Supermarket Refund Policies

43722

For now, I will keep this general, but it is based on an experience I had yesterday in one of the big supermarkets.

I was attracted by a poster at the store entrance which was promoting 48 Weetabix for £4. The till wanted to charge me £5.49, but after intervention, the lower price was allowed to stand. Staff thought that should be the end of the matter, and, in terms of daily routine, I agree. I saw them remove the poster also.

I just wonder how many people would have paid the higher price, simply because they were too busy, or too distracted, to notice. When I checked the store website, it is clear that they do not want people to be overcharged. And yet, that day alone, possibly 10/20/30 people had been overcharged oh this line. Given the use of technology in stores, is there anything else that could be done to refund unfortunate customers, when the error clearly lies with the business?

user1977

Probably, but is it worthwhile? How many of those customers were even aware of the promotion?

(the own brand equivalents are also made by Weetabix, if anybody is genuinely money-saving...)

RefluentBeans

Hanlons Razor I feel is applicable here. Is it more likely that the company is purposefully mispricing things to trick customers into buying things at the wrong price, or that a special offer was missed to be taken down and/or placed up too early? I think the latter is more likely. 

I’m not sure what you realistically want supermarkets to do - contact every customer who bought the item priced incorrectly? That’s not realistic, in the slightest. Also - consumers should be checking the prices of items. If you use self service it shows you as you scan, and if you used a staffed check out, do you expect the minimum wage employee to have an idea of every priced item, or should the consumer, as they saw the price, know something is wrong, and check the receipt? Having worked retail / the amount of people who just don’t even look at the contextless screen is terrifying. 

Could technology be used - maybe. But to replace every sign in a chain is going to be really expensive and slow going. 

The ‘maybe 10/20/30 people could’ve been overcharged’ - you’re right. Maybe just you, maybe 200 people! The more people that have purchased the item, the more likelihood that someone will have noticed. 

To me the store did what they were legally obliged to do (remove incorrect signage) and went above and beyond to give you the discounted rate. They certainly didn’t need to. To me, the store acted very well, and should be praised. 

43722

Yes, I am not suggesting that this was anything other than a mistake. But I was wondering, now that transactions are cashless, whether more could be done, via technology, to refund overpayments when the store has erred. I am not sure that you would need to contact each customer to do this. I know they debit £99 when I fill  up the fuel, but adjust the amount afterwards,  and they have made adjustments to online shopping bills too.

I always check my receipts, and inaccurate charging happens a lot.  I was also overcharged at a garden centre this week, and had to get a refund. 

Murphybear

43722 said:

Yes, I am not suggesting that this was anything other than a mistake. But I was wondering, now that transactions are cashless, whether more could be done, via technology, to refund overpayments when the store has erred. I am not sure that you would need to contact each customer to do this. I know they debit £99 when I fill  up the fuel, but adjust the amount afterwards,  and they have made adjustments to online shopping bills too.

I always check my receipts, and inaccurate charging happens a lot.  I was also overcharged at a garden centre this week, and had to get a refund. 

loads of people pay cash where I live

RefluentBeans

43722 said:

Yes, I am not suggesting that this was anything other than a mistake. But I was wondering, now that transactions are cashless, whether more could be done, via technology, to refund overpayments when the store has erred. I am not sure that you would need to contact each customer to do this. I know they debit £99 when I fill  up the fuel, but adjust the amount afterwards,  and they have made adjustments to online shopping bills too.

I always check my receipts, and inaccurate charging happens a lot.  I was also overcharged at a garden centre this week, and had to get a refund. 

I think the short answer is no. I think there’s three reasons the answer is no:

1. The cost of refunds - there’s is still a cost of payment handling for all refunds. This may be only pennies, but there isn’t an automatic system (yet) in place so all refunds would be manual. So how far should the company go? Where should the line be? What about an item advertised at £4.99 and I get charged £5? An item at £138.50 and get charged £140 (this is the same case as yours in terms of pure value, but feels completely different). I think it’s unreasonable to expect retailers to absorb these costs of implementing this system, when there’s a free way already - the customer checks their receipt! 

