Big Mess with IPAD 2 and best buy

[tc8z]

Apologies to freebird as you are a BB employee. You seem to be one of the better ones. Unfortunately, there are also bad employees and we usually only recall the bad ones more than the good. I'll withhold my past experiences but as it pertains to this forum, I did have a positive experience at the Fair Lakes VA BB where I got the iPad2.

 

[mossfur]

Mossfur

Congrats Vin, you will be a better person for going thru all this turmoil,especially now since you have the IPAD 2,enjoy.

 

[freebirdforever]

Apologies to freebird as you are a BB employee. You seem to be one of the better ones. Unfortunately, there are also bad employees and we usually only recall the bad ones more than the good. I'll withhold my past experiences but as it pertains to this forum, I did have a positive experience at the Fair Lakes VA BB where I got the iPad2.

Cheers m8. I know we've gotten a bit of a bad rap sometimes due to stupidity of our employees.

 

[Beornls]

So glad to hear that this worked out for you! I have some experience in loss prevention, and this type of scheme has been going on for years and years. Usually you see it in the form of barcode switching. For example, people go buy say a fishing rod, they take the bar code from the $12 fishing rod, and attach it to the $99 fishing rod, take it to the unsuspecting female checker. voila... instant $99 rod for $12. This used to be VERY common until manufacturers began to get wise and started using applied bar codes, etc. Now a days, the thieves use a bar code program and avery labels to apply their own bar code over the item they want to buy. They insure they use another "active" barcode in the stores system, usually for a similar lower priced item, then they just simply stick it over the existing barcode reap the profits. Another old time proven method is similar to what you experience, we used to term it 'shadow boxing'. Meaning they buy something, take it out, replace with something of like weight, reshrink and return. Actually in this situation you could might even consider yourself LUCKY. The thieves could have simply put something in the box weighing 1.3 lbs and gambled their luck... in which case you would have got home and had no iPad at all. I suspect the thief in your case was a scared amateur. Thats why they actually replaced the new iPad with an old one, just in case the BB return person actually opened it to check. At first glance, the old ipad looks the same, especially to a busy return desk person or someone who isnt familiar with them.

So best bet, as others have suggested, whenever your buying something, even if its NEW IN THE BOX, take the time to check it over very carefully. When in doubt, open it their, at the store, at the register even. That's the only way to be fail safe...

 

[freebirdforever]

So glad to hear that this worked out for you! I have some experience in loss prevention, and this type of scheme has been going on for years and years. Usually you see it in the form of barcode switching. For example, people go buy say a fishing rod, they take the bar code from the $12 fishing rod, and attach it to the $99 fishing rod, take it to the unsuspecting female checker. voila... instant $99 rod for $12. This used to be VERY common until manufacturers began to get wise and started using applied bar codes, etc. Now a days, the thieves use a bar code program and avery labels to apply their own bar code over the item they want to buy. They insure they use another "active" barcode in the stores system, usually for a similar lower priced item, then they just simply stick it over the existing barcode reap the profits. Another old time proven method is similar to what you experience, we used to term it 'shadow boxing'. Meaning they buy something, take it out, replace with something of like weight, reshrink and return. Actually in this situation you could might even consider yourself LUCKY. The thieves could have simply put something in the box weighing 1.3 lbs and gambled their luck... in which case you would have got home and had no iPad at all. I suspect the thief in your case was a scared amateur. Thats why they actually replaced the new iPad with an old one, just in case the BB return person actually opened it to check. At first glance, the old ipad looks the same, especially to a busy return desk person or someone who isnt familiar with them.

So best bet, as others have suggested, whenever your buying something, even if its NEW IN THE BOX, take the time to check it over very carefully. When in doubt, open it their, at the store, at the register even. That's the only way to be fail safe...

This.

 

[SDM44]

Glad to hear everything worked out just fine.

But just a FYI to others, in case you didn't already know, you can shrink wrap a box back very easily with the right parts. And there are people who do just that.

There are places too like Fry's Electronics, that if you bring back an item still shrink wrapped up, they will open it up anyways and verify what you are returning to them (the first time I saw them do this, I was amazed that they ruined the perfectly unopened item I brought back to return). But these days, you have to CYA if you're the seller or buyer, especially as people have gotten crafty to do things like this.

 

[ThePhotog]

Outstanding!

Sent from my iPad using iPF

 

[Mountainbikermark]

I bought my wife a laptop computer,got home, she saw how much I paid and said take it back, box unopened.
Went back to Best Buy, box unopened, the lady at the return desk unsealed it, checked it, then gave me back my money.
To me that's like the FEW places ,like the Oakley store that actually check my ID when I use my card. Some folks get all pissy. I ALWAYS thank them because IF that wasn't me and they were buying on my card, or in this instance the lady made sure the next customer didn't get ripped off (possibly me), she prevented it from happening.
OP,glad you got it resolved. It annoys the crap out of me when someone obviously didn't do their job then gets all defensive saying they know how to do their job. No one ever said they didn't know how , just saying they chose not to and someone is downhill catching the poo


Support Our Troops!!
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk.
You read it correctly, iPad and Tapatalk muhahaha!

