for this on request. I got scammed* this way for a pack of PDA styluses at an office store recently; the moment the words “California law” came out of my mouth, the manager was suddenly at the register fixing the problem. I called Weights and Measures when I got home and they sent a secret shopper there, who was able to duplicate the problem and give them an official warning. AIUI, they now have to display what amounts to a “We Rip People Off” sign for a certain period and are required to fix all of their price problems during that time, after which Weights and Measures will sue them if they’re still misrepresenting problems.
- I doubt it was actually a scam–having worked in retail, I’m sure someone just forgot to update the tag after the price in the system got changed. The effect is the same, though.
I dunno, does 68 countries count? Note that I said I’m willing to haggle when that particular country’s society deems it necessary. The fortunate thing is that in my experience, one half off is the price that one should pay.
But wouldn’t it be debatable whether it’s the “labeled price”? Sometimes it’s pretty obvious the store’s own employee put the stuff in that spot on the shelf, but I don’t think you could prove it unless you actually saw him do it.
Well they aren’t advertising it very well, and it’s certainly not universally enforced, because I’ve seen many, many stores where it’s pretty hit & miss whether the price tag on the shelf is correct. And I have never had a cashier offer to sell an item to me at the “tag” price when I have complained that the tag on the shelf directly under the item displays a different price than the computer. In every single case, the cashier has simply said, “That’s the wrong tag”. (And when you think about it, if they did do so, it would be pretty easy for customers to scam them by moving items around on the shelf, so I don’t see how it would even be practicable.
But if there is a price tag for that particular item, and not just a tag on the shelf that’s in the wrong place, they usually will sell it at the “tag” price.
I think you are correct. The OP of the 9.99 item indicated it was on the incorrect shelf and if they had read the description of the 9.99 item, it would not have been the $67 thing he picked up. I am pretty sure in CA they must give you the advertised price but aren’t responsible for customers moving the inventory around and other customers not reading the description off the tag before they bring it to the register.
I usually see this when the $67.88 fish splooge is on the same shelf as the $9.99 beef splooge. If there are far more jars of fish splooge than beef splooge, they might “spill over” on the shelf to the beef splooge area, and thus be over the tag for it. The jars move, the tags stay put.
I see this most often in the produce aisle.
Trust me, you really don’t want to know. But you’ll only notice the taste when it’s not there. Sort of like salt.
Cashiers have never offered to sell the item to you at the correct price because they’re (apparently) trained to violate state law until you hold their (well, their managers’) feet to the fire about it. Trying to get a $67 fish whatever for $10 may be a little absurd if it was really just set down by a customer, but the next time the tag price doesn’t jibe with the price in the computer, don’t walk an inch from the computer until it’s corrected, and remind the cashier and any manager who comes along that you’re aware of the law and willing to call Weights & Measures. It’s the managers’ duty to make sure that the price tags are all accurate, and I, having worked for lazy managers, am not about to enable them. As for $67 fish splooge (really, WTF is that? seriously!), well, most grocery stores have descriptive language on their price tags to ensure that they’re not held liable for what the customers do with the items after they’ve drank everything in the Cold & Cough section.
Its not quite as carved in stone as you make it sound, it has to be marked on the item or the shelf tag would have to clearly state fish-splooge $9.99. The fact that it was sitting on a shelf marked $9.99 is not good enough. This is why you don’t get $50 stuff for a dollar by claiming you found it in the dollar bin. The simplistic way you stated it would in theory allow people to go wandering into the store and posting their own signs to demand discounted items or work in pairs loading up discount shelves with other product to claim this law and get discount. The state of CA is not in the business of enabling fraud. In your scenario, major chains often do not have independent control over their SKU’s and UPC bindings, requiring intervention at the corp office to make corrections. With dozens if not hundreds of new items a day going into those databases there are bound ot be errors especially when prices get changed for just as many items.
IME as someone who worked in such a heavy inventory data handling environment, corporate probably bumped the price because the latest purchases of that item were more expensive and retail needed to reflect it. The store had not adjusted the shelf tag to match. This is the normal MO for this type of error. It might feel good to play victim, but the store was just as much the victim as you here.
Drach, who has wandedered a warehouse changing 700 item tags on too many occasions.
Who’s playing victim? The store has a responsibility to advertise the correct prices. Period. When their managers and employees can’t keep up with that, it’s time to find new managers and employees. Period.
Considering how many people on this board are both perverts and nature documentary fans, I’d’ve thought it wouldn’t need defining, but some people call it “milt.” It’s used in Russian cooking, which shouldn’t be surprising, I suppose.
splooge = sperm
I assume he was just making up some imaginary product for grins, at least I hope so… 
:eek: :eek: :eek:
Well, it means the male sturgeons don’t die in vain.
You are operating under the mistaken assumption that many large businesses:
A: Give a shit
B: hire sufficent help
C: Hi(re) Opal!
D: Actually warn stores that changes like this are coming before they happen.
I have seen more than once where notifications for label updates didn’t show till 20 min before the doors open when the sale ads had been distributed 2 days before. You felt that cashiers are trained to break the law…no they are trained to trust their computers unless someone protests. No way in hell someone is going to memorize the 150,000+ SKU’s in a typical big box retail. Many of these prices vary from week to week and keeping tabs on them is not the cashiers responsibility.
I posted this because you referred to it as being scammed, when what you saw was an one of the most common types of errors for the very reason I stated.
I assume none of those things. The fact that many/most large businesses don’t take their obligation to the customer seriously is an indictment of corporate culture, not evidence that the obligation doesn’t exist.
I was directly responding to someone’s story about cashiers who insist that the computer is right, even after the customer protests. There are two possible causes for that: either (a) the cashier has been trained to deny the customer’s claim instead of calling for a manager to fix it, which is in violation of the law (here, at least); or (b) the cashier is not acting according to his/her training. Both are indicative of larger problems in management.
What does that have to do with anything?
The fact that it’s an error and not a malicious scheme doesn’t mean the customer isn’t getting ripped off.