Is this Barnes & Noble crazy or am I?

[EL PRESIDENTE]

I know. Some of you are saying it doesn't have to be an either/or issue.

Barnes & Noble was having a sale on DVD's last month. If you bought two, you got a third one of equal or lesser value for free. Which is essentially a third off if you pick them right.

I bought six DVD's last week that happened to all be Criterion DVD's. After I checked out the clerk told me that they would be having a sale on Criterion DVD's the following week with all of them being half off.

With the clerk thinking he/she did you a favor, since they presumed you were a fan of Criterion DVDs. Barnes and Noble has no obligation whatsoever to let you know before you make their purchase that they are having a sale.

I was a little annoyed he waited until after I had checked out to tell me the items that I had just bought were going on sale the following week. But I figured it was no big deal. I just left all of the DVD's and the receipt in the bag in my car.

Today I went back to the same Barnes and Noble. I confirmed that I could return them all for the price I had paid for them. So I said I wanted to return them all and then buy them all back at the sales price.

And they said I couldn't do that. I went through three levels of managers and they all refused.



They all agreed I could return the DVD's and get my money back. And they obviously agreed I could buy DVD's at the sales price. They even agreed that if I returned the DVD's I had bought they would just reshelf them and put them back for sale. But they said I couldn't buy back the same DVD's I returned.

That's because they realized you were scamming them.

Obviously I could have gotten around this. I could return the DVD's and then sneak back into the store in disguise a few hours later and buy them back. I could return the DVD's at one store and buy the same movies at another store. I could give somebody else the money and have them buy the DVD's for me.

Then why didn't you?

But this was just so stupid. Can anyone come up with any reason why this policy would make any sense? Right now I'm half way tempted to return all of the DVD's after the current sale ends and keep my money. "There, you didn't sell them to me for a third off. You didn't sell them to me at a half off. You didn't sell them at all."

They would probably have been better off if you did, since obviously you sound like a bit of a pain in the ass.

I work in customer service, and have to put up with people like this all the time. You made a conscious, educated decision when you bought the DVDs and got the third one for free, or whatever. The clerk went out of his/her way to let you know about an upcoming sale.

No good deed goes unpunished, as a week later, there you are, wasting valuable time with three levels of management to try and screw Barnes and Noble out of 10 bucks. This was probably going on while there were ten people in line behind you, probably had about 1000 things to do that day, but your petty complaint torpedoed their day.

If they said yes, then, what is to stop you 6 months later from showing up with your unused DVDs to try and con them into another sale?

I bet if the clerk DIDNT tell you, and you found about the sale after it was over, you'd probably call the store to complain, as well.

My advice is this: put your DVDs in your DVD player. Watch them. Get over it.

Stop being a freeloader. This is why so many people in customer service are nasty to customers---they just cant take people like you anymore.

[EL PRESIDENTE]

How long do you think it takes me to threaten those actions at B&N? All day?

Well, maybe for you, since your charisma would be holding things up.

Wow.

Your really hung up on that "charisma" post, aren't you? Did it bother you that bad?

[Astro]

Let me ask this for those who feel Barnes and Noble has a valid point.

Suppose the fifty percent off sale wasn't at Barnes and Noble. Suppose it was at their rival Borders.

Now I go back to Barnes and Noble and they agree to refund my money. But I mention the reason why I'm returning the items. And they say, "We're willing to refund your money. But not if you're going to just go and spend that money buying the same movies at Borders."

Do people feel that's reasonable? That a refund can be made conditional on a promise not to spend it on something?

I think you need to stop for second before continuing to argue about B&N's bad faith corporate police regarding returns. It is, I believe, very unlikely this is really B&N corporate policy. It is far more likely you got stuck with group of part timers who were shining you on, or possibly you were being dealt with by some very poorly informed or trained personnel.

You really need to nail down what the truth is. B&N retail policy as you described it being dictated to you is contradictory to 99.99% of large box retail policies in the US. The likelihood this is real vs being bad info you received is pretty small IMO.