Customer Service Tips
Posted: 2009-09-30. Categories: Meijer, Michigan

The entire night I have been going through pages of Michigan Retail Law, trying to figure out what in the heck I am supposed to know about how things scan in the store. I work at Meijer, and would appreciate that my name and email aren’t included in this publicly. But, I can assure you, I have a rather in depth look from both sides of the scanning debate.

My store is pretty good about it, we’re a huge store in Metro Detroit, and we are the busiest Meijer in Downriver. So, it’s pretty sure that we make a few mistakes. We’re always understaffed because we are an older store and because our profits don’t merit our staffing, which means that although we have more traffic than another store, we can’t have as many people working because that other store makes more from their advantageous clientele.

Theft Is a Huge Problem

ShoppingTherefore, we have quite a few variables to piece together. We have a higher theft rate. We have more customers than an average store, but those customers tend to be poorer than other areas, so we make less profit. We’re understaffed, and underpaid, but it’s work.

Honestly, over two years ago I started out at Meijer making $5.50 an hour. I’m making $6.50 now. When someone steals from our store, or when someone gets grumpy because they read a sign wrong, it’s personal to me, not business. Because every drop in profit we have feels like it comes right out of my pocket. Why didn’t I get that merit raise I busted my butt for all year? Because half these people are fricken’ illiterate in the store.

It’s true that we make mistakes. Like I said, I’ve worked there for over two years, and I’ve done everything from being a bagger, to running the service desk, being a cashier, pulling in carts, stocking toys, throwing out candy, auditing other sections through Systems; I’ve done it all. I would say, that 1 out of about 50 or 100 complaints about pricing is in fact our fault. This is an estimation, and I’m inclined to say that there are fewer instances than I’m guessing that is our fault.

Addressing Scanning Errors

I’ve done the scanning award quite a few times, and I’ve told people more than once they couldn’t have it because it wasn’t marked on the item. Of course, I also make sure that there wasn’t a sign or shelf tag that said something else. A very specific tag that had not only a date which was current, the same UPC, and a price. I’ve done price changes, but no scanning award, for people that made mistakes reading the sign, where it was slightly misleading- but even when I was just a lowly consumer, I wasn’t so stupid as to just assume something was one price. I read signs thoroughly, because my Pa always taught me to read the fine print.

I have to say that most of the people that come to the desk for a price adjustment and scanning award bring up old signs, wrong signs-, and sometimes, just for giggles, things that don’t even slightly resemble signs that any of our stockers would use.

I had a woman the other night insist that her apples rang up for the wrong price and she deserved the scanning award since her cashier had been faulty. I went back, grabbed the sign, said, “Yes, this is on sale. Unfortunately, you grabbed the wrong brand of apples. Which were on the other side. Which you couldn’t possibly have mistaken for these apples. I’ll make the price adjustment, since it’s only a few cents, but I’m not really supposed to, and you are not entitled to the scanning award.”

Handling Complaints

Many more people come up to the desk to rip us off. And the ones who complain to our AG about the “worst things we’ve done” are almost always those people, because the honest people that just made a mistake reading a sign, or bring up the sign that show that we made a mistake- we always honor it. I have never found an honest to goodness UPC error that we did not correct.

Then you have to consider another factor of this law. We’ve had half of the Metro area working at this store- or someone in their family. We’ve had price guns stolen, and we’ve had a few idiots work for us. We’ve actually caught people coming through and marking things the wrong price over where the correct price. We’ve caught people carefully peeling up stickers from other items and gluing them faultlessly on something else. Sorry, but it’s unrealistic that we’re going to give someone a $15.00 (retail) bag of dog food for 90 cents. But we have people that will argue it.

Managers Attempt to Satisfy Customers Needs

On the other hand- our managers often say that they will gladly give that customer the lowest retail price on the object- what the store pays for it- so that we make no profit and they leave happy. That’s really the best we can do.

