Gift card fraud at Sears ... Be careful always check your balance after refunds
An employee attempted to switch and steal my gift card.
This happened yesterday at the Sears Scarborough Town Centre, electronics department. I was returning an unopened blu ray player because it did not have Wifi capabilities, the item was purchased with $100 gift card (Sears colours points). The employee put $100 refund back onto a gift card and leftover amount onto my Sears Mastercard, the thing is he had 2 gift cards sitting on top of the register. He loaded the refund $100 onto one card, then switched the gift card with a blank one and gave it to me.
This all happened in a matter of a split second and i didn't even realize that I had been defrauded. It wasn't until I was almost walking out of the store I looked at the back of the Gift card and compared it to the number on the receipt and the numbers did not match, they were off by 1 digit. I then went to another cashier and told her to check the balance, she did and the card was inactive. I told her the story and she then proceeded to tell her sales lead who was incompetent and did not realize what the employee had done and just told me to go back to the cashier.
I went back to the original department and the guy attempted to check the balance of my gift card and pretended to act surprised saying that there was nothing on the card. He then looked around on his register and surprisingly he found the gift card sitting there.
I would have gone home put this gift card away and not use it till I needed to buy something, if I didnt catch this there would be no recourse for me, It would be my word against theirs.
I reported this employee to both a manager who then gave me an additional $10 gift card for my inconvenience and to loss prevention department. I spoke with one of the managers and he said that this had also been happening in cosmetics, people getting blank gift cards, so be aware guys.
So my lesson now is to ask a different employee to double check any gift card refunds. I learned the hard way
This happened yesterday at the Sears Scarborough Town Centre, electronics department. I was returning an unopened blu ray player because it did not have Wifi capabilities, the item was purchased with $100 gift card (Sears colours points). The employee put $100 refund back onto a gift card and leftover amount onto my Sears Mastercard, the thing is he had 2 gift cards sitting on top of the register. He loaded the refund $100 onto one card, then switched the gift card with a blank one and gave it to me.
This all happened in a matter of a split second and i didn't even realize that I had been defrauded. It wasn't until I was almost walking out of the store I looked at the back of the Gift card and compared it to the number on the receipt and the numbers did not match, they were off by 1 digit. I then went to another cashier and told her to check the balance, she did and the card was inactive. I told her the story and she then proceeded to tell her sales lead who was incompetent and did not realize what the employee had done and just told me to go back to the cashier.
I went back to the original department and the guy attempted to check the balance of my gift card and pretended to act surprised saying that there was nothing on the card. He then looked around on his register and surprisingly he found the gift card sitting there.
I would have gone home put this gift card away and not use it till I needed to buy something, if I didnt catch this there would be no recourse for me, It would be my word against theirs.
I reported this employee to both a manager who then gave me an additional $10 gift card for my inconvenience and to loss prevention department. I spoke with one of the managers and he said that this had also been happening in cosmetics, people getting blank gift cards, so be aware guys.
So my lesson now is to ask a different employee to double check any gift card refunds. I learned the hard way