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Castorama caught out..


milkeybar kid
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Double check your bar code and price. I was fuming to say the least.

We go into Castorama specific for fuses.

It was marked clearly a pack of 3 at €3.80, we go to the till and she asked for €5.80.

What! no I said it was marked clearly at 3.80, she phones a bod and says No its €5.80, so we trundle off back to the shelf to those long spikes that had 200 of these packs of fuses on, so I thought I would take the mountain to Mohamed and lifted all 200 and the bar that supported them stating the price was €3.80!!! hubby goes and hides and says he is too embarrassed to watch , I go back to the same till and in my best sign language and charades I am able to convey that this is the price I intend to pay as it is the law that they must sell at price stated, and said I would stay here blocking the till all day! She phones a bod up who confirms I am correct and says he has to get a special paper, 15 minutes + waiting and have to put up with this sniggering girl telling all and sundry I brought the whole shelf to prove the point, eventually the bod returns with specially printed paper saying what I have no idea asks me to sign it and I refuse and put the exact money on the table and managed to convey my husband will be writing to Castorama of your conduct. Poor hubby emerges just on cue, and they let us pass with the fuses at the price advertised. Oh, how we laughed afterwards, but I am sharing this to say stand up to them, look at the fiddle thats going on and I might add my hubby says the bod put the shelf back and did not correct the price so even more folk will think its only €3.80 and what with other things they buy might not spot they have paid 5.80. Bas****s , no wonder they can afford to sponsor yachts.
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Typical....They have put the price up so it will show at the till but when it comes to altering barcodes on items  and changing prices on display  they are too lazy to do it. or more likely dont know how ! .

 Happens everywhere.in France .................Feels great when the French suddenly improves because you are wound up does it not !

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[quote user="AnOther"][quote user="milkeybar kid"]this is the price I intend to pay as it is the law that they must sell at price stated[/quote]

Good for you for making a stand but can you provide a link to that law please ?[/quote]

I don't believe there is a law which states the shop has to sell at the price displayed, but it is customary in case

of difference between the price indicated on the shelf and read at the till, to charge to the most favorable price to the consumer

(except in case of obvious error, such as a TV set priced at 10€).

In other words, it is down to the person responsible for the shop to accept that the item should be sold at the price displayed on the shelf, rather than the price read at the till. (ref HERE)

I have, on occasions, been know to deliberately purchase items when I knew the price to be incorrect (in my favour)...[Www]

A recap might be useful:

  • In case of a promo, any item or service purchased or ordered during the period of the promotion must be sold at the price advertised. (Art. 3)
  • No item or service can be advertised if it is not available during the period of the promo. (Art.4)
  • This means that if your supermarket distributes a leaflet with a special price for an item and that item is not available during the dates advertised, you are entitled to a purchase voucher for the item at the reduced price OR you can try to negotiate for a similar item at the reduced price advertised.
When or if the leaflet states a maximum number of items available during the promotion, (for example, 1500 computers only, as Lidl or Aldi do), once the item has sold out, that's it.

Legislation HERE.

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[quote user="Clair"]I have, on occasions, been known to deliberately purchase items when I knew the price to be incorrect (in my favour)...[Www][/quote]

You are not alone ... even I have been known to succumb on the odd occasion. For me it eases my conscience to believe that a canny purchase at the right time makes up for all the times I am overcharged and cannot be bothered to argue ... [blink]

Sue

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[quote user="suein56"][quote user="Clair"]I have, on occasions, been known to deliberately purchase items when I knew the price to be incorrect (in my favour)...[Www][/quote]

You are not alone ... even I have been known to succumb on the odd occasion. For me it eases my conscience to believe that a canny purchase at the right time makes up for all the times I am overcharged and cannot be bothered to argue ... [blink]

Sue

[/quote]

My thoughts exactly.

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I saw your link Clair, and this is from the DGCCRF web site

http://goo.gl/P3c5o

Vous constatez une différence entre le prix indiqué en

rayon et celui lu en caisse.

Il est d’usage, en présence d’un produit indiqué à

deux prix différents, de faire payer le prix le plus favorable

au consommateur (sauf erreur manifeste, par

exemple un téléviseur à 10 ).

Si vous avez un doute avant de passer en caisse, utilisez

les bornes de lecture optique mises à la disposition des clients dans certains magasins.

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[quote user="Clair"]I have, on occasions, been know to deliberately purchase items when I knew the price to be incorrect (in my favour)...[Www][/quote]

Ah but have you considered the possibility of reverse psychology ?

Deliberate mis-pricing designed to entice customers to buy items they neither want or need simply because it looks like they are getting one over on the shop.

A neat way of getting rid of surplus stock without dropping to knock down prices or putting it the €1 bin. God help you all if I ever open a shop [6]

Interesting how everyone seems to choose a TV as their example [;-)]

Do you really think this is just a French thing Frederick ?

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Kid you dun good.

What is wrong with your husband? Why should shops get away with this - the reverse would be if they were priced at 5:80 and you just put down 3:80 to pay, would they let you do that? No of course not. Let's have a level playing field and one where people do not feel guilty for standing their ground.

It is amazing though how the shop, in this case the assistant on the till, made out it was your fault they were having to wait instead of the other way round that it was the shops fault.

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A French pal is quite rare in that he has travelled further than 3km from where he was born and even to England and is the only person that I can rant to about customer service, all the others just cannot get their heads around things in other countries being different to France whether it be GCSE's instead of BAC+ or other regs than NF so they just cannot comprehend what customer service is let alone could/should be.