I’m hoping that the new provisions to the laws pass in Michigan. I think it’s high time that people begin looking a little closer at shelf tags, UPCs, and what an item is actually marked. In my tenure, it is exceedingly unlikely for any of us to find people come to us with scanning errors that are just complete errors in our system. Either they read the sign wrong, read the wrong sign, looked at the wrong shelf tag, or were pasting little tags on the wrong item to their own whim.

We try to deal with this as best we can. Service is the hardest section to work for, because every customer that comes through expects us to memorize the entire store and know the price of all 250,000 items or so that we carry in the store at any given time.

Then you have to add in the given variables of thieves, daily switcheroos, and con-artists that come through on a more than regular basis. Every person that I have waited on or have heard about being waited on that had a genuine problem with pricing has brought up an item with at the most a five dollar difference between the price it came up at and the price it should be. And we always honor it. I’ve never had someone come up with a current, correct sign and a marked item that rang up for 100 dollars more than it was marked, that’s just not realistic.

Retail Bandit Reader Tips

Here are a few tips for the people on Retail Bandit, and a few scenarios from someone that has watched almost every con play out, and been conned by almost every con once. One, you have to prove the error. It is on your shoulders to do that. Just because a sign is misleading doesn’t mean we have to honor it. If the UPC is different, if it is expired- we do not have to honor it. If the sticker on it says $2.00 and it’s an X-box, we do not have to honor it.

Want to know why? Because it will work out like this- you will file a complaint, or you will file a law suit. If you file a law suit, you have to bear the burden of proving we were wrong. Then, in the very slim chance that you win, we pay for what? Your lawyer up to, I believe $300 or $500, and the difference in the price.

We do not pay for emotional suffering or the incredible loss of time in your life. In most cases, we’ll settle out of court for less IF someone has that much resolve- which 1 out of 10,000 won’t, or the Judge will ask how you were so stupid as to think you would get an X-Box for $2.00.

Don’t come in without the item, a week into your 30-days, and demand the price adjustment. First off, that sign is probably gone. Second, you don’t have a marked item with you. Just last week I had a guy come in and say that his beer rang up for $7.00 and the sign in the back said $5.00. Sure, that’s not a big deal, right?

Well, to begin… it’s against Michigan law to change prices on liquor. He didn’t bring his beer back in so I could verify how much it was supposed to ring at, or call back to see what brand it was so that someone in grocery could check for a sign. He just expected me to jump to attention for him. Sorry, I’m a human too. And I’m paid by the hour.

You can piss and moan at me as long as you like, as long as you don’t touch me, because I get paid all the same. Actually, I’d be more than happy to have helped him. Help me, help you, and I’ll change the price for our mistake or make exceptions for likely cases of your mistake.

Getting More Flies With Honey

It’s usually all in the way people treat me. If you ask me nicely, I’ll do almost anything for you, I’ll bend over backwards trying to get someone somewhere with the authority to authorize it. But, even if you are right, and you come to me with an attitude, I’m going to painstakingly draw out the proceedure, leisurely walking through the store in search for the object, making sure to call every department and manager possible before giving you the adjustment.

Just like the guy I had tonight. I was called over to a lane to give an override to one of my cashiers so that they could make a price adjustment. The item was marked $3.99. But was ringing up $39.99. Which means someone misplaced a decimal.

However, where he found the few things there was a huge sign. Because that item was on sale this week for $39.99, right above where he got them. He had to have seen that sign. There was no way to miss that near square foot of bright yellow paper. And the manager who came up said she would be more than glad to give it to him for $28.00, which was the lowest value. That guy just got $10.00 off a sales price for an item, but he wasn’t content. Come on.

Gentle Reminder

Again though, here is a reminder. Read the sign completely. It is not our job to read it to you. The sales paper and the sales signs may have slight differences in them. Usually not differences in what is on sale, but differences in the limits of what varieties or how many you may buy.