2. Online and petrol stations charge a holding amount. What this means is the money is ringfenced in your account, available for the supermarket to take the amount of money they need to. A contract is formed when a supermarket dispatches the order - the reason for this if theres a price error on a website (e.g. an Airfryer being sold for £5 instead of £55). They can reject the order up to the point of dispatch and change prices as they want to then. With a petrol station you can see why they put a holding charge on your account - the amount of people stealing fuel. Again they’ll take what they need to. So looking at in store - it’s fairly simple when a contract is formed - it’s when the items are scanned and paid for. At that point the contract is formed, supplied, paid, and closed in very quick succession. So your receipt can act as your contract for goods offered, so any change to that contract (e.g. refunds) needs to issue a new contract (e.g. new receipt). So now that’s the case - how should they get the receipt to you?Assuming a Clubcard type situation - they probably can get your email and send you an email, but then we’re falling into the same trap as above of unrealistic costs. 

3. The customer should be checking their receipt. This I think is the most clear cut - the customer should be checking their receipts. A system of automatically refunding people is fundamentally flawed as it relies on people reporting the issue (if the shop knew there was incorrect signage then they’d just take the sign down) and when did the special offer end and how many people have been affected. Even if that system works, you’d still need to get an email address from people or they’d have to come to collect the refund. I’m all for innovation, but customers literally only have to check their receipt to see if they’ve been over charged. I don’t see any issue in that. 

Interestingly - if this ‘modification of prices’ became normal place, and you knew you were being undercharged would you then be happy with the supermarket writing you a new receipt and clawing the money back? That’s currently now allowed, but if retailers are then expected to make an effort to refund all customers who they *mistakenly* sold something at the wrong price to, then I think the clawing back underpriced items would be a compromise we could see come into law, but that seems very, very anti consumer. 

(All these comments I’ve made are for genuine mistakes - completely different if there’s an attempt to purposefully mislead consumers)

43722

Thank you for the responses.

So far, the best way forward would seem to be that stores commit to keeping prices, and publication of prices, synchronised. I definitely agree with checking receipts too. In fact i use the technology available to check prices as i shop, and ask for intervention before my cash is handed over. But I think it may be unrealistic to ask  all customers to do this all the time, and shoppers should me able to expect accuracy at the checkout.

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Technically it's a breach of the CPRs but enforcement is lacking in general meaning they have no reason to pay attention to the details, supermarket pricing is generally poor with either offers that don't scan correctly or stuff on the shelves with no prices. 

When you end up with a market dominated by a handful of companies the service starts to go downhill, the supermarkets are a prime example of this. 

RefluentBeans

43722 said:

Thank you for the responses.

So far, the best way forward would seem to be that stores commit to keeping prices, and publication of prices, synchronised. I definitely agree with checking receipts too. In fact i use the technology available to check prices as i shop, and ask for intervention before my cash is handed over. But I think it may be unrealistic to ask  all customers to do this all the time, and shoppers should me able to expect accuracy at the checkout.

The supermarkets have data on what the price should be. Publishing that wouldn’t be an issue for them to do, but doesn’t solve your issue. The issue is that the stores sometimes make mistakes with special offers. So how do you deal with that? Do you want the staff to go around record the prices of everything on a daily basis? Hourly basis? Weekly basis?

Additionally there is some variance between store types. Tesco Extra vs Tesco Express pricing is generally 5-10% more expensive in the latter. You say it’s unreasonable to ask a consumer to check the receipt - why? Legitimately - why is it too much to ask?

Grumpy_chap

All display prices (eg shelf edge / banner) are merely "invitation to treat".
Price is only agreed when paying.

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Grumpy_chap said:

All display prices (eg shelf edge / banner) are merely "invitation to treat".
Price is only agreed when paying.

This is correct but had someone made a purchase due to seeing a poster about a promotional offer and that offer not being available they'd very likely have a right to redress under the CPRs. Same could apply if the ticket on the shelf is incorrect. 

Not going to happen for a box of Weetabix obviously