I bought a Black & Decker toaster oven from Target today. I got it out of the box at home and,
A. It’s been used…burnt food on it.
B. It’s filthy, as if it had been sitting uncovered in a dusty warehouse for a long time.
C. The plastic legs are broken.
It’s unbelievable to me that someone could examine it, put it back in the box and put it out for sale as new. If I hadn’t had such a hard time getting it and it’s styrofoam packing to fit back into the box for return tomorrow, I would get it back out and post pictures.
When I worked retail, we got a talking to one day from the boss, who’d observed that sometimes the cashier didn’t always open the box and visually inspect the returned item to make sure it was in order. A Melbourne branch of our store had been burned by this: someone returned a PC in a box, except later the box was opened and found to contain rocks. It’s completely plausible that someone brought the toaster oven in and said “I bought this this morning, but when I got home I found my husband had bought one too - can I return it? Here’s the receipt.” and the return has been processed and stock returned to the shelf without anyone checking - meanwhile, the customer has kept the new toaster oven, put their old broken one in the box, and scored themselves a full refund.
TL;DR version: scammy return, careless cashier, no one looked in the box to make sure the customer had returned the right item. It happens, and shouldn’t, but does.
this used to happen a lot at Best Buy, especially with some computer peripherals. people would buy a fairly high-end video card, get home and find some dusty old used one. someone probably bought the new card, then “returned” it with their old one in the box.
I bought a Toyota, new, with an odometer reading of 210 miles. That was the distance from the other dealership the car came from, and I understood that. However, they just used the trip odometer A reading. The trip odometer B reading was higher, and the regular odometer was higher than that. Of course, I didn’t notice this for a couple of days. Turns out it didn’t matter, as the car now has nearly 100k miles on it and warranty work was never needed. The car had never been sold before, so it was technically new. Maybe the other dealership had been running errands in it or something- the miles were higher than one would expect from just test drives. Still sucks, though. It is something to be watched for if one is considering buying a car.
It was several decades ago, but we had a problem like this with some furniture.
We bought a stereo cabinet and a couple of chairs from Macy’s. When they were delivered, we noticed the chair had some loose stitching and the corners of the cabinet were off kilter. The delivery guys said we had to contact the store to authorize a pickup and/or exchange.
Many weeks later they came back to exchange the cabinet, but not the chair. This time the cabinet had white paint drips on it. We contacted the store again.
Many, many weeks went by and finally they came to exchange the cabinet again. It was the original cabinet.
This had been bought on store credit and we told them we now just wanted to return both items and that we would not be paying for them. Eventually they came back for the cabinet, but still no word on the chair.
Finally, a full year had gone by, and we were moving to a new place. We called the store and told them, look, we have not and do not intend to pay for this chair. We are moving a week from today and are leaving it behind. If you want it, come get it.
Fortunately this was not an expensive lesson; we never bought furniture from a department store again.
I had an almost incident like this. A certain furniture rental company had a showroom full of pre-rented furniture that they were now selling cheap. I went to buy a sofa. The showroom floor was packed solid with sofas, all looking alike. Of course, being used, they are all being sold “as is”.
So I walked around, looking for the very best one I could find, with no rips, cigarette burns, seams falling apart, etc. The clerk even offered me (and I hadn’t asked) the option to collect the best pieces I could find from any sofas there. So I found a good frame and a bunch of perfectly good looking pillows and assembled them all into one sofa.
Of course, being sold “as is”, it ought to go without saying that they should deliver the very same sofa that I chose. I secretly marked the sofa by putting a little “X” in an inconspicuous spot on each piece. Then the clerk put a tag on the sofa with my name on it.
Fast forward a few days: The delivery guy delivers a sofa. I immediately looked for my little secret “X” marks. Need I say that they weren’t there? They delivered a different sofa.
My response: I took the time right then to inspect every piece of that sofa in detail for any blemishes, while the delivery guy chafed that he had more deliveries to do and a tight schedule to keep.
I found the sofa to be in excellent condition, so I accepted it, and afterward, never had occasion to regret it.
No horror story, but I bought a GPS-type thing from an Amazon third party retailer new, but it came with documentation suggesting it was refurbished. I got it returned no problem, although thought it odd that they just assumed it was a return and not try to offer a partial refund.