If the sign doesn’t list the varieties limited, we’ll almost always give them to you for sale price. If the sign doesn’t list a limit of 2 that’s in the paper, too bad. There’s a limit anyways. If the sign doesn’t have the same UPC, the same size, or the same brand, we do not have to give it to you, regardless of the placing of the sign. People move items, people move signs. We can’t be everywhere at once.

Just because something is marked does not mean we have to give it to you. If it is within reason we doubtlessly will, we do want your business and are glad for small sacrifices to keep you. If it’s not within reason, then you’re insane for thinking we’ll give it to you. Sorry. Perhaps the core of this is that I’m saying that maybe you should realize that a lot of your fellow shoppers are the reason your pleas for justice are met with suspicion. If we didn’t have 100 other people screwing us for every honest person, we wouldn’t question your ability to read a sign.

Last Thoughts

Also, in concern to one, Chuck with a complaint on our return policy- we always take returns with reciepts. If however you make more than three returns without a reciept, it’s obvious we’re not going to take it. We do not have to take returns without reciepts, period, and often do one or two just to be courteous. But there is a point where you move over into the suspicious category if you’re making a bunch of returns without one.

In regards to the scanning award, I was wrong in the suit department. You can get lawyer’s fees, up to $300 paid, and either damages, or $250 for the lawsuit, whichever comes first. Again, a drop in the bucket for Meijer if 1000 people were to sue them tomorrow night.

Name withheld by request

8 Comments to "Customer Service Tips"

  1. Paul says:

    Michigan’s minimum wage is $7.40 an hour. If you are making $6.50 an hour, it sounds like Meijer is breaking employment laws as well.

  2. Andria says:

    I agree with you 100% about customers, and some of the customers think that all they have to do is be rude. And they get their way, “the customer is always right,” is a bunch of B.S. They are not always right, they are human and they do make mistakes. I think that Michigan should get rid of that stupid law, like the other states. I bet the theft and changing of prices will be cut. People live off that Michigan Scanner Law.

  3. Kris says:

    One of the stupidest situations I’ve been in (not the worst, just extremely retarded), a chick walked through my lane with groceries and at the end had maybe half the bill off on in coupons. At least 25% of the coupons weren’t valid and I pointed that out to her (either she didn’t have enough of the item or she didn’t buy it but she said she did). The rest were free or large amounts off.

    That’s not the stupidest part though. The chick brought something else that was huge (maybe $150) GM item, and she handed me coupons for it. Not 1 coupon, coupons.

    I basically spent a minute handing every single (5 or more) coupons to her saying you didn’t purchase this item, because she bought 1 item and each coupon was different.

    I saw her later at the service desk and wanted to punch her in the ovaries. I’m not gonna say what she was, but if you work at my Meijer it’s the groups of sharp noses that always come in with their kids or 2 other family members to translate for them but they’re never alone.

  4. Kris says:

    By the way, is it ok if i post this at my meijer? every one of my coworkers will get a kick out of this.

  5. annie says:

    You sure can. Just so long as the url is on it somewhere. 🙂

  6. sydney alexander says:

    I understand you 100%, you seem like a good employee, and I wish you worked at the Meijers by me. I have to drive 10 miles out of my way to go to walmart b/c the cashiers are SO RUDE at Meijers.

    I go late in the evening and the same ppl are there, one actually yelled at me once. There was a candle marked $5.99 on a clearance shelf, it rang for $10.00 and I said I didn’t want it b/c it’s on sale. She went and checked and she said it was an accident and wasn’t on sale and YELLED at me.

    She said, “and we DON’T have to give it to you for that price.”

    REALLY are you kidding me! I am a waitress and yes the customer is wrong A LOT, BUT if I acted like this, I would be FIRED, immediately. I am going in the store in the morning to talk to someone, b/c this is unacceptable. They have 10 ppl standing around talking, while I stand in line for 20 mins. and my ice cream melts. I know they don’t NEED my business, they will survive w/o me, but its still unacceptable!

