The Great ‘Store Returns Policy’ Hunt. Who, what, where and when?

murphaph

Hi Richard,
the girl who processed the refunds was a german placement student. I don;t know if Aldi sends them over but Lidl does and they are naive to say the least-they are simply totally unfamiliar with the notion of shoplifting as most are from affluent areas of germany, as you say, blissfully ignorant of the real world.

Lidl considers write offs (out of dates and breakages) and unknown inventory loss to be 2 separate figures. The max allowable for the two combined is 1.6% but go over 1% unknown loss and the store becomes a "focus store" and you don't want that!

We also apply the same targets to high turnover stores in leafy suburbs to low turnover ones in run down areas. Grossly unfair but what can one do!

hollydays

I have never accessed the refund Policy,although I would't envisage any problem,as I would know my rights. I am not suggesting Lidls shrinkage are overall higher,but simply saying that in the case you have highlighted-your company bore a lot of the responsibility for protecting itself..etc..

hollydays

Richard019 wrote: »

Something does need to be looked at with the Lidl example given. There's no way that should have been possible but the blame isn't necessarily with the store staff, it's more the training.

I work for Aldi myself and it's not uncommon for people to come in for several high value items on their launch day (particularly midweek) and to want seperate receipts because they've been sent for family members who are working. I'm assuming this was the circumstance there.

It's the immediate refund for them that would get me (training) alerted. One, maybe two I'd be comfortable with if they had someone ring them up on their mobile to 'cancel their order', but all five for a change of mind should have been picked up on.

As I say, I would pick up on it but that's because I'm used to dealing with the dodgy elements from my previous job. Where I am now is a far more respectable area and the saying ignorance is bliss has never been more applicable. Just purely due to lack of exposure to it the amount of customers that are shocked that shoplifters even exist is frightening. Now the staff obviously know better than that but have come from these same families so don't have the experiance to recognise it.

The failure in the example is that the staff don't seem to have been told what to look out for beyond someone shoving a chicken up their jumper. That is what the thief has recognised, nothing to do with the lack of gift vouchers.

All that said, as has already been said the inventry losses are far lower in Aldi/Lidl than in almost any other retailer. I don't know what Lidl count as inventory loss, but we count theft and wastage (ie reductions/out of dates and breakages). The percentage we actually produce for them combined is less than 1/2 of what the target was at my previous employer for theft alone, and less than 1/5 of the target for wastage alone. Note in the old retailer I gave the targets, around half the stores will miss those targets as it's the company target I've used not a store specific one. (They actually used the same figure for all stores which seems really hard on the quiet shops in rough areas where waste is harder to control and the loss of a bottle of Vodka has a bigger effect).

The post Murphaph describes-he said the "customer" came in 5 seperate times-(not the same as coming in once and purchasing 5 items which would't necessarily be seen as suspicious).They really should have been trained to call a Manager-that is very suspicious behaviour.However,I know some staff can be told but you can not necessarily give them the benefit of your experience.

hollydays

This thread interests me because refund wise,so often staff will say " we can't do this " "we can't do that",but when questioned there is no logical reasoning behind why they do certain things- and it's often the result of poor training- and a huge lack of basic common sense- but it succeeds in driving the customer away-and in other examples they do give money away they had no need to..There has to be a lesson there that good training reduces losses and maximises profits.

murphaph

hollydays wrote: »

I have never accessed the refund Policy,although I would't envisage any problem,as I would know my rights.

But your rights only extend to refunds for goods which have a fault/not fit for purpose or as described etc. You have no legal right to return perfect goods, with or without a receipt. These types of 'change of heart' returns really show a retailer's attitude to its customers.

hollydays wrote: »

I am not suggesting Lidls shrinkage are overall higher,but simply saying that in the case you have highlighted-your company bore a lot of the responsibility for protecting itself..etc..

Indeed. It was a screw up but the poor girl wasn't to know-she'd recently been placed there and training takes time. I was merely using it as an example to show why you might come off the worse if a store has just been hit by a scammer etc. when it comes time for the manager to use his discretion. At the end of the day, the manager isn't there 24/7 and deputies and supervisors also have authority to issue refunds but generally it's the store manager who bears the responsibility for loss, so he or she will naturally be more reluctant to facilitate someone just after an incident.

hollydays

Yes,obviously I know that:rolleyes:

Although, I can give you examples that turn that on its head.
I have a slightly less retail based view than you,but I maintain that would in effect be punishing the customer for the companys own stupidity-in general not aiming that personally at any company.

*kingpin*

TKmaxx have signage all over their stores stating there new refund policy - 14 days with a reciept or absolutely nothing , but yet this does not effect your statutory rights.

murphaph

hollydays wrote: »

Yes,obviously I know that:rolleyes:

No need for the roll eyes. Knowing one's rights doesn't mean you'll get a refund.

hollydays wrote: »

Although, I can give you examples that turn that on its head. I have a slightly less retail based view than you,but I maintain that would in effect be punishing the customer for the companys own stupidity-in general not aiming that personally at any company.

....which is why it is always best to approach store staff in a friendly and polite manner and you are more likely to benefit from their goodwill.

Richard019

murphaph wrote: »

Hi Richard,
the girl who processed the refunds was a german placement student. I don;t know if Aldi sends them over but Lidl does and they are naive to say the least-they are simply totally unfamiliar with the notion of shoplifting as most are from affluent areas of germany, as you say, blissfully ignorant of the real world.

Lidl considers write offs (out of dates and breakages) and unknown inventory loss to be 2 separate figures. The max allowable for the two combined is 1.6% but go over 1% unknown loss and the store becomes a "focus store" and you don't want that!

We also apply the same targets to high turnover stores in leafy suburbs to low turnover ones in run down areas. Grossly unfair but what can one do!

I've only been with them a couple of years but we've not had one yet. Then again we've been running heavily staffed due to a 2nd store being built locally. (We need local staff with experiance in both so we sent people to other stores (which seem to have been skeleton crewed) most weeks rather than receiving people).

We work out both figures seperately for store use, but the one that gets used to rank the shops is the combined figure (around 0.4% we had last year, which shows what the area is like). Given we're going to be below it I'm not sure what the company acceptable level is (makes sense, I wouldn't tell people how far they could slide before they were not meeting targets either).

What one can do is make sure one is working in a high turnover store in a leafy suburb, that way one's bonuses will be bigger.;)

murphaph

Hi Richard,
How does Aldi view productivity? Are they as focused on it as Lidl? Example for comparison....my store turns over about 190k Euro (about £145k) p/w and I am allowed about 430 hours for all staff incuding managers for the same period. How does that compare to Aldi? Do they make allowances for store layout/design/average spend/low spend on specials? Lidl makes allowances for certain stores with awkward designs and low spend/high turnover.