2 Stealing Tricks Of Shoprite That We Must Resist!
I did not write this story because Shoprite is from the ungrateful country called South Africa or because of the fall-out of the constant xenophobic attacks by South Africans against other Africans living in South Africa.
I wrote it because it is high time we protested and stopped Shoprite from swindling Nigeria and Nigerians through some dirty tricks.
Would like to know what those tricks are? Find them below!
1. Deliberate Duplication Of Items Purchased
Please, follow me attentively in order to understand how this trick works.
Sometime ago, I went to Shoprite at the Asaba Mall in Asaba, the capital of Delta State, for my shopping. After I had selected what I wanted, I took them to the cashier, paid for them and left for home with them.
When I got home and dropped them in the kitchen, my daughter started arranging each of the items where they belonged, with a view to tidying the kitchen. While she was doing that, she saw the receipt issued to me by Shoprite, and started studying it.
Not long after that, she came to where I sat in the sitting room and said: “Daddy, you came back home with two loaves of bread, but your receipt showed that you paid for four. Why?”
Following her observation, I decided to join her in cross-checking the items I came home with against the receipt. Behold, my daughter was correct!
There was a duplication of the number of loaves of bread that I paid for. Instead of the two I took to the cashier, my debit card was charged for four. Without much ado, I took the whole things I bought and went back to Shoprite.
Instead of confronting the teller whom I paid to, I decided to ask for his supervisor. After lodging my complaint with the supervisor, he requested me to lead him to the cashier who attended to me, which I did.
After a few minutes of interrogation, the supervisor discovered that it wasn’t a mistake, but a sharp practice by the cashier. To cut the story short, the supervisor pleaded with me to forgive the offending teller and gave me the value of the loaves of bread that I was over-charged for.
Some unreasonable readers of this story might say, “Is it only two loaves of bread that you went back to Shoprite to complain about?”
It is not about the loaves of bread. It is about the evil behind the loaves of bread. It is about correcting the attitude of that particular cashier and others like him.
If that criminally minded cashier was not punished by his employer for his bad attitude of that day, I definitely know that he would think twice before trying such nonsense on some other persons, except he was a devil-incarnate. That’s the point you must take away from this story.
A similar incident happened to a lady at the same Shoprite in Asaba, not too long ago. This time by a female cashier. It happened in my presence, as if I was gifted in discovering dubious Shoprite tellers.
The victim, a thirty-something-year-old lady, came there to buy some household items, including tins of corned beef, sardines, powder milk and toiletries. When it was time for her to pay, she offered the teller her bank debit card, and her card was charged.
Upon receiving her receipt and change from the teller, she paused for a while, after studying the receipt curiously and shrugged disapprovingly, signifying that something must had gone wrong somewhere.
After a few seconds of studying her receipt, she broke her silence and said: “I don’t think that the things I bought are up to the amount that my card was charged. Could you, please, re-machine or re-calculate these items”
Immediately after making that firm observation, the teller, in a face-saving manner, said: “Oh, oh, oh, you’re correct. It seems I made a mistake. Let me see!”
“That is why,” continued the cashier in her face-saving defence, “we advise our customers to always look at the screen of our machines whenever we’re machining their items, so that any mistake could be spotted immediately before it is too late.”
The cashier’s victim knew that the cashier was trying to pull a fast one on her, yet she did not utter a word of provocation as most other people would. All she wanted was value for her money; no more, no less, which she got.
So, my dear reader, whenever you visit any Shoprite outlet, in any part of Nigeria, please, make sure you check the items you purchased against the receipt issued you by the cashier. Do this even when you make several purchases.
Do not be in a hurry to go home with your items, unless you’re comfortable with being cheated or unless you want to encourage Shoprite cashiers in their habit of stealing.
Ensure that you check the items you bought against the receipt issued you. Finally, still make sure you keep your receipt(s) at home for some days. It is very advisable for you to do so for several different reasons.
2. Coin-Change Denial
In the early days of the Asaba Mall-based Shoprite, it used to give its customers coin change, whenever its customers had a small amount of change to collect after purchase.
For example, if a customer bought an item worth N49.99 (forty-nine naira ninety-nine kobo) and offered his/her cashier a hundred naira (N100), such customer would be given a change of N50.01 (fifty naira one kobo), and so on and so forth.
But today, the story is no longer the same. The Shoprite in Asaba has suddenly become a corporate thief; it no longer offers coin-change to its customers. All the coins-change that result from customers’ transactions there are now being stolen by Shoprite and its cashiers.
If one million Nigerians, which is possible, are denied their one kobo change every day by Shoprite, how much do you think Nigeria would be losing to Shoprite every week, every month and every year?
Is this not stealing? Over to you!
When I confronted and accused one of the tellers at the Asaba Mall-based Shoprite over this type of stealing, she smiled wryly and said: “Sir, we stopped giving coin-change because some Nigerians don’t like accepting it.”
Does this make any sense to you? Would the fact that some people don’t like collecting their coin-change stop Shoprite from giving those who are interested their change?
For me, the answer is a capital NO! It doesn’t make any sense to me, at all!
What I feel Shoprite should be doing is to offer coin-change to any customer who has one to collect. Any customer who refuses to collect such change should have his or her change returned to Shoprite’s coffers.
2 Stealing Tricks Of Shoprite That We Must Resist!
