I’ve had this happen several times. Sometimes things just get marked down further and the signage doesn’t get changed. I bought a bunch of stuff in the dollar section of Target that was marked 30% off, turns out it was 75% off. So I went back and got more hair clips for a quarter each. It didn’t even cross my mind to feel bad about it.
I have greater faith in Wal Marts computer system (they are the technical leader in this space) than I do in their employees (they pay the least punt possible and it often shows).
You got the right price.
I don’t think it’s stealing in any sense, based on one assumption. If the store would require you to pay the price that rings up on the register rather than the one marked on the shelves or the item then they should bear the responsibility of that system failing. Some stores might allow payment based on a marked price instead of the programmed price, but if they don’t, their rule is that you pay the price that rings up at the register, and in no way have you done anything illegal, immoral, or unethical.
Of course it’s not stealing. Whatever the scanner says the price is, that’s the price. I bought a car battery at Wal-Mart several years ago and the price came up something like $11.00. I got a great discount on a car battery. If that was an incorrect price it isn’t my job to fix their mistake.
That happened to me at the Disney Store a few years ago and we didn’t notice until we got to the tube that the total was wrong. Tempting as it was to just keep going, it was one of my kids who noticed and I didn’t really have much of a choice but to set a good example and go back to the store and show them the error. Theyweren’t even appreciative of our honesty and we all felt like we should have just kept going.
No.
I did something similar once - while out at a pub with friends, I went to a supermarket to grab something to eat and noticed some long-life lightbulbs on sale for 4p each. They were usually about 25 quid each at the time. So I bought almost all of them (left some for other people who just might need a lightbulb) and everyone I was with at the pub that day went home with a couple of lightbulbs, while I still have a neverending stock of them.
The staff knew how much it was ringing up for, knew they weren’t going to get in trouble for it, and frankly I’m not going to lose sleep over a dint in JS Sainsbury’s billion pound profits due to their own error.
This happened to me recently in a video game. Games are far less lenient about people abusing bugs; they are called exploits if they are committed knowingly and for gain, and can/will earn you a permanent ban.
So when I purchased an upgrade character slot and instead got ‘3’, my first thought was ‘Well, it doesn’t really say that the price is for a single slot, maybe it IS for 3’, and thought about getting more. But held off, just in case.
Sure enough, a couple weeks later it was noticed that people were getting 2 or 3 slots instead of one, but not everyone, so it obviously wasn’t intentional.
The company owned up, fixed the problem, and said “Enjoy your free slots!”. And that’s how it should be.