Sometimes he puts me straight when I recount an encounter be it shop, grossiste, bank, Secu etc when I say that the person was racist, he says dont confuse their ignorance and insulting behaviour as racism, yes they use racist taunts to you because it is easy but he is treated just as badly and insulted in equal measure (he is one of the most charming guys I know) he tells me that the moment you walk into any premises here unless you are family you are usually assumed to be up to no good and trying to work one over on them, if you are returning a faulty product then it is an automatic reaction, it is because they assume that everyone else shares their moral code which happily is not true.

I use the word here to denote my locality, not as a generalisation of the French or even all Picards as it is a large departement and I live in hope.

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[quote user="AnOther"][quote user="Clair"]I have, on occasions, been know to deliberately purchase items when I knew the price to be incorrect (in my favour)...[Www][/quote]

Ah but have you considered the possibility of reverse psychology ?

Deliberate mis-pricing designed to entice customers to buy items they neither want or need simply because it looks like they are getting one over on the shop.

A neat way of getting rid of surplus stock without dropping to knock down prices or putting it the €1 bin. God help you all if I ever open a shop [6]

Interesting how everyone seems to choose a TV as their example [;-)]

Do you really think this is just a French thing Frederick ?

[/quote]

 Putting up prices is not just a French thing ..but ...not bothering to change the prices on the shelf  and the item barcodes so that the buyer has hasstle at the check out seems to be !

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This seems to be a standard practice in most supermarkets. They rely on you not noticing, or more to the point, not bothering.

If you query it, you will eventually get it for the right price, but you have to wonder if 15 minutes of your time being huffed and tutted at by a mardy cow on the accueil desk is worth it?

Last time I found this, it was a €2 overcharge on a computer lead I needed in a hurry. I only noticed as I had only bought the lead and 2 other items. If it had been in with my "big" shop, I probably wouldnt have even noticed. When I pointed the error out to the cashier, her manner changed straight away from the usual semi-cheeriness. Shutters came down and she bluntly told me to either leave it or buy it at this price and take it up at the service desk afterwards. I bought it and off I went. After the usual 3 minutes of being ignored while they talk amongst themselves, I was served and explained the situation, to be told that this was flatly impossible and I had made the mistake. Being polite but insistent got me nowhere. Her reply was that the error simply could not happen, or perhaps the item had been returned to the wrong peg by another customer. They even insinuated that I was trying to scam them. Eventually she agreed to look, and stomped off across the shop. I pointed out the lower advertised price on a peg full of the same item. Without further word she stomped back to the desk with me trailing after her. Common sense would dictate that they should just give me the €2, but no.....the transaction had to be refunded onto my card and then charged again at the "correct" price. (this is another minor scam in itself - debits are almost instant where refunds take up to a week, so I paid for the item twice and eventually got refunded once - I wonder who profits from that tiny amount of interest my money would have earned....the shop or the bank / merchant system?)

I wonder if the tide is very slowly changing though? One of the shouty adverts I hear every ten minutes on the radio is for a supermarket....Auchan, I think. The gist is that if there is a pricing error like this, they refund the difference and the entire purchase price of the item. However, the item refund is only applied to your loyalty card (I never bother with these anyway) and is limited to a max of €10, 1 item per person per day.

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I have had the same experience, word for word on many occasions.

What about a restaurant saga update?

You are a better man than me if you can poke up with the adverts on all French radio stations, they are nearly always the same supermarket as well, I just want to throttle the voice over woman that they all seem to use and that cheeky chirpy chappy for Leclerc would not sound so chipper if ever our paths cross!!

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Be aware...  Easter approaches  and with it an urge to check out all the things that may be needed this year to run your  pool if you have one ... The providers of "Pool Stuff " will have an equal urge to jack up theiir prices . If you find stuff at Easter that stilll has the winter price it will be as big a miracle as the virgin birth .

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As you say, once the French gets better you can hang on in there - my remark in the past has been ' Madam, je suis Anglaise, pas stupide!' That has usually got the whole queue sniggering at the mealy-mouthed cashier, who did not want to assist![;-)]
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I too have been overcharged at Carrefour in the past.

The girl on the till sent me to the "Customer Services".

I had to queue and it did take ages and I wasn't made to feel very welcome but, in the end, they refunded me TWICE the overcharge.

And, they gave me cash even though I had originally paid by credit card.

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I have been encouraged and heartened by the postings on this thread and I have to say I had 2 good results this weekend.

Firstly, Auchan were having a BOGOF on bedsheets.  Big display and sign but of course the size I needed wasn't explicitly mentioned.  So I took the 2 sheets I wanted to Customer Information and asked if these were included in the offer too.  Ooo don't know but a quick scan and tappy-tap and the computer said Yes!!  Got to cash desk and even the nice lady there was surprised a little and remarked that I had got one free.  She then asked where were they on display so she could get some!  It goes to show, not unreasonably, that the staff don't always know what deals are on offer.

Second result was in a fairly upmarket sports shop.  Spotted a nice ski jacket reduced from €160 to €70. Now since my old jacket has definitely seen better days and has a rip in the back I treated myself.  Got to cash desk where it was rung up at €160 !!!  I pointed out it was now on offer but she wasn't having any of it.  Right, back to the rack of jackets, every other one was marked at €70 but the only one in my size wasn't.  Found a sales guy and explained, at first he was sceptical but when I pointed out the others he appologised for the error and wrote the correct price on the ticket.  'Tell the girl on the desk that Serge says this is the correct price'  Well done Serge !!!

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