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97 responses total.

Call the management, they _love_ to hear from happy customewrs like you! 

   You can only get the maximum of $5.00 per type of item, so four
of the same thing overcharged still only gets you $5.00.  Also,
unless the law has been ammended, it's 10 times the difference, not
five.
   Yes, it always pays to look at things.  Krogers has been the
worst at this (or best, if you look at it from the monetary
standpoint), but all stores do this all the time.

870 is the department number for housewares.  it should be on just about
everything in that department.
the overcharge law applies to all things scanned, not just groceries.

I guess you really have to make sure that the item you grabbed was the one
that the sign was advertsing, exactly.  sometimes they stick the 6 digit
SKU number on the sign, so you can look for that on the product.  sometimes
a product model number.  sometimes nothing.  sometimes the sign hasn't been
taken down after the sale expired, in which case you ARE entitled to the
correct price, a refund, and 10 times the difference or $5.  

as for if you bought 4 dishes of the same UPC#, you would only be entitled
to one 10x or $5 bonus.  but, if you had 4 different dishes, differentiated
by UPC number, then you should get the 10x|$5 for all of them.

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 no. MIchigan law says that all items must be tagged with the price.

Valerie, I used to work for Meijer's and they have a great customer
satisfaction policy.  If you present yourself as a "regular customer"
who can't figure out why the prices don't match, are a little dis-
appointed, and would like to purchase them at the lower posted price,
odds are very good that a manager will sell them at that price.

Put it this way:  it doesn't hurt to ask.

I'd take them back.  They overcharged me for some vitamins and I got
$5 back because of it.

To quote State of Michigan PA 344 of 1984:
"Except as provided in subsection (3), this section applies to a sale at
retail which meets all of the following conditions:
(a) There is a price stamped on or affixed to the item.
(b) The sale is recorded y an automatic checkout system.
(c) The buyer is given a receipt which describes the item and states the
price charged for the item.
Subsection (3) : THIS SECTION DOES NOT APPLY AT RETAIL IN WHICH THE 
SELLER INTENTIONALLY CHARGES MORE FOR AN ITEM THAN THE PRICE STAMPED ON
OR AFFIXED TO  THE ITEM.

In any casee, though, this law would not apply to the problem at hand 
since the allegedly misscanned item was not actually purchased.  You've 
got to consummate the sale, then go back and ask for the refund.

Don't you just love the media circus?  

I was working (and still am) in a grocery store at the time the news gave the
"BIG" story on overcharging.  For two weeks after we were assaulted by greedy
people wanting more than their share back.  We need to educate people on the 
law, especially if they want to get something out of it.  I'm not saying that
what happened was right (If a item is marked by a sign, it should ring up that
way at the counter, and if it doesn't, you should say something.  It not only
gets you the correct price, but it alerts the management that the item in 
question is not in the computer correctly.)  I've been in Meijer's and Kroger
, and twice I've been offered a scanning overcharge.  They thank me up and down
when I tell them it's not necessary, and to just give me the difference.  Do
you have any idea how much a pain in the butt those things are for everyone
involv- ed?  Filling them out, entering them into the register, justifying them
in the accounting department...?  Big fun!  I saw a fellow employee lose his
job because he failed to correctly price tag a product, resulting in five 
scanning overcharges before it was fixed.

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The over charges that are hard to catch are the extra scan they do
once in a while when you have 50 cans of the same thing...

Like, what?

Um, cat food?

 I have a copy of this law on the computer somewhere. I'll post it when
I can find it.

And please keep after m if I have not done it.

   Randall, the whole point of the exercise in filling out forms, etc.
is to make it painful enough that stores will do something about it.
I clearly remember the attitude in food stores that basically went:
oh, we overcharged you? Oh well, here's your money
and that was it.  Nowdays they're scrambling to get it right.
Back when I was a little kid, I remember going shopping with my
mother, and one of the games I played was to memorize the price of
things and make a running tally of the total, which I'd then use at
checkout time.   I can only remember one occaison where I caught
something being overcharged.  And remember, I'm ancient.  This was
all manually entered data.   So now that we have electronic systems
there is anywhere as much of an excuse for this as there was in
the 60's?  Hah!  I think the law is wonderful.