 

[Tinman]

I bought my wife a laptop computer,got home, she saw how much I paid and said take it back, box unopened.
Went back to Best Buy, box unopened, the lady at the return desk unsealed it, checked it, then gave me back my money.
To me that's like the FEW places ,like the Oakley store that actually check my ID when I use my card. Some folks get all pissy. I ALWAYS thank them because IF that wasn't me and they were buying on my card, or in this instance the lady made sure the next customer didn't get ripped off (possibly me), she prevented it from happening.
OP,glad you got it resolved. It annoys the crap out of me when someone obviously didn't do their job then gets all defensive saying they know how to do their job. No one ever said they didn't know how , just saying they chose not to and someone is downhill catching the poo


Support Our Troops!!
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk.
You read it correctly, iPad and Tapatalk muhahaha!

I'm always amused at this. While checking your ID seems like they are looking out for "you" you should at least understand they are not: they are looking out for themselves.

You won't really be exposed if someone were to steal and use your credit card. But the retailer who has to deal with the chargeback will be.

So who are they really looking out for? And handing a stranger your ID is not always healthy either... especially if taken out of your sight.

As for opening a package before leaving the store... Well that sounds like putting the burden on the consumer. What if it is a gift? What if they have a policy to not accept opened returns? There needs to be a better solution other than making the actual consumer become a detective.



Michael

 

[Mtnmedic]

So glad to hear that this worked out for you! I have some experience in loss prevention, and this type of scheme has been going on for years and years. Usually you see it in the form of barcode switching. For example, people go buy say a fishing rod, they take the bar code from the $12 fishing rod, and attach it to the $99 fishing rod, take it to the unsuspecting female checker. voila... instant $99 rod for $12. This used to be VERY common until manufacturers began to get wise and started using applied bar codes, etc. Now a days, the thieves use a bar code program and avery labels to apply their own bar code over the item they want to buy. They insure they use another "active" barcode in the stores system, usually for a similar lower priced item, then they just simply stick it over the existing barcode reap the profits. Another old time proven method is similar to what you experience, we used to term it 'shadow boxing'. Meaning they buy something, take it out, replace with something of like weight, reshrink and return. Actually in this situation you could might even consider yourself LUCKY. The thieves could have simply put something in the box weighing 1.3 lbs and gambled their luck... in which case you would have got home and had no iPad at all. I suspect the thief in your case was a scared amateur. Thats why they actually replaced the new iPad with an old one, just in case the BB return person actually opened it to check. At first glance, the old ipad looks the same, especially to a busy return desk person or someone who isnt familiar with them.

So best bet, as others have suggested, whenever your buying something, even if its NEW IN THE BOX, take the time to check it over very carefully. When in doubt, open it their, at the store, at the register even. That's the only way to be fail safe...

My sister's best friend is a loss prevention manager for an electronics store. A retired cop, actually. This person says there's always the possibility that some less-than-honest employee with easy access to the stock and shrink wrapping tools working late (or early) in an unmonitored area could have had an opportunity to get himself a little upgrade on the sly.

This was brought up because I fell victim to the same problem as the OP a couple months ago. I ordered "new" headphones from an eBay seller with 99% positive feedback who supposedly sold over 200 of them. What I got was an opened packaging containing a totally broken, worn and old unit of the same model. Neatly packaged, of course. Unfortunately, the seller wasn't cooperative at all and that upset me. I filed a complaint with eBay and the seller's response to them was that I was trying to scam them, saying things like "We have receipts to show you that we bought hundreds of these new from the manufacturer and we've sold so many without complaints", and "don't let him do this to us", etc. Can you believe that? Little did they know I video recorded the removal of the product from the mailing package and the unboxing, as I always do with eBay purchases for my protection. After the back-and-forth dialog with the seller was getting nowhere, I escalated it to eBay's resolution team, who ruled in my favor the same day. I got a refund and was told I didn't have to return the product (which ended up in the skip, anyway, save for a cool little soft case and a some new mushroom ear tips it came with). Anyway, this friend of my sister's said inside job was possible because the seller (who is a warehouse vendor) was adamant that they'd sent me a new one and had sold many without issue, more than likely not knowing someone in their employ might have gotten himself an upgrade/free replacement.

But, honest customer or not, they should've just sent me a replacement, had me send the defective one back and chalked it up as the cost of business because-thankfully-the vast majority of customers ARE honest and the likelihood of this kind of thing happening is relatively rare. I'm an Amazon seller and that's exactly what I would've done (in fact, I probably would've told the customer to go ahead and keep what he got, being that the value was $30, as a token of good faith). Instead, these fools ended up getting the worst possible feedback and a raised eyebrow from eBay.

When we were kids, the trick amongst some devious friends was to simply switch price stickers. Of course, this was before bar code scanners.

Michael "Spam, spam, bacon, eggs and spam. Hold the bacon and eggs." Sent from my iPad using iPF