  7. Joanne says:

    To Andria,

    You know the Michigan Scanner Law was created because many merchants were crooked. Meijer doesn’t follow the pricing laws, which is why this ra ra employee mentions signage so much. According to the scanner law only a certain classes of merchandise isn’t required by law to be priced.

    I think every state should have a scanner law that is written much clearer than Michigan’s law. I’ve called and asked the attorney general for clairification of different portions of the law and he refused to give an opinion.

    It’s only a matter of time before someone figures out the problem with the law and sues these huge stores that feel they are above the law. Meijer isn’t any better.

    I’ve actually purchased items from Meijer, got my bounty for their error and went back the following day to do it again because their employees were too lazy to correct their error. One could do this everyday and make a nice living, without a great deal of effort and why shouldn’t they reap the benefits? Why should shoppers continue to get ripped off and the store management obviously doesn’t care.

  8. Lee says:

    Maybe Downriver Meijer has scamming customers but the Meijer in Warren is the worst in deceitful pricing. I have NOT once had and order small or large that rang up correctly!

    The author of this article makes me laugh.

    “I’ve done the scanning award quite a few times, and I’ve told people more than once they couldn’t have it because it wasn’t marked on the item.”

    As far as I know everything should have a price tag on it with a few exceptions. I feel Meijer purposely doesn’t put price tags on items so they can avoid the scanning award. Meijer doesn’t care that they are not following the law by placing a price tag on the item.

    Last Wednesday I went to the Warren Meijer to buy milk and juice. I noticed the Pepperidge Farm frozen cakes had a signs on the shelf stating it was $2.99. I decided to buy one. The cake rang up at $4.19 which I didn’t notice until I got home. I went back with receipt, package, and the tag from the shelf. The clerk gave me the $1.20 back. I asked for the scanning award. He said, “I don’t get one because “it wasn’t marked on the item.”

    I talked to the manager and said this item is supposed to have a price tag on it. She said “Yes, it is.” (Like what are you going to do about it?) She gave me a $5.00 gift slip which forces me to shop there again. (Ugh, I hope I don’t lose the little slip of paper she gave me.) Makes me wonder how many other customers bought that cake and paid $4.19 instead of the $2.99.

    “I’ve done price changes, but no scanning award, for people that made mistakes reading the sign, where it was slightly misleading.”

    Slightly misleading! More like grossly misleading. This is one example of MANY Meijer’s “slightly misleading” signs. There was a large rack packed with swimsuits. On top of the rack was a sale sign. Well, the sign was for a certain brand which was stated in that fine print the author mentioned. On the large rack of packed swimsuits there were maybe three or four swimsuits that were the brand on sale. Most customers would assume the whole rack of swimsuits were on sale. I say assume because other stores have a sale sign on top of a rack, everything on that rack is on sale. Stores work that way. As a consumer who would think Meijer would be deceitful and NOT display their sale items like other stores. Made me wonder how many people bought swimsuits thinking they were on sale and they weren’t.

    “I wasn’t so stupid as to just assume something was one price.”

    What the heck does that mean? Shouldn’t items have one CLEARLY marked price?

    “I have to say that most of the people that come to the desk for a price adjustment and scanning award bring up old signs, wrong signs…”

    Why is that? Why would there be old signs left up? Why would they have wrong signs? How many times have I found sale tags on the shelf under an item that matches the large print but not the small print? Many, many times. One example, Dixie paper plates on sale. The sale tag was on the shelf and above was a large stack of Dixie plates. One would think those plates were on sale but “no”. The plates above the sale tag had 100 count. In the “fine print” the sale tag states 50 count. Is there a sale tag under the 50 count Dixie plates? NO! (I can’t believe there are customers going around switching sale tags. It seems Meijer is the one that has this problem so often.)

    “I have never found an honest to goodness UPC error that we did not correct.”

    Ya, right. At this Warren store, I bought hair coloring that scanned up wrong. The price on the shelf and the price on the box were the same price but it rang up at a higher price. I got the price difference and the scanning award. About four weeks later I purchased the same hair coloring. The price rang up at the same higher price as it did the last time. I got the price difference and the scanning award. I said okay, Meijer doesn’t want to correct the price; I came in two days later bought the same hair coloring, got the price difference and the scanning award.

