Has Marks and Spencer refused you a refund? Post details here.

Sy1 wrote: »

I've just noticed this thread and have been reading people's comments with interest as I used to work for M&S up until about 3 years ago. I spent 4 years or so working there part-time and 2-3 years of this was spent on the Customer Services Desk dealing with Refunds & Exchanges.

My experience there was a real eye-opener, and for those of you criticising staff for being suspicious of everyone without a receipt, I can tell you several stories which would make you suspicious!

I have seen cases of people ripping labels out of M&S suits and stitching them into cheap non-M&S suits to return for refunds, people stealing left-over M&S green till rolls and printing their own receipts for stolen goods, and people trying to return stock from the 1960s! I've seen every scam and could not believe the lengths people will go to to make a bit of money with a fraudulent refund.

When I worked there the policy was still very open - a refund to the method of payment with a receipt, or a refund in credit vouchers with no receipt. If the item was reduced in the sale, we would ask when the item was purchased and provide a refund according to the price of the item at that time as shown on the till - we took the customer's word for it.

Obviously you are suspicious of people returning high-value items with no receipt - we regularly had emails about bulk quantities of suits and leather jackets etc being stolen from other stores in the area and had to be wary of people returning these items with no receipt in case they were stolen.

You also become suspicious when you see the same faces returning high-value items frequently with no receipts. There used to be notorious 'customers' who would only ever shop during sales and would intentionally look for sale items which were not 'red-dotted' do they could return them without the receipt, claiming they purchased them before the sale at full price, in order to make a quick profit.

When the refund policy was so loose and so open to abuse of these types, as a Sales Advisor you became very suspicious that some customers might be trying to get one over on you and the company. You have to ask yourself, if somebody genuinely purchased a high value item knowing that they may return it, then why wouldn't they keep the receipt?

Staff on the Refunds desk were generally more experienced staff and as such were allowed by management to make their own decisions and managers were usually only called to assist if a customer kicked off, and the manager would generally back-up what the Sales Advisor had said.

I personally think that it is great for M&S that they have tightened up on the refund policy as it used to be abused on such a massive scale. I also think that for the vast majority of people, 90 days is more than enough time to return an unwanted item. Why should people be allowed to return items months or years later? Usually, after 6 months or so all items have been reduced in the sale, and by allowing refunds after long periods of time old stock just hangs around for ages.

The other point I find really interesting is the fact that people have been discussing the fact that staff are able to look up transactions.

To clarify, based on my experience, the POS system does allow transaction searches up to roughly 12 months prior. The system can be searched by date/time, value of transaction, till number, sales advisor number, card number etc etc - it is very comprehensive.

However, this system was only accessible by management and senior sales advisors. It was not a fast process, and to locate a specific transaction you would really need to know a customer's card number and card type, which not all customers have to hand.

Because the transaction search is so slow and a manager would have to be called to do a search, it was rarely used and was generally used only in instances, for example, where a customer phoned in and said that they had asked for cashback and not received it. By doing a search a manager could find the sales advisor and ask them if they remembered giving cashback etc.

I have to say, I really don't understand why people think M&S have a duty to do such a search to prove that a customer purchased an item or what price they paid - surely if returning an item a customer must hold some responsibility to retain their receipt if they buy an item knowing there is a chance they may wish to return it. You wouldn't try returning an item without a receipt to many other high street stores so why should M&S be any different?

I think people generally expect the earth from M&S because in the past they have bent over backwards to help their customers. Unfortunately, a large volume of customers abused such open policies on a massive scale so the company has had to tighten things up. It's not unfair, if it was your business you'd do the same. And the policies M&S now use still seem to be very competitive in relation to the rest of the high street.

Anyway, rant over! This is just a summary of what I saw at M&S when I worked on Refunds & Exchanges. I'm glad I'm no longer there or in retail but it was a really interesting job at the time and did really open my eyes! Knowing the lengths people will go to to pull off a scam and make a few quid has made me much less naive, and I'm not necessarily suspicious of people, but I'm much more confident questioning things I'm not totally sure are right!