Walmart Chronicles part 2

I'm a coupon-clipper. In fact, recently, I have become one of those mega coupon-clippers. Yesterday, I bought toothpaste and two 8-packs of Aquapods for 25-cents each. (I don't normally buy Aquapods, but we often drink what we bring with us when we play at the park. It helps to have something I can keep in the van all the time. And for 25-cents for 8 bottles of water, I wasn't about to walk on by! Did you get that, 3-cents per bottle!) If the stores near me offered double-coupons, I'd be getting paid to grocery shop!

But that was all just to tell you how much I love my coupons and how much I use them. One day I was at Walmart buying paper towels with a coupon. The cashier scanned the coupon and nothing happened. She scanned it again and again and again. It just wouldn't scan. I guess, if it won't scan, it's not accepted. I personally think that's laziness and poor service. The manufacturer will still reimburse for it as long as it is completely in tact, and it was. But this particular cashier wouldn't do anything. She looked at me like I was supposed to come up with a solution, so I told her if she wouldn't take my coupon, I didn't want the paper towels. And I want my coupon back! I did tell her that she could enter the code on the coupon and it would still work, but she said she could only scan coupons. So, intending to write a letter, I asked for her name because her name tag was turned around backwards. She told me her name and that she was a customer service manager and not politely, I might add. Did I tell her she could use some additional customer service training? Yep, sure did. Did I ever write that letter? Not this time.

But I remembered who she was. Not that it mattered much, but I avoided her lane. I don't think it was personal; I had never even met her until that day. I just think she was lazy and not wanting to do anything out of her way.

One day I was buying canned cat food. My old man cat who passed away earlier this year at the nice age of 18-1/2 had to be hand fed for quite some time, so I bought his favorite: Nine Lives Super Super, in a combo pack that was shrink-wrapped. When I got it home, I went to open the shrink-wrap and one of the cans exploded. Yuck. It was still all contained in the shrink-wrap, so I just put it back in the bag, tied it shut, and hung it on the front door knob for next time I went to Walmart. Yes, I was going to take it back. I honestly can't tell you how long it was there. Not days, maybe a couple weeks... I couldn't smell it, but the bag seemed to inflate a bit. I was not about to open that bag, but it was still going back to the store.

Finally the day came that I was taking it back whether I had another reason to go or not. Child A and I hopped in the van and went to Walmart. I said I couldn't smell it in the house, right? Well, I had to open all the windows in the van and we still gagged all the way there. Fortunately, Walmart is only a few miles away.

When we walked into Walmart, I expected people to clear the way to avoid the contents of the bag. I wouldn't have been surprised if they had called the haz-mat suits. But no one seemed to notice. We were about the 27th person in the customer service line when someone told us that we could go over to Register #1 to be helped. Sounded great to me, until I got halfway there and saw who was opening up that lane. It was her. The same customer service manager (CSM) that refused my coupon. I looked back at the service line to take my place back and saw that my spot was gone and there were now about 40 people in line. Great. Oh well, here goes. This is the conversation that ensued:

Me: "In this bag is a 4-pack of cat food that exploded. I'd like to return it. Here is my receipt. I wouldn't open the bag, if I were you."
CSM: "Why would you like to return it?"
Me: "Uh, because it exploded when I tried to take it out of the shrink-wrap. I'm not going to feed it to my cat."
She's opening the bag.
Me: "I really don't think you want to open the bag."
She just looked at me and opened the bag.
I actually backed up two steps and pulled Child A back with me. I thought the CSM was going to lose her lunch! And the look on her face!!!
Then she says, "What am I supposed to do with this?"
What, I have to tell her how to do her job?
I just looked at her. So she repeated herself.
Me: "Give me a refund?"
CSM (gagging): "Well, how am I supposed to scan it?"
Me: "I don't know. What do you think?"
CSM: "Well, I need to scan it."
She's really stuck on this scanning thing, isn't she? Why does the customer have to come up with suggestions for the customer service manager?
I let her stew about it for a minute or so, during which time she gagged a few more times. {giggle}
Finally, I offered to go get another off the shelf and we'd just exchange it - she could scan the good one for both transactions. And she was OK with that.

But I sure enjoyed watching her gag a few times after I had warned her.

But, really, she couldn't have come up with the idea to go get one off the shelf?

Disclaimer: I really do love Walmart. I know not everyone does, but I do. I get some great deals at Walmart, save a lot of money, and can find so many useful things there. My only problem at my local Walmart has been with customer service managers who really should receive some additional training if they are going to carry a title with "customer service" anything in it.

Walmart Chronicles part 1

A little over a year ago, I gave a high-level summary about something that happened at Walmart about a year before that. It was on my other blog, which is rarely updated, and it really didn't do the story justice. So here is the unabridged version.

I was taking my 3 children to Walmart for various groceries and prescriptions. They were A-7, B-5, and C-2. I know, what was I thinking??? While, Children A & B were holding on to the cart with one hand, like they were supposed to, Child C was having a freak-out attack that 2-year olds are known to have. She was sitting in the child seat in the cart screaming that she was falling backwards. (She wasn't falling backwards!) This was relatively new and had been going on for a couple weeks for no apparent reason. Although it may make sense to you, it really did not make sense to me at the time. At some point she was moved from the child seat to the big basket. (Yes, I know that's not recommended, but I am an attentive mom and she was sitting and I always had my hands on the cart. thankyouverymuch.)

When we arrived at the pharmacy, there a line and and we waited behind 2 or 3 people. My kids asked me a hundred and four questions about products designed to prevent pregnancy that were right there next to us. The line gradually progressed forward and we found ourselves next in line. After paying for my prescription, Child C stood up in the basket, and I, being the attentive mom, turned my back on Child B (I should know better!) for about 20 seconds to sit Child C back down. I turned back around to Child B who was holding something out to me. She said, "Mom, help, I can't get these back on." They were black pieces of plastic and I had no idea what those things were, so I asked her. She said they were "here," and showed me the cash register on the counter.

She took apart part of the cash register! In about 20 seconds, while I had my back turned, she just did something and the pieces came off in her hand! The cashier had already moved on from me to the next person in line and had gone to retrieve their prescription. No one saw how B did it. When the cashier returned, I handed her the pieces and told her she'd probably need them and I was sorry I didn't know how to put them back on. She asked what they were and I showed her they were part of the cash register. Her face lost color. She set them aside and tried to ring up the customer, but the cash register wouldn't work without those pieces.

The cashier called someone else to help put the pieces back together. He fumbled with it a little, seemed half amused and half annoyed when he turned to her and asked her, "How did you do this?", to which she replied, "I didn't do it!." Have you ever wanted to just disappear? Yep, me too. I quickly turned the cart around and we walked very quickly right out of there!

A year and a half later, I had another amusing moment at Walmart. To be continued...