Have any of you ever been ripped of by the barcode scanners in a shop?

Xterminator · 14-01-2002 01:05PM #1

Hi,

Just thought I'd share my experience with Pennys on Henry St with you.

I went in to buy some throwovers for the couch on Christmas Eve.
Town was crazy busy, and Pennys had there fair share of customers, and q's.

I bought some throw-overs, all marked £5.
I queued at the till for a while and got served, but when the items were scanned in, I was charged £6 for each item.

I know its not a lot of money, but it annoyed me. I said to the girl on the till, the tag says £5.
She said it was'a mistake' .
There was a big q, and besides she was only doing her job.

So i walked over to Customer services, and queued. When it was my turn the girl said to me, "We cant deal with that problem here. Youll have to talk to a manager. But there all busy. Go over to that till over there, and see the manager in there, ask her etc."
I asked what was there policy when a customer was charged a higher price, and she replied 'i dunno'.

Customer Services desk? What service.

So I went over to speak to the manager. There were at least 2 other people waiting to see the manager. But the manager was taking money from the tils, and was couting and balancing the till etc. So i stood there for nearly 10 mins, and the manager had moved to the next till and did that 1, avoiding me and the other customers who were waiting.

Now it was christmas eve and i was busy, so for the sake of £3 I walked out, and resolved never to return again.

But I have to say those scanning machines can have any price on them, and there should be a fair way of dealing with errors or descrepencies straight away, in every shop.

Anyone else ever have a similar experience? Is this common?

X

jes · 14-01-2002 06:19PM

i always wanted to get a barcode tattoo on my arm, then go into supermarkets and shops and scan it in to see what i would come up as and also how much i would cost.

Littletinyman · 14-01-2002 07:20PM

Hey remember Barcode Battlers?

DeadBankClerk · 14-01-2002 07:56PM

Raskolnikov · 14-01-2002 08:31PM

To tell the truth i never look at the damn things when i am buying stuff, maybe it's time we should!

Barcode Battlers? I never owned one, were they any good?

MarcusGarvey · 14-01-2002 08:31PM

Originally posted by jes
i always wanted to get a barcode tattoo on my arm, then go into supermarkets and shops and scan it in to see what i would come up as and also how much i would cost.

Theres different standards for barcodes so try and make sure you get a universal one. I also thought about the barcode tat but its becoming so common now.

I may get a tat of my name and birthdate in the form of a binary ring
111000100010101010101010010011111100 etc

(note to ubergeeks: I know its not a well formed binary sequence )

smoke.me.a.kipper · 14-01-2002 09:05PM

from experience of working in superquinn

, the scanners *usually* have the right price. it's the shelves that are not updated. but in sq you get the product at the lower price and get double the difference back too (or something like that)

Victor · 14-01-2002 09:27PM

It is 'typical', although to be honest most prices (where displayed) do scan right. The main problem is with staff and in particular managers failing to make sure prices on the shelves match those on the scanner data-base. Ultimately it is false advertising and you should complain loudly at the point of purchase, this usually gets a managers attention as a manager / supervisor is needed either way (to change the price or cancel the transaction). That said, I have never has any serious problems with Pennys.

Errors are much more frequent in the supermarkets, but they are generally quick to fix them. Tesco / Quinnsworth were fined several thousand pounds a few years ago for systematicly not updating prices on shelves.

Monkey · 14-01-2002 09:40PM

If something is advertised as a certain price in a shop they've got to sell it to you as far as I know. I worked in a shop once and something was mispriced and when someone tried to buy it the person at the till wouldn't sell it for the price that had been displayed. So the customer wrote a letter to whoever deal with consumer problems and the shop got in **** over it and were threatened with random checks and fines if it happened again.

Mixie · 14-01-2002 10:23PM

"Barcode Battlers? I never owned one, were they any good?"

They're okay, until the novelty wears off. Like TopTrumps... but not as 'fun'.

Victor · 14-01-2002 10:26PM

If something is advertised as a certain price in a shop they've got to sell it to you as far as I know. I worked in a shop once and something was mis-priced and when someone tried to buy it the person at the till wouldn't sell it for the price that had been displayed.

