Circuit City
Employees disrespected degraded embarrassed me wife & newborn son in front of customers & employees on a product return

This is going to be a long story, and so unbelievable in my eyes, that I do not want to leave out even one detail.

Ok, let's get it started.

Three weeks ago, my wife and I had our first newborn son & were in the market to buy a camcorder to film our child through the upcoming holidays. My interest was for a Mini DVD camcorder that recorded on DVD-R, as well as DVD-RW media. (Very important that it records on this media, or else it will not play on my DVD player or computer).

We began comparing prices from major local stores & were pleased to find what seemed to be a great deal on a Hitachi DVD camcorder in an After Thanksgiving Sale flyer from Circuit City.

My wife wanted to get out of the house, so she went to the store to pick it up. I had her call me on her cell phone once she began speaking with a salesperson, so that I could ask my important questions, and be certain that this camcorder would be compatible with my needs. My wife then calls me, I ask all my questions to the salesperson directly, & was told YES, this will work on the media requested. My wife then goes ahead and purchases the camcorder, extra battery, case, * 5pk of DVD-RW discs.

* = will be important later in the story.

Two and a half weeks go by, I never open the box (big mistake) because I am only anticipating using it for Xmas, therefore in no rush to record with it. On Friday 12/10, I finally had some extra time and I decided to open it up and familiarize myself with the camera. I pop in a disc from the 5 pack & it does not work. Why, why, why? I pull out the manual & go through the first few pages only to find out that DVD-RW media is on a list of NON-compatible media for the camera. At this point there is no big deal because I will go research a camera that WILL fit my needs and arrange to make a switch.

Researching other cameras, I find a Sony HandyCam that will work for what I need on Amazon.com, at a great price ($200 less than what Circuit City advertises for the same camera). My thoughts now are, go to Circuit City with the ad and see if they can match the price, or to give me a full refund to buy the camera directly from Amazon.

I know, I know get to the point, right? We will now get to the meat and potatoes

Monday evening 12/13/04, my wife, I and my newborn son go over to Circuit City to work it out. We head up to the service counter and are greeted by a service rep. I tell her the whole story of how we were sold the camera with the understanding that it was compatible with DVD-RW media (the 5 pack sold to us on the same receipt), and in actuality it was NOT compatible. I then ask if she can match the Amazon price, or give me a full refund to go purchase elsewhere. The service reps offers to transfer the full amount of the sale towards the purchase of another camera at her store, but cannot match the competitor price, or she can give me a refund minus a 15% restocking fee!

Me: Absolutely not, why do I need to pay a restocking fee if your salesperson sold me non-compatible products on the same receipt to prove it?
Service Rep: You are returning the camera in an open box & it is our policy to charge the fee.

In a respectful manner, we now get into it a little and I request a manager.

I am now greeted by Cathy the Asst. Manager (very rude from the start). We go over the whole story again, only to be told once again that I would have to be charged the 15% fee. She did not care that the salesperson did not know what he was talking about when I was sold the item, and that the box was open. Blah, blah, blah, fee, fee, fee.

Me: Please get me the Store Manager.
Cathy: He is not here. (Super rude mannerisms with a line of approx. 7-8 customers, my wife and son by my side)
Me: Can you call him, I will not leave until this matter is resolved.
Cathy: I am the only one who can deal with this, you can call some 1-800# and file a complaint if you would like.

This is completely crazy to me, and I am not going to be stuck with a camera that does not work for me! I ask for the manager's name, and she tells me I cannot have it. She then tells me her two options again. I refused them once again and tell her I cannot believe this is happening. I am then told that she has told me everything she has to say and walks away to a back room. (I am livid, and not leaving).

In the mean time, people are still in line watching this circus as I stand there for approx. 10 minutes. Out comes Jay, very rude as well with arms crossed with a smart ass grin on his face. What can I do for you!?

I ask him, first off who are you, and will you be able to help me? He says he is also an Asst. Manager and to go ahead with my story. Once again, I tell the entire story, all the while this smart ass grin on his face. I just knew I was wasting my time with him as well. At the end of my story he tells me regardless of your story, I stand behind Cathy's decision

I request full names of both Jay, Cathy and the store manager so that I can contact him. Jay tells me I have their first names & he will not give me anything else!

He then has the audacity to wager me that I will not get my money! I said excuse me??? I guarantee you I will get what I want. Again, he says I will bet you that you WILL NOT GET YOUR MONEY!!! The encounter gets ugly and I repeat the request for full names for record purposes.

All the while there are customers in line, my wife has become completely embarrassed & is standing aside with my son, and a half circle of employees has formed around us enjoying themselves as if this were a live comedy skit.

With altercation type mannerisms i am told by jay, you have everything you need! Now get out of this store, you are not welcomed here, leave immedatley before i call the police for trespassing!!!

I am in absolute shock that I am being treated in this way in public, disrespecting me, my family!

He comes from around the desk, arms crossed in an altercation type manner, walks closely behind me and my family as he attempts to escort us out of the store. My wife then says, wait a minute we have done nothing wrong, why don't we stay and call the police as well. I said great idea, this way we can file a report and get full names of these employees involved so that we can escalate this matter.

The police arrive and want to hear the complete story. I tell them everything that had transpired, and they were completely shocked that it had gotten to that point. They completely backed me up with the idea of taking this to upper management, but regretfully could not make a report because it was a civil matter versus a criminal matter. We finally leave the store, feeling used, abused, disrespected, degraded and with nothing resolved!

The very next day 12/14/04, I said to myself why not attempt trying the return at a completely different store and not even mention what had happened the night before. On my lunch break I brought all the merchandise to the Circuit City in Cranston to make the attempt. I was greeted by a woman at the service desk who asked why I was returning the merchandise. I told her the whole story as well of how it was sold to me, but was non-compatible with the disks, blah, blah, blah. She asked what I would like to do? I told her I wanted a full refund minus the disks (I would keep them for when the Sony camera came in). She then processed the full refund and I was on my way. This whole transaction took 5-8 minutes tops!

Gee isn't that weird how that was soooo easy. Unbelievable, but this is not over.

I begin researching upper management information to escalate this matter. I receive the phone # of a regional sales manager and left a message of the story on his voicemail. He returned the call almost immediately, and was shocked of the story and could not believe it had gotten to the point that it did. Not to mention furious that no one had notified him the police officers were called to the store. He was very sympathetic and I was extremely glad to have talked to him. He said once he was off the phone with me, he would call the store manager immediately to have a talk.

The family and I went out for the evening. When we came home, there were 2 voicemails showing on my home phone. The first was from the store manager apologizing about the situation and wanted me to call him. The second voicemail is the kicker.

The second voicemail was an anonymous employee of Circuit City who had witnessed everything un-fold. She said she could not believe what she had seen and felt bad that I had been treated the way I had. She also wanted to give me the full names of the two main employees involved and to top it off, Jay had put out an email to the store employees after I left about A Nutty Customer and how to never give out manager information when requested by a customer.

Tonight 12/16/04 I will be going to meet with the store manager face to face

Steve
CUMBERLAND, Rhode Island
U.S.A.

Company: Circuit City
Country: USA
State: Massachusetts
City: North Attleboro
Address: 1360 South Washington Street
Phone: 5086953375

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