River Island - refused to refund on £ 40 jeans

Morty_007

superflygal wrote: »

Although, I would recommend you ensure your letter is perfect with both spelling and grammar!

as a matter of interest....why? Is he known to judge the worthiness of someones request by the quality of their letter?!

Enterprise_1701C

If I am buying something for someone else I explain this to the staff and ask if I will be able to get a refund/exchange if it is wrong. If the answer is no I do not get the item, if it is yes I very nicely ask the SA to write as much on the receipt and sign it. No complaints yet!

Englishian

SolicitorMidlands wrote: »

I worked in retail as a student. I used to refuse all sorts but customer services would always take the customers side. Kick up a fuss with head office and they will give you a refund or vouchers. At the very least they should have offered you an exchange.

I also worked in retail for many years and completely agree with SolicitorMidlands. Whenever we refused a refund and it went to head office, they ALWAYS sided with the customer- even when they shouldnt have. You will be fine

Its not your fault if thats the condition the jeans were in when you purchased them but I can understand where the SA's are coming from.

Fingers crossed it all works out!

jenniewb

I used to work in RI, for the whole time I was there it was just refund every customer that asks, full refund...company policy... then we started getting complaints from head office that we were refunding too many people and either not giving them an alternative or persuadeing them to accept vouchers.
I would have in your case (as a SA) suggested you get a different sized jean (if you stroy was true, you would still be looking for a correctly fitting pair and this would solve your problem and make me believe your experience) Or offered vouchers.
If

jenniewb

I used to work in RI, for the whole time I was there it was just refund every customer that asks, full refund...company policy... then we started getting complaints from head office that we were refunding too many people and either not giving them an alternative or persuadeing them to accept vouchers.
I would have in your case (as a SA) suggested you get a different sized jean (if you stroy was true, you would still be looking for a correctly fitting pair and this would solve your problem and make me believe your experience) Or offered vouchers.
If you had declined both and not really explained why, and the jeans I had comming back were not resellable, I would be wondering how I could accept them back.

Thing is that right now, this is the worst time of the year for retail: xmas has gone, sales are over, few customers have enough cash to spend, sales take a dip.
I am not saying what has happened was right, but from a stores point of view, they may well be trying to clamp down on refunds and this could be contributing as to why they may well have refunded something in similar condition 2 months ago when sales were stronger (at their strongest).

If you think the store is behaving unfairly, the expensive way round is to call head office (expensive as they often have an 0845 number) or simply go to another store. Though it would help your claim if you were asking for an exchange or for vouchers, stores will be reluctant to lose money at this time of the year, thats not saying they wont refund, just that its likely to be something they will have been prewarned to avoid via the staff meetings each and every morning.

HTH

SteveCutler

jenniewb wrote: »

(if you stroy was true, you would still be looking for a correctly fitting pair and this would solve your problem and make me believe your experience)

I don't believe this is true - items aren't always bought because of a requirement, sometimes impulse just plays the main part and if they don't fit then no alternative is sought.

If I buy a pair of jeans I like and they don't fit, it's not a given that I'll buy a different pair as a substitute.

zenseeker

SteveCutler wrote: »

I don't believe this is true - items aren't always bought because of a requirement, sometimes impulse just plays the main part and if they don't fit then no alternative is sought.

If I buy a pair of jeans I like and they don't fit, it's not a given that I'll buy a different pair as a substitute.

Sorry, but that is a lame defense. Fair enough, you bought them on impulse, and found that they didn't fit, but you still shouldn't expect to get a refund as it is classed as changing your mind, and stores do not have to give a cash refund in that instance, they are quite within their rights to offer you and exchange or store credit as the item wasn't faulty.

SteveCutler

zenseeker wrote: »

Sorry, but that is a lame defense. Fair enough, you bought them on impulse, and found that they didn't fit, but you still shouldn't expect to get a refund as it is classed as changing your mind, and stores do not have to give a cash refund in that instance, they are quite within their rights to offer you and exchange or store credit as the item wasn't faulty.

Zenseeker I'm not the OP, I'm just saying that if it was me who bought a pair of jeans, I most likely wouldn't buy an alternative unless I bought the jeans with the mindset of requiring them.

gemgemgemgem

[SIZE=-1]

This whole argument is kind of silly! If a stores policy is that you can refund something that has not been worn within a certain number of days, then thats the policy! Enough said! Whether the customer wants another pair of jeans, or nothing....it doesn't matter....if it was the case that she just changed her mind then thats ok too!!
If the shop didn't have that policy then fair enough.....but they do!!

I mean some stores use that return policy to make the sale in the first place! They can't go back on it!
If they are in a re-sellable condition, customer services will side with the customer.....

[/SIZE]

SolicitorMidlands

Call customer services and complain. They will definitely give you the money back. I've seen shop lifters get a refund on stolen goods before!!