I sent the email below to kmart's customer service dept and received a general email reply detail kmart's layaway program:
Hello, I have used K-mart's services (at other store locations) in the past to layaway items for my daughters' Christmas presents with no problems until this year. Approximately six weeks ago I got a layaway purchase of Christmas items. At K-Mart Store # 4043 on 4400 Fort Jackson Blvd, Columbia, SC 29209. I went in two other times and paid on my purchases. My contract # was 40847. Today I go in to pick up my purchases and am told that my packages were put back on the shelf on November 5. I had made a layaway payment AFTER this date! Turns out I was paying on someone else's account—the cashier transposed the numbers on my contract on two separate occassions. I did notice that the price of the items had gone down, but I thought it was because said items were on sale. The cashier Niconya was very rude to me and told me that I paid on someone else's account and didn't I check my contract #? I told her that I didn't think that was my responsibility—the cashier was supposed to make sure that the account being paid on was correct. And why do you even ask to see ids if you are not checking to see who the customer is. I'm already dealing with a difficult situation and she did not help matters by any means. She was also rude to another customer and made a comment that she wasn't going to deal with this anymore. I have spent over two hours shopping for these items and going to the store a total of three times to make payments on this account. I feel like this is a contract violation on Kmart's end. I had to wait for about 30-40 minutes before I got my money back today. I told a manager that was walking by that I was very upset about this. I thought I had done the majority of Christmas shopping for my girls and now I have to start all over again and possibly not be able to purchase the same items again since it is one month before Christmas! I was also upset because of the rude cashier and managers that were told about my situation and made no apologies until I reminded them of that fact. When you make a mistake like that I believe that an apology is the first thing to do. Apologize and then try to rectify the problem. I was then apologized to, but I felt it was too little too late. I was offered an attempt to get my items back in layaway but why would I trust this store again? I also must mention that while I was waiting another customer coming in to make a payment was told that her items were sent back to stock and she received a refund. She told her mother that she had been up to date on her payments so she was leaving and now doing all of her layaway shopping at Sear's. All I can say is that I am deeply dissatisfied by Kmart's actions with my layaway purchases. I feel a serious violation of trust and a serious waste of my time. If you can't do it right don't do it at all. I have always liked K-mart and hated the way Walmart has taken over so many different shopping arenas. But hey, if you aren't going to take care of your customers, not honor contracts, disrespect them and treat them rudely then maybe Walmart is not so bad after all.
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