Target Store, Pasadena, TX - charger and battery missing from V-Tech phone - no exchanges allowed due to box being opened - finally given store credit to use in any department

# 16 for June 29, 2003

Complaints.com received the following on June 28, 2003:

From: Email User

RE: Target Store, Pasadena, TX - charger and battery missing from V-Tech phone - no exchanges allowed due to box being opened - finally given store credit to use in any department

Last night we were at Target and decided to purchase another V-Tech phone to go with the base that we bought three years ago. This phone allows you to add up to four phones. When we got home and opened up the box we found that the charger and battery were missing, all that was there was the paperwork and the phone.

My husband also realized that the phone was different then the one we had. He then went online to the official V-Tech web page and further discovered that the phone that we purchased would not interface with the older model that we had.

Now I have the receipt and today went back to return this phone. I was promptly told that no exchanges could be made because the box was opened. Hello, how were we supposed to know half was missing? I recommend, following our conversation with the assistant manager, that when you are checking out you OPEN all boxes and sort through all the parts and make sure that they are all there.

They assume that you are guilty of taking them. I know people do this, but why would I want a base and return the phone? After I asked him if he was promoting that we all open our purchases before we walk out the door. He said well I guess you are correct.

I have to admit that as mad as I was getting the young lady at the counter was very nice, she also believed me. I did offer to drive the manager over to my home and look at our phones.

My is that he told me that he would let me have a store credit but that I would have to use it only in the electronics dept. I regularly spend several hundred dollars at Target a month. Like I told him, At this time I needed nothing from that dept.except a phone. I was told that I could only get an exchange in the same dept. Now I had planned on shopping for laundry detergent, new clothes, etc. I knew I would probably spend way more than the 49.00 I had coming.

They offered me a card to customer relations main office. This was at 7:00 p.m. on a Sat. For some reason I called on my cell phone just to see if I could leave a voice mail. Surprise when a live person answered. After explaining what happened she then talked to the store manager. They reversed the decision and gave me a store credit to use in any dept.

This was the Pasadena Texas store and the Manager was very polite. My complaint is with the policy itself. what happens to the people that don't get mad? One other thing with computers it is easy to track who returns and how often. Like I told him, I shop regularly and haven't returned anything in years.

Shouldn't that count for something? Also, I realize that people trash, steal and swap items, and Target needs to protect itself, but how do we protect ourselves? I suggest that we all wait till check out and then in front of the clerk open every box and count all the items. That will be lots of fun come Christmas time.

Ellen Klassen