Handling a Retail Scammer

One busy day, I got called up to the registers to approve a return without a receipt. This is standard procedure. I take a look at the item to make sure it's in resellable condition (even though we'll probably send it back to the distributor anyway) and to use my retail spidey sense to determine if anything shady is going on.

Returns without receipt happen several times a day and usually I'd just punch in my ID and sign my initials without much thought. If you're not a complete idiot, there's not much stopping you from just grabbing an item off the shelf and bringing it to the registers and asking for store credit. There'd be no way for me to prove you didn't buy it or deny your return under our policy.

But once in a while we do get complete idiots, and this was one of those times.

So on this busy day, I'm snaking my way through the gaggle of customers and employees crowded at the registers so I enter my ID and get back to more productive work. I give the return item a glance and something is obviously not right. It was a DVD box set of some Spanish language show, probably Rebelde. It was sealed, which is required to return it, but it also still had all the price sticker, sale sticker, and an active anti-theft tag.

Now having the price sticker still affixed is normal. Even the active anti-theft tag doesn't necessarily mean we're getting scammed. Cashiers were terrible about deactivating them or calling back customers who set off the security gates on the way out. The real red flag was the sale sticker still being on there. Nobody leaves that on, especially when they could potentially get the full price for their return.

I run the DVD through our inventory to see if we'd sold any. We hadn't, which was interesting since the sticker had our store number on it. No matter, the inventory isn't live and it could've been purchased today. The sticker was dated two weeks past which is the date it was printed at the distributor. We'd received it about a week ago.

Now if this lady had played her cards right, she still could have pulled this off. All she had to say is that she purchased it recently enough and I wouldn't be able to prove her wrong. Our inventory was unreliable so it was hard to say anything about it with certainty. Now it was time to confront the customer.

Me: "It doesn't look like we've sold this DVD in this store."
Her: "It might've been from another store. I got it for my birthday so I really don't know."
Me: "The sticker on it says it came from our store."
Her: *shrugs* "I really don't know. I just got it as a present."
Me, trying to make this sound like small talk: "So when was your birthday?"
Her: "About a month ago."
Me: "That's weird because this sticker was printed two weeks ago."
Her: "Maybe it was two weeks ago, I forget."
Me: "And our inventory shows we haven't even received it, which means it must have just come in."
Her, sounding a bit panicked: "Fine, it was a few days ago. Can I just get my refund?"
Me, probably louder than I realized: "Do you even know when your birthday is?"
Her: *speechless*
Me: "I don't think you got this as a gift. I'm pretty sure you just grabbed this off the shelf and tried to return it. So I'm going to hang onto this and you're going to leave."
Her: *stands there for about 5 seconds stunned, and then bee-lines for the door*

If you're a scammer, just keep your mouth shut. I didn't really give this lady the opportunity to do that, but the more detail she gave me the deeper she dug her own scammy grave. If you're the person in my position, just be pleasant and let the scammer unravel their own lie. And do your damnedest not to assume anything, or it'll probably cost you your job when it turns out you were wrong.

This is probably way longer than it needed to be. I ended up with a rather searing stress stomache ache when all was said and done. I hadn't even realized how worked up my body got when it was happening, but while my mind was calm, my body was furious. I probably would've passed out had the confrontation gone on much longer.

You just learned how to scam retail stores. Oh well, knowledge wants to be free. The store in question no longer takes returns without receipts anyway.