The poor little old lady cried to me and there wasn’t really anything for me to do. I remember her coming in a little while back and she was helped by one of my employees.
She said she was fitted for a product, and when she went to pay the guy wend to the back and swapped it and she never checked it until just now and it what she has doesn’t work for her at all. She asked her husband if it was his but he said “no” and that she got them from my store. She says she ONLY buys from us and has been that way for years.
I wanted to help her but the thing is the product was a brand we’ve never carried. I know everyone makes mistakes but no way did my guy give her this item. She was quite upset and told me about some other troubles she’s had lately and insists that someone’s pulled one over on her. I said I was sorry but there’s no way it came from us and I couldn’t take them.
I really don’t think she was trying to scam us or anything. She was confused and frustrated, and understandably so. I felt bad for her.
Is she actually a recurring customer of yours? I’m very customer-focused, so I would try to help her or convert her to a customer while holding that we didn’t make the mistake.
“I’m sorry you’re going through this. This is 100 percent from another store, but I want to help you resolve this. If we offered you this item at with XX% rate, would that be helpful?”
This is basically the sort of policy that Nordstrom became famous for. They actually accepted a return of TIRES once because that’s their policy. (Or was once upon a time). That’s how much they value their customers—they’ll make it right. (Again, or did. I don’t shop there or try to make weird returns so things may have changed in the last 20 years lol)
They actually moved away from the “take anything” return policy around a decade ago. They’re still very liberal about items they could have sold you, but it has to be something they could have sold you.
Really, that’s amazing, but why have that policy if you didn’t sell it? Looks ripe for manipulation by scammers