When a shopkeeper puts something on a shelf they are (in legal terms) not offering to sell that product (Imperial Pharmaceutical Society -v- Boots). It is an 'invitation to treat'. The customer initiates the offer and the shopkeeper usually accepts. Eventually the habit of shopkeepers refusing to sell mis-priced items and/or deliberately or negligently indicating terms and the joining of the EEC led to consumer legislation in the 1970s.

http://193.120.124.98/front.html
CONSUMER INFORMATION ACT, 1978
CONSUMER CREDIT ACT, 1995

So the customer wrote a letter to whoever deal with consumer problems and the shop got in **** over it and were threatened with random checks and fines if it happened again.

This was under the consumer legislation, not at contract.

Monty - the one and only · 15-01-2002 12:35AM

Keep it on topic, this not about barcode battlers

Lenny · 15-01-2002 01:33AM

OMG Victor, you sound exzactly like my business teacher!
Honest, you seem to have good knolage of your rights for not being a business teacher

Victor · 15-01-2002 03:15PM

Originally posted by OJ
OMG Victor, you sound exzactly like my business teacher! Honest, you seem to have good knolage of your rights for not being a business teacher

Thats what Law I & II get you in third year Construction Economics. Do I really sound that sad?

seamus · 15-01-2002 03:15PM

Having been a price controller for superquinn (wooo!!:D) I know ALL about this stuff

......
smak said it right - it's not the scanner that's wrong, rather the price on the shelf/tag. It all works this way:

There is a database of all products somewhere in the shop (usually in the cash office). When a barcode is scanned/entered the ickle register computer queries the db and returns the price. So you would think that when you change a product's price it's easy to just print off a new label and go down and replace it. NOt quite. Every Monday, the prices are reviewed/changed in Head Office and automatically put into each shop's db, courtesy of a 1Mb leased line.

That means that the poor price controllers must arrive in on Mondays half an hour before the shop opens, and put up the shelf labels for every product that changed. Oh did I mention that on a typical Monday, there are about 3000 price changes? Given that there are 18-20 thousand products that may or may not be on the shelves (but are in the db) I think they can be forgiven for missing 1 or 2. As well as that, all labels are double-checked(in our shop they were anyway) so it was quite rare to find a wrong label. Maybe 2 per month in our shop.

Just try keep this in mind next time you see a wrong priced label

(but still get it for free, or cheap of course)

Victor · 15-01-2002 03:32PM

Originally posted by seamus
That means that the poor price controllers must arrive in on Mondays half an hour before the shop opens, and put up the shelf labels for every product that changed. Oh did I mention that on a typical Monday, there are about 3000 price changes? Given that there are 18-20 thousand products that may or may not be on the shelves (but are in the db) I think they can be forgiven for missing 1 or 2. As well as that, all labels are double-checked(in our shop they were anyway) so it was quite rare to find a wrong label. Maybe 2 per month in our shop.

a) Then it's a bit stupid to change 3,000 prices a week. Stupid for senior management to impose it and middle management to accept it.
b) I doubt many stores carry more that 5,000 products (Lidl and Aldi have been accussed of carrying as low as 1,200-1,500).
c) Experience is that many more that "1 or 2" in "18-20 thousand" are wrong. In O'Briens today (with as few as 100 products), they still couldn't sort out prices.

Originally posted by seamus
Just try keep this in mind next time you see a wrong priced label (but still get it for free, or cheap of course)

Ah, so it's a conspiracy for staff / relatives / ex-staff to get free food then?

seamus · 15-01-2002 04:03PM

Experience is that many more that "1 or 2" in "18-20 thousand" are wrong. In O'Briens today (with as few as 100 products), they still couldn't sort out prices.

Ah, but I'm only talking from my own experience really. It all went even harder for us, when they had that whole 'wrong price' scandal in Tesco that time :rolleyes: damn moaning oul ones

Ah, so it's a conspiracy for staff / relatives / ex-staff to get free food then?

No, sq give it to you for free if the price on the shelf is wrong. So, if you want a better chance of getting some free stuff, go in early on a Monday and mark down all the prices on the shelves of everything you bought (if you're a cheap bastard/student)

WhiteWashMan · 15-01-2002 04:20PM

Originally posted by Monty - the one and only
Keep it on topic, this not about barcode battlers

my barcodes kung fu is better than your barcodes kung fu.

'take it micro barcode! mwuahahahahahaha!'

BigMac · 18-01-2002 10:51AM

Being an expert on this subject, it sounds to me that you are all talking rubbish I' afraid.

I know it all.

Pablo · 18-01-2002 03:31PM

i better set ye all straight.

if an item is mispriced , a retailer isn't obliged to sell it at the lower price. If s/he refuses to sell it , they must take off the product from the shop for 24 hours and reprice the item. Then they can introduce it at the higher one the next day.