Some appliance companies do counsel you to inspect it before accepting delivery, or return it if the packaging itself is damaged.
It is not in Target’s interest or want, or especially the employee’s , to hassle the OP or accuse them of lying. And I imagine they’ve seen much worse merchandise, or obvious scamming that might not be worth addressing.
When I worked at Wal-mart, folks would come in with their Vizio or whatever boxes; with TV’s inside that were clearly old or had been bashed with a baseball bat. Wal-mart has a very generous return policy, so they got their money back (or a new TV - win win!). Afterwards, the Store Manager required us to open every TV, show it to the customer, and write the serial number on the receipt. Problem solved!
In Russia, I was in a line buying some batteries. And they were opening *everything * to show to the customers. Small TV’s, food processors, electric teapots. And here, there’s a very harsh “return policy” to begin with.
I bought an Atari Flashback 2.1 console a few years ago directly from Amazon (not a third party seller) because I didn’t want to receive a used console sold as new. According to a thread that I viewed later on at Atari Age, the console had the markings of a counterfeit.
I once bought a Playtex bra from Walmart, the kind that comes in a box. When I got home and opened it, someone had replaced it with a dirty, ratty old bra. :eek: Alien underboob grime!
I returned it to Walmart where the service desk associate glared at me as if it was my cruddy bra.
Just before Christmas I ordered a smart phone from Amazon which was described as “Refurbished-like new.” When I tried to activate it, it was still active on someone else’s account. The call center rep said “This is bad. This is very bad. Where did you get this phone?” I said “Don’t worry, I’m returning it to Amazon.”
The seller had had near-perfect ratings. When I went to leave a review I found out why. They apparently resell thousands of random things, and most of their reviews were glowing, interspersed with the occasional “WTF!! My thing that I bought is counterfeit/broken/whatever!”
I wound up buying a new phone that was actually new, for less than the refund on the “new” one.
As I was lying in bed this morning I happened to think how embarrassing it would have been if I had purchased the toaster oven as a gift for someone. The recipient would have assumed that I took my own used one and “re-gifted” it to them.
I took the TO back this afternoon. Thumbs up to the Target staff. The girl that I spoke to first was as horrified as I was and no trace of suspicion that I was the one scamming. She called the manager and another employee. The other employee immediately went to get me a replacement. The manager, the first girl and I then examined the one I got yesterday. The door had been taped shut (like the new one) and I did not remove that tape or open it yesterday. It was obvious that this oven had been used extensively. The girl I spoke to first then noticed that the first oven wasn’t even the same brand as the box! I hadn’t noticed. That explains why I had so much trouble getting the oven and the styrofoam packing to fit back in the box.
What obviously (to me, anyway) happened was somebody’s toaster oven quit working, they went to Target and bought another, put the old one in the B&D box and returned it to Target.
Yup noticed this policy too outside the US, even plugging stuff in before you pay or screwing in lightbulbs. Makes sense as it protects the store and the consumer.
When you make a return you have to give your name, checked against an id. I recall sometimes having to give my address but probably only when not returning something purchased with a credit card.
I wonder if they will make an effort to find the person who did the scan return.
Just happened to me recently with a baby carseat. Went with my son to target, picked out the carseat and picked up the only boxed version on the floor. I noted that it looked like it had been opened before, but he assured me that couldn’t be the case because it clearly states on the box that carseats can’t be returned.
So we go out to the parking lot and try to install it in my truck, but the instruction booklet is missing. 30 minutes later we decide something is really wrong and we can’t make it right and take it back inside the store. Son goes off to find another while I am in the “take it back” line. Clerk is super nice about it and towards the end of the process son comes back with another carseat. Clerk does an exchange. Son tells me and the clerk that he looked at the display of the first one we purchased and the one we bought was missing an essential component. Bleh, hope the one we returned did not end up on the floor again.
Best Buy. We bought a 50 inch Sharp Television , box seemed like it had the original seal. Took it home, and set it up and it worked terribly. Bad picture, no sound…As we were preparing to return it, my husband and I realized that the TV did not have the customary eight miles of plastic sheeting covering everything and that the remote had already had the batteries installed. Duh, on both our parts. Bright side is, when we returned it,they had no other Sharps in that size, so we were ‘forced’ to take a 60 inch samsung for the price of the 50 inch Sharp.