My wife _regularly_ checks her receipt at Meijers and Krogers and 
_more often than not_ there is a scanner error.  She gets a scanner
award every time.  We must have collected hundeds of $$.

By the way, I'm looking at a rendering of the law (Act# 449 of Public
Acts of 1976, Section 45.360a)

The scanner award is 10X the difference, but not less than $1 or more than 
$5.  This is of course in addition to the actual difference you were 
overcharged.  

Example:  overcharge 20 cents each on 50 cans of cat food:
Scanner award = $5.00, plus 50 X .20 = $15.00 total refund.
(You don't get to multiply the penalty times the number of an item
purchased)

Years ago the service desk people at Meijer and Kroger would try to
make up excuses such as, "You have to go home and come back", or 
"It doesn't apply to (Fill in item name such as meat, ethnic food, sale
items etc.)"  and a few other excuses I can't remember.  Now they just 
hand it over.  I would not say they act "happy"

Two comments about the whole thing:
Is it intentional?  I think so, in a way.  I think the retailers pay
a lot more attention to keeping the prices _up_ in the computer than they
do to _reducing_ them.  Or they raise prices without changing the price 
tags.  They are definitely more likely to err in their own favor than
in your favor.  

Recently 20-20 did a piece on this subject.  One of the retailers said
"hey, we're not that bad.  We get the right price at least 97% of the time!"
Can you believe that??!!  He thought that was _good_!  They only rip off
the customer on about 3% of all purchases!!  They did not even challenge
him on this!  They thought that was OK!  Give us a break!  97% is not OK!
(wjw steps down off soap box, agrees to switch to decaf)

Hey everybody, CHILL OUT!  Who enters the numbers?  People!  Of course they're
gonna make mistakes.  This law is a farce.  Our society continually helps out
individuals that make mistakes, bu insists upon punishing businesses.  I may
just be an eternal optimist, but I don't believe these supermarkets are
intentionally misentering info.  The paybacks simply don't cover the potential
dangers.  All businesses into public services want the trust of their
customers.  Thats why they will fix their mistakes.  I used to be a manager
at a McDonalds <insert wisecrack>, its the same kinda thing, public service.
What was the number one goal I was to have?  Make that customer happy.  We
did whatever it took to make the cust. happy.  Give these poor guys a break.

I recall the news story mentioned above saying that statistically scanner
errors are are much more likely to be in favor of the store than in favor
of the customer.  If it weren't for that, I'd agree with Jason.

Since it was the stores' idea to go from a system that made fewer errors to
one that makes more errors (just to save money, which it did), I am in 
favor of the law too.

   Jason, I'm just old enough to have grown up with manual systems
when I was younger and bought food for the family.  I simply do not
remember the sheer number of errors that exist today.  Of course
people make mistakes; thats a given.  But the incresed number? No.
And worse yet, they're using technology that makes it so much
easier.

They're making a completely different kind of mistake now. With the old
system a human read a price off the can. Misreading and miskeying were
the sources of error. Now, to save $$, they don't put prices on the can.
These new errors are extremely systematic. As soon as the shelf and the 
computer disagree, all instances of people checking out with the affected
item will produce errors. This boosts the number of individual errors way
beyond what we used to see. And technology makes these errors possible
(while eliminating the old ones, of course).

[Is this a version of The Monty Question from an eralier Item?  8^) ]

Re: Jason's post
There are _some_ retailers who seem to be trying to please the customer
and some that are not.  And it appears the grocery stores are happy
to get away with ripping off those customers who are unaware of the
scanner errors.  As stated above, if it were simply human errors, half
of them would be in favor of the customer, and it's been pretty well
established that that is not the case.

Regarding McDonalds philosophy of pleasing the customer:  I've noticed
with McDonalds and also other frachises particularly Domino's and 
Avis Rent a Car -- If it's a company owned location, they are more
likely to try to please the customer than if its a franchise.  The 
franchise owner is using his _own_ money to please the customer, whereas 
the company store employee is using the company's money.

