MayhemNetworks

I’ve always been happy with the products, service, and price of things we’ve purchased from Sears in store and online. But I can’t say the same about our latest experience.

I got the Sears circular in the Sunday, May 13th newspaper. In there I found an awesome deal for a Hitachi 51F59 51″ rear projection TV for $599.99, with no interest financing for 18 months on purchases over $399. On Tuesday I printed out the ad from their website to take down to the store with me since my wife had the print ad. I didn’t have time to go down there Tuesday and decided I would do it the next day. When I went back to their site to look for a surround sound system I found that they had pulled that TV off of their website.

I went down to the store and asked about the TV and they said they had one floor model and one open box return in the back. The sales rep said I could purchase either one of them if I was interested, but they didn’t have any more new in box and the distribution center were out of stock.
After seeing the TV I really liked it, but I usually don’t buy floor models and returned merchandise. The sales representative said that he would sell me a Magnavox with the same specs for the same sale price, but he wanted to check with his manager. After a few minutes he came back and said that the returned TV had been sent back to the manufacturer already and that his manager wouldn’t allow him to sell the Magnavox for that price. I then asked for a rain check and was told that they don’t give rain checks.

I left the store and filled my wife in and discussed the possibility of buying the floor model. I explained to her that it was in mint condition and placed on a high shelf in the store where people haven’t touched it. She agreed that it might be a good idea to buy it, but wanted to check a few other local stores to see if they had any new ones in stock. She called 3 other stores with all of them saying they were out and that the distribution center was out and they were backordered.

She then called me and told me that she would go to the Sears I went to and would buy the floor model if she thought it was in mint condition too. When she got there the sales rep (same one that I dealt with before), told her that he couldn’t sell the floor model because the TV’s were on backorder with the manufacturer and when they came in they would be selling them again using that same TV as the floor model. He also told her that when the new ones come in she couldn’t buy it for that price because they would be for sale at the standard $999.99 price. She then asked them if she could get a rain check to purchase a TV when the new ones came in and the sales rep told her no they don’t do rain checks.

After coming home we both decided to call customer service and have them check inventory within a 65 mile radius and called 6 of the stores that supposedly had them in stock. Well, to our amusement NOBODY had them in stock! We finally gave up on calling, but found on their website a rain check policy. It states that they issue rain checks on all of their items for advertised prices, as long as the item wasn’t being discontinued. So why did the sales guy tell us they don’t do rain checks when the item we were after was backordered?

Looking around on the web, you can still see the Hitachi 51F59 offered on Google by Sears, but it’s unavailable on the Sears site once you click through a violation of the Google Base terms which state an item is required to show the price as well as be available for purchase online.

My question is this, why print out millions of ads insert them in newspapers for millions to read and not be able to follow through for your customers only 3 days after the ad began. How are all the stores and distribution center out of stock 4 days before the advertised ad expires? It seems like false advertising and unfair to consumers to say the least. Sears customer service is falling right in line with the worst of them (BEST BUY). And why do we get a different explanation in the store about their rain check policy then we seem to find online at their store? I can’t imagine Sears is going to win a lot of repeat business when their employees don’t follow their company policies. I don’t know for sure about my wife, but I know for sure that this whole thing has really left a bad taste in my mouth about Sears and the way that they handled the situation.

I’m also sending a letter to Sears corporate and including the link to this post explaining how frustrating this whole situation was. I mean why couldn’t they just offer me the rain check like their website says? I’ll update this post with any new news.

Images of the Sears ad, Froogle posting, My online print out of the catalog page, and Sears raincheck policy