Supermarkets are destroying the traditional British High Street by undercutting prices till smaller local shops go bankrupt or give up. They, the supermarkets, offer choice and prices that no small retailer can match. So ‘they’ continue to expand and the small shops disappear.
But not only are they depriving the local communities of the choice of where they can shop they are also deliberately ripping off the very people who keep them in business. It’s illegal but they don’t care!
This is how they do it. They advertise promotions at an offer price on the shelves and then charge the full price at the tills. Here’s an example of how I got ripped-off by Asda the British arm of Wallmart. I took advantage of an Asda promotion that offered three yoghurts for £2 (approx $4 US) when I got to the till they charged me the full 37p (approx 70c US) each.
When I complained I was treated with disdain by the assistant possibly because the total overcharge was ‘only’ 22p (approx 40c US). Quite a small amount but hey, try taking out 22p worth of goods without paying and see what happens! At very least you’d be branded a thief by the supermarket but more likely you would get a criminal record because the supermarket wants to make an example of you to deter other miscreants.
When I got home I found a previous till receipt and realised I had been overcharged before. I decided to run an experiment. After all I had alerted them to the error now and a responsible retailer would make sure the error was put right. Yeah, OK, right!
As well as the bad attitude of the staff member it took fifteen minutes to sort out the refund. First of all I reported it to the assistant at the checkout. He was very polite, apologised and sent me to ‘customer services’.
The woman (with the attitude) at the customer services counter looked at my receipt and went to the yoghurt shelf to check that I was telling the truth. When she got back she confirmed my honesty and expressed a reluctant apology. Then I had to endure a painfully bureaucratic process of refunding the Asda theft of 22p. I even had to sign for my money!
Now if this was genuine mistake that was immediately rectified, OK – human error and all that, but nothing was changed. I continued to buy the same yoghurts right up till the day I left the UK and I was mugged by Asda every time.
The Asda Shelf Price
Now Get Ripped-Off At The Till
Oh by the way, this case at Asda is not rare. So why aren’t Asda and other supermarket chains prosecuted by Trading Standards or the Police for this illegal activity? Here are some interesting links with further interesting evidence.
We Estimate That Tesco Steals £7.8 Million A Week From It’s Customers
UK supermarket rip-off? – ThisIsMoney.co.uk
The half-price wine ‘rip-off’- ThisIsMoney.co.uk
Supermarket rip-off culture must end – The Independent
Exposed: the tricks supermarkets use to make rip-offs look like bargains – Mail Online
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Supermarkets are dishonest. The practice you describe is widespread and too common to be incompetence.
Are Tesco incompetent or dishonest? At their Walsgrave store today I purchased their £9 meal deal only to find that they charged me 19.99. When I returned to the store their defence was the offer had ended. Never the less they continued to display on the usual display as if it was a special offer. The store managers were that she was unaware the offer had ended. The refunded my money. I then went to their Arena store and guess what they were still displaying the £9 offer so I attempted to make another purchase. Once again Tesco wanted to charge the non offer price only this time as their display was clearly offering the goods at £9 I stuck to my guns and paid £9
Next stop their website which is clearly displaying the offer but if you bore down far enough you can eventually find an indication that their offer ends on 1.2.10.
Their customer services are a waste of time. They say that individual stores don’t control the prices and there may have been a mistake at the centre. How many people across the country who did not check their bill are £10 down and didn’t notice the rip off. I suppose Tesco have a plan to use this windfall in an appropriate manner LOL. Of course their wonderful clubcard system could identify all the club card customer who have been disadvantaged by their incompetence and arrange an unsolicited refund. But don’t hold your breath.
Thanks Michael,
The evidence does seem to support your suggestion. If this isn’t the case why are some of the staff so shitty about it being reported? I’ll never understand why SOME working class people are willing to back up scamming employers. They get lousy pay and conditions but instead of helping customers get a fair deal they become obstructive and defend the bosses. Crazy!
I have lost count of the times I have selected an item from the shelf because the price has been “rolled back” only to find that I have been charged a higher price at the point of sale. I always point the discrepancy out to the checkout personnel and I am then treated with the usual disdain from asda staff. After an unneccessarily drawn out process I am charged the shelf price. I have never had such an error charged in my favour and considering the fact that this has happened to me at least twenty times, leads me to suspect that this is a scam.I would be very willing to contribute any help I can to stop these scammers getting away with this!
Absolutely let’s keep the pressure up. I got a reply to my original post by email from Asda with an apology but since I’ve been back to UK I have had frequent overcharges at the till so nothing has changed. A neighbour of mine took back some out-of-date items got the items replaced and her money back.The real problem here, I believe, is that large companies like Asda deliberately run understaffed but require the same amount of work done. Overworked staff will always make mistakes but the overpaid managers who should be checking that everything is done properly don’t. Unfortunately it is always the lowest grades that take shit from angry customers and lazy overbearing management. (I generalise here because some managers do do their jobs properly and are supportive of their charges.)
Over the last 4 weeks, I have had to check my Asda till receipt only to find that the items either marked on the product or on the shelf, IS NOT the price going through the till. Twice I was offered the difference back and a £2 giftcard…..today I was told it was not their policy to give a £2 giftcard when someone had just forgotten to remove the lower price sign..when in actual fact the product had returned to normal price. Not interested in conflict as had to get kids for lunch…but a long hefty email to head office when I got in…lets see what the reply is.
It’s about time things like this were brought to people’s attention – I can’t begin to imagine how many times this may have happened to me and I haven’t noticed (given that my average weekly shop is between £70 – £100). I’ve started using Morrisons instead now – they may not have the same wide choice of goods offered by Asda & Tesco but they’re definitely cheaper and as far as I know haven’t robbed me yet LOL