    “I think it’s high time that people begin looking a little closer at shelf tags, UPCs, and what an item is actually marked.”

    Do you have any idea how long it would take to shop if people read a little closer at shelf tags, UPCs, and what an item is actually marked? Why does Meijer make it so difficult when other stores don’t? The author stated UPCs. The print is so small on the shelf tag most times you need a magnifying glass to read it. Customers are supposed to match the UPS on the shelf tag with the item above the shelf tag? Well, I’m one of those people that look a little closer at shelf tags, UPCs, and what an item is actually marked. What would have been 15 minute shopping turns into 45 minutes! Since Meijer makes so many mistakes, I don’t buy the item because I don’t want to deal with customer service or I do buy it and get the scanning award. Also, if people did begin looking a little closer at shelf tags, UPCs, and what an item is actually marked, they would find more of Meijer’s mistakes.

    “In my tenure, it is exceedingly unlikely for any of us to find people come to us with scanning errors that are just complete errors in our system.”

    That’s not my experience at Meijer.

    “…because every customer that comes through expects us to memorize the entire store and know the price of all 250,000 items or so that we carry in the store at any given time.”

    I find that hard to believe. There may be few that think that or you have a lot of stupid people in your area.

    “One, you have to prove the error. It is on your shoulders to do that. Just because a sign is misleading doesn’t mean we have to honor it. If the UPC is different, if it is expired- we do not have to honor it. If the sticker on it says $2.00 and it’s an X-box, we do not have to honor it.” “The item was marked $3.99. But was ringing up $39.99. Which means someone misplaced a decimal.”

    So the author is stating the store has no responsibility for their employees who misprice items, place things on the shelf in the wrong place, place sale tags in the wrong place or leave expired sale tags up? And that it’s okay to mislead customers? I believe the store should honor them. (I don’t believe customers do it. I’ve never seen anybody play with signs or move a stack of items to a different place on the shelf.) If there was more than one X-boxes priced $2.00 the store should honor it. (When it’s obvious the store mispriced the item not a customer placing a price tag on it.) When I happen to make mistakes at my work place the company pays for it. When Spirit Airline accidently listed flights to Orlando, Florida for $12.50 round trip they honored the price. To me it’s like saying the store can make all these mistakes and they are not responsible. That guy should have gotten that item for $3.99 since that someone that misplaced that decimal was probably an employee.

    “But, even if you are right, and you come to me with an attitude, I’m going to painstakingly draw out the proceedure, leisurely walking through the store in search for the object, making sure to call every department and manager possible before giving you the adjustment.”

    You $#%&@%! It’s obvious this author doesn’t care about people. How many of those customers have worked all day. Then shopped for two hours or more because they’ve spent most of their time carefully looking at shelf tags, sale tags, UPSs, price tags, reading small print, and expiration dates on food items, etc.

    Then spent a long time in line because was only a few registers open. Or go to the self-serve to ring up, bag own items and not get paid for doing that. Only to find out AGAIN an item has rung up wrong. The customer is tired, back hurts and wants to go home but again is in that slow customer service line. Who wouldn’t be crabby or attitude? All that harassment this author just gave that customer, now for sure, has an attitude for the next time they need to go to customer service. Plus the customers behind that customer the author is harassing has to wait longer and they didn’t even do anything to warrant a longer wait.

    “Again, a drop in the bucket for Meijer if 1000 people were to sue them tomorrow night.”

    That is why Meijer doesn’t follow the law, grossly misleads the customers, doesn’t honor their employee mistakes, under pay their employees, and under staff their stores.

    I have shopped at many different stores and Meijer is the worst to shop in. I’ve been to most in the Macomb area and they all operate the same though the Warren store is the worst of the worst. I now rarely shop at Meijer. I’ll just run in to get my juice only because they have the brand I like with the most variety.