I've actually had employees of frachise locations of the above 3 outfits
tell me "we're a franchise, not a company owned store.  We set our own
policy, and that's the way it is"

So regarding scanner errors, I think the law is necessary to force them 
to clean up their act.  If anything, the scanner award should be greater.
97% correct is mighty poor.  Would you fly on an airline with a 97% success
rate?

Clean up their Act?  What are they, intentionally doing it?  I don't think so.
Consider the vast number of products a grocery store carries, I've never
counted but have seen inventory sheets that go on forever.  In the old days
(apologies to all) when products were labeled by hand there were only two
sources of error, mislabeling and misreading.  Now with the advent of 
computers there are multiple places for error, with teh frequent price
changes and sales.  Higher error is understandable.  You are very right about
franchise stores, and it is up to the customer to keep the business in line,
not the government.  I wonder if you all would be so hard if you saw the 
money the stores were saving with computers.  Think lines are long now,
what if each item were manually entered!  Stores are able to keep prices
lower by increasing check out speed (thus increasing volume) and by saving
on labeling.  Any error found should be reported to a manager, and he should
be willing to help.  If he isn't, go somewhere else.  (oops, forgot to be
PC, should have used woman and she).  Consumers can work wonders on keeping
businesses inn line.  Just ask the people at consumer reports.
As for the airline analogy, I would hope a life and death situation like
that would have lower error margins.  Last I checked there were no instances
of 400 people dying in flames due to a mis-scan of soup.

re 24:
I think the answer to the question you pose in the first line is, yes, it
must be intentional, since if the errors were random they would be in the
consumer's favor about half the time.  Studies have shown that they are
predomiantly in the store's favor.  (as well as folks' experience posted 
here).  Is there any other explanation?

Yes.  i believe the predominant errors occur with sale items, or the like.
Whenever a price is reduced there occurs many chances for error.  The most
common error would be not entering the new price, or misentering it so that
the computer rejects the update.  I don't think they are doing this on
purpose.  the telzon machines they use are very touchy.

re26:
No.  You have a point, but most times an item goes on sale it also
comes off of sale and the price goes back up.  They are pretty 
quick to raise the prices again...

If the predominant source of errors is with sale items (I'm not sure it is)
then "forgetting" or "screwing up" entering the sale price is eequal to being
intentional.

as a former retail employee, I am speaking from experience here.

1)  I think the law is a good thing because it does force the store to be
    more accurate, to WANT to be more accurate.  10X the difference over-
    charged removes the profit in more than 10X the same product sold,
    in most instances.  profit margins are generally 1 to 3 % - if you
    are charged $10.10 on a $10 product, your award is $1.10.   the
    profit made on that $10 product is usually at most 3%, or $0.30.
    they now have to sell 4 more of that product to break even.

2)  Sale items.  the law does not require scanned products to have the
    marked price change for sale items - they can be left marked at full
    price, and then scanned at the sale price.

3)  The stores do not care that they are overcharging.  see #1 above.
    also, my job, along with 5 other people, was to go through the store,   
    department at a time, item at a time, scanning and verifying the price
    on every single item.  
 
4)  everything else I want to say:
    when an award is given, the scanned item is 'restricted' and WILL NOT
    SCAN at the register - the price must be entered by hand - this will
    prevent overcharging.
why are there more overcharges than undercharges?  because prices go up,
not down.  costs go up.  everything goes up.  inflation.
the scanner prices are all in the computer.  it takes a matter of seconds
for the computer to change and update the price of everything in the store.
all of the price changes every week take effect as soon as the sheet of
price changes is mart(k{_ed as "complete"
if some stock was missed, wandered off to another department, or was
in the backroom lost somewhere (also missed) then these thingst( lead
rather quickly to overcharges.

I too think that this is likely the reason that most errors turn up as
overcharges.  Previously-priced merchandise is missed.  I've seen lots
of times when this has plainly happened, there being items marked at two
prices on the shelf.  (Unlike some of you, I usually call this to the
cashier's attention, preferring to avoid the hassle at the cost of losing
the award.)