As you can guess it is normally in the retailers interst to keep the customer happy.

Victor · 19-01-2002 12:19AM

Originally posted by Pablo
if an item is mispriced , a retailer isn't obliged to sell it at the lower price. If s/he refuses to sell it , they must take off the product from the shop for 24 hours and reprice the item. Then they can introduce it at the higher one the next day.

Where does it say this?

Makaveli · 19-01-2002 11:37AM

In the shop i work in (spar), if something is priced differently to the price in the db we have to sell to the customer at the price on the tag.

leeroybrown · 19-01-2002 03:07PM

Afaik, If a shop has an item for sale marked at a certain price they must then sell it to the consumer for the marked price. As for barcodes ripping people off, prices are wrong from time to time and the difference is usually neglegible. Most of the time bar codes are perfectly correct and save us shoppers a lot of time at the tills.

smoke.me.a.kipper · 19-01-2002 10:14PM

Originally posted by seamus
Having been a price controller for superquinn

hehe. it is a hard job alright. seen them all day scanning everything in the shop to see if the label is right. even herder with the euro and the change over and all. im glad i just pack the juices!!

sceptre · 20-01-2002 05:55PM

Originally posted by leeroybrown
Afaik, If a shop has an item for sale marked at a certain price they must then sell it to the consumer for the marked price.

Nope. In practice, they often will for goodwill but they don't have to (who quoted the Boots case?).

I think the major supermarkets who give you the damn thing for nothing are playing it correctly - compensation for inconvenience of going over to customer desk and all that (though obviously the items are small value and it's worth it to them - shop that sells fur coats or DVD recorders - forget it).

I see Dixons in Limerick have solved this problem - they forget to let you know how much half the stuff in the shop costs by not putting prices on some of it and putting half the PC stuff on the shelf nowhere near the relevant price tag. Plonkers.

Clintons Cat · 21-01-2002 12:21AM

if you retained your receipt,send a copy to their head office a long with a letter saying how you and your family have shopped there for years and how disappointed you are that their recent slide in customer service and attention to detail was atypical of the high standards of care you associate with their stores.
Explain politely why you were unable to bring the matter to the attention of the manager but that you had raised the issue twice firstly with the cashier at point of sale and with customer services.
Ask if they would be kind enough to take the time to reciprocate you for the price of the items and the inconvienience of having to to take this unusual method of seeking redress.
Finally ask for a written assurance that they will investigate the matter thouroghly to ensure it doesnt inconvienience your shopping experience with their chain in the future.

It should be good for a couple of vouchers.

Pablo · 26-01-2002 11:23AM

Originally posted by Victor

Where does it say this?

from what i've been told on a retail course. :rolleyes:

seamus · 26-01-2002 05:03PM

Originally posted by sceptre
I think the major supermarkets who give you the damn thing for nothing are playing it correctly - compensation for inconvenience of going over to customer desk and all that (though obviously the items are small value and it's worth it to them - shop that sells fur coats or DVD recorders - forget it).

I see Dixons in Limerick have solved this problem - they forget to let you know how much half the stuff in the shop costs by not putting prices on some of it and putting half the PC stuff on the shelf nowhere near the relevant price tag. Plonkers.

Just to clear up a few things....The majority of shops which use barcode scanners are part of EAN which is an organisation which specifies a code of practice for retailers using a barcode scanning system. The next few points are either part of their code of practice, which all involved retailers must follow or face fines, or they may be actual law - we were never really told.

All products which do not have the price clearly displayed on the packaging must have the price clearly displayed on the shelf edge as close as possible to the product
Products which are marked at one price on the shelf edge/packaging but which scan on the till at another, must be sold at the price on the till, or not at all.(I'm fairly sure that this is law)
Prices of a product may not be raised during trading hours, but they may be lowered. In the case of a 24-hour shop, prices may only increase between 12am - 8am, and the new prices must be displayed before they come into effect.(not sure about the times, but thats the gist of it)

Check out the website above if you're interested, it might clear up some things.

Victor · 27-01-2002 10:27AM

Originally posted by Pablo
from what i've been told on a retail course. :rolleyes:

http://www.ean.ie/pages/Literature/index.html seems to be in a very different spirit. Please not my new signature.

Have any of you ever been ripped of by the barcode scanners in a shop?

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