Best to thing with continuous rip off shop.

Archeron

Hi all,
Just looking for your opinion on what you would do in a particular situation.

A store close to me, petrol station/supermarket type place has been wrecking my head with the amount of times that have tried to rip me off, every time I go there, and I kind of feel enough is enough. Their wonderful sales tactics include:

60% of items in the store have no price on display.
Special offers "accidentally" not put into the till and still charged at the regular price. (blame the manager I was told)
Many items appear in two locations in the shop, and sometimes with two different prices. Of course the higher one is the one that always goes on the till.
Double scanning of items so you pay twice for one item.
Short changing people regularly.

Now I know this shop is overpriced, but I am willing to accept that for the convenience. However, on my last visit there, the bill came to €34 in total, and nearly €5 of that was overcharges. A special offer on packaged luncheon meat, branded by Denny in luminous yellow writing covering the whole pack as "€5 special offer!!" was keyed in as a non food item at €6.50. When I pulled her on this, I got a dirty look and was told, "oh sorry, I thought they were €6.50" Cans of beer were listed as special offer at €1.79. Bought 12 of them, and was charged €1.89. When I queried this, the till girl ran down, took down the price tag saying €1.79, and brought me a €1.99 one saying that there was never a cheap offer in the first place. I stood my ground, and got my money back, but the looks I got from all the staff could have killed an elephant. There was also items scanned in twice by accident. Ahem.

Now I know its simple, dont go back there, but I am so bloody sick of them doing this (most of their business is passing trade and people who wont be back), as well as the treatment you get when you pull them on it. What is the best way to deal with this? Is it worth having a word with the manager? Is it worth reporting them to a consumer group? Normally, I wouldnt be bothered with this type of complaint, but this crowd have just infuriated me so much that I'm determined to do something.

aaah, I feel better now.

catch--22

Thats a tough one! I'm not sure what a consumer group will be able to do. It would be graet to stick it to them though! So many shops get away with this on a regular basis and make a packet out opf ripping people off by small amounts at a time!

HMV are always guilty of having various prices for the same item. I remember a few years back going to their Henry St store for the Red Hot Chili Peppers in Slane DVD. I found it in three different places in the store at three different prices! I brought them all to the counter and asked what was the real price to find they all scanned in at the price shown! So if I had picked up the more expensive one....i would have had to pay that price! Needless to say I took the cheapest of the three! That really annoys me!

MOH

catch--22 wrote:

Thats a tough one! I'm not sure what a consumer group will be able to do. It would be graet to stick it to them though! So many shops get away with this on a regular basis and make a packet out opf ripping people off by small amounts at a time!

HMV are always guilty of having various prices for the same item. I remember a few years back going to their Henry St store for the Red Hot Chili Peppers in Slane DVD. I found it in three different places in the store at three different prices! I brought them all to the counter and asked what was the real price to find they all scanned in at the price shown! So if I had picked up the more expensive one....i would have had to pay that price! Needless to say I took the cheapest of the three! That really annoys me!

I bought a CD I didn't really want in there years ago because it was priced at 14.99 but the one in the middle of the bunch was only 3.99.

Came out feeling like I'd got a bargain, though I'd really just wasted 3.99. Ah well.

ejmaztec

Would we be leaving ourselves wide open for getting sued, were we to name these robbing b*******? Most locals know these places where they have a price for the natives and a different price for anyone else. My daughter, down from Dublin to Listowel over Christmas was charged €2.80 for 2 litres of Dawn milk by some old bat whose shop was the only place in the town that was open. Some times I feel a yearning to invest in a couple of gallons of 4 star and a box of matches!

wyndham

Archeron wrote:

60% of items in the store have no price on display.

This is a very serious offence.

At Portlaoise District Court on 11 January 2007, Vincent and Joseph Byrne, owners of Costcutter Store Centrepoint Shopping Centre, pleaded guilty to 52 counts of failing to display prices and to unit price a range of grocery products. The offences occurred on 14 June 2006. Judge Mary Martin convicted Costcutter in respect of the first count, ie. non display of prices on home gallery coasters, and fined the owners €750. Expenses of €250 were also awarded. Having taken into account the store’s guilty plea, the judge decided to convict on just one count. The Judge also mentioned that she noted a marked lack of price display in garage forecourts along the Dublin route.


The Director of Consumer Affairs and executive Chair of the National Consumer Agency, Ms. Ann Fitzgerald, welcomed the court’s decision to convict and fine Costcutter. “Failing to display prices is breaking the law. Under the Product Prices Regulations 2002, businesses must display the price of all goods on sale to consumers. This legislation is not new. Retailers therefore have no excuse ”, the Director said.



Referring to the Judge’s comment about the lack of display by garage forecourt shops, Ann Fitzgerald said “ Poor compliance levels by garage forecourts and corner shops is a matter of concern”. She advised that monthly monitoring statistics have shown that this sector’s compliance rates are approximately 15% below the overall average. Last year, her office prosecuted 18 corner shops and garage forecourts for breaches of the Product Prices Regulations. A further 5 cases are scheduled to come before the courts in the coming months.



The Director advised that in addition to prosecution, her office had also put measures in place to help bring about voluntary compliance. The Director said “a significant number of these types of stores are members of Symbol Groups. I have therefore set up liaison arrangements between ODCA inspectors and designated officers in the various Head Offices, with the objective of getting the Symbol Group management to put pressure on, and assist their members in complying with the display legislation”. She added “I would like to see businesses, with the support of their representative bodies, complying voluntarily with all consumer law. It should not be necessary for me to take prosecutions to get the business community to honour their fundamental obligations to their customers”.

The above is from the ODCA website, which is a great resource and there are lots of reports like this. Just last week, La Boulangerie in Aungier Street was fined the maximum under the act, times 3, for the same offence, came to 10k+.

eth0_

wyndham wrote:

Just last week, La Boulangerie in Aungier Street was fined the maximum under the act, times 3, for the same offence, came to 10k+.

Do you mean the place on Camden Street, opposite the camden court hotel? If so..I wonder why? That place is great. Maybe they didn't have any prices listed for their cakes etc - but not many bakeries do put prices beside their goods IME

MadsL

http://www.odca.ie/

Report them.

Sponge Bob

ODCA will come out to check if they are reported , be specific and remember that you may be asked to provide receipts etc so keep them .

Archeron

Well, thanks everyone for your posts. I did follow through and mentioned this to the consumer people. I must commend them for being very responsive and genuinely nice, as I was a little self consious being a tattle tale.

Now that I have made my complaint, if you'll excuse me, there appears to be damn kids on my lawn, so I must don my slippers and cardigan and mumble things about respect at them while gesturing angrily from a window.

catch--22

Archeron wrote:

Well, thanks everyone for your posts. I did follow through and mentioned this to the consumer people. I must commend them for being very responsive and genuinely nice, as I was a little self consious being a tattle tale.

Now that I have made my complaint, if you'll excuse me, there appears to be damn kids on my lawn, so I must don my slippers and cardigan and mumble things about respect at them while gesturing angrily from a window.

Ha ha ha!