But isn't it punishing a rathert small mistake.  When stores run on such
small profit margins anything this big really affects them.  I guess my
problem is that I expect the consumer to keep the business in line, where-
as some of you would prefer the government to do it.  Think what would
happen if everytime you accidentilly paid too little at a fast-food polace
they would charge you 10 times the difference.  I think most of you would
feel like they are punishing an easy to make mistake rather harshly.

I really don't think this is a big deal to the stores, and it serves to keep
them honest.

Maybe so, but think of the precedents it causes.  Government intervention
in all forms of business, on the pretense of "keeping them honest."  Quite
frankly this scares me, seems a little too close to Socialism.  I still
think consumers can do a better job than the government of keeping businesses
in line.  After all, MI is making the consumer enforce the law, is it not?

Re #23- Just a little info:

I worked for McDonalds for a little more than 3 years, and 'frannies' most
certainly DO NOT have a license to walk all over the customer.
Item pricing and caring certain items and hiring and firing and accounting, 
etc., yeah, they can hadnle that pretty much the way they want.
McDonald's Corp. has a policy out regarding ANYONE using the name McDonalds
when it comes towards customers, however.
THey can't just 'abuse' you and tell you 'tuff crap'.
I'd suggest getting in touch with the local area management where this
'frannie' is located.  The corp. management, that is.
They may give you a line and say that they are non-corp and can do their own
thing, but that 'frannie' will DAMN WELL have the corp checking them out.
They also, btw, are subject to loss of rights if they violate McDonalds
food prep guidelines.  You don't serve under the McDonalds name
(at least in theory) unless you are serving under their guidelines.
I won't argue that rules get inforced very well, but I KNOW they do investigate
stores, including 'frannies' and have given 'fix it or else' orders

I would hope that corporate McD's enforces their franchising terms,
but in practice it doesn't always seem like it (or maybe it's that
change takes 5 years to be noticeable at some franchises).  If you
want a lesson in how not to do McD's service, check out the McD's
on Maynard in Ann Arbor.  It is simply the absolute worst, most
pitiful, McDonald's I've have *ever* had the displeasure to do business
with.  I complained to the manager and he said 'yeah, we know.'  That
as far as I can see has been the end of the story.

Re #35-  Basically you've got it, at least when it comes to McDonalds.

From my McD experience the problems basically stem from the fact that
they will hire ANYONE.  That is just not gonna cut it when you are a
customer concerned company.
(Or claiming to be one)

My McD experience has led to the conclusion that they hire whoever they can.
We routinely had a staffing problem, not because our standards were strict,
but because we only offered minimum wage.  The good emoployees were usually
only transitionary, and soon went on to better paying jobs.  re#36, you are
absolutley right.

Re #35:  I've never had any problem at the McDonalds on Maynard.  It's
an awful nice layout - although I've never been able to find the bathrooms.
What problems did you have there, Kent?

Weve drifted a bit here but, my McD experience:
My sister was a crew kid at a company store.  Their policy was to please
the customer at all costs.  If a problem with order, that order is free.
If that's not enough, give them more food or coupons.  That's what I 
expect.
My experience (@ Zeeb road/I94 store, a franchise):
I go thru the drive thru.  When I get home, the pies (dessert for the kids)
which I paid for are not in the bag (I never leave without checking any
more).  So I make the drive back, and they REFUSE to give me the pies,
instead they offer me VOUCHERS for the pies and a large burger ON MY NEXT
VISIT!!!  If I want the pies that I paid for I need to buy more and pay 
again!!!  I was shocked.  They said there was absolutely no way that they
could give me my pies because that was the policy of thier store, set by
the owner.

Getting back to the scanner issue, I was thinking about this and the 
arguments as to whether it's intentional.
One arguement was that inflation causes a lot of errors.  They raise the
price in the computer but "forget" to change the tags on existing stock.
The other argument was that sale items cause errors.  They lower the 
price tags on the existing stock but "forget" to lower the price in the
computer.  Well why do both of these situations happen more often in the
store's favor?  You can't have it both ways.

My diagnosis is that they pay  a _lot_ more attention to keeping the
price _up_ in the computer than they do to lowering the price when they
are supposed to.

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss