Dec 17, 2009
Bossy Thought You’d Enjoy This Holiday Exposé Reminder
Who remembers Geraldo Rivera and his crazy-arse exposés, like the time he pried open Al Capone’s vault on live TV to find nothing but an old stop sign and a few empty gin bottles?
Well Bossy’s exposé is just like that, except it’s about gift buying. And while it’s true Bossy’s exposé doesn’t feature a vault, perhaps gin can be blamed?
Let’s get started.
Here’s the deal: say you’re standing at a counter and you are purchasing Aunt Sadie a holiday present. And say the cashier, who is taking your money, asks, “Would you like a gift receipt?”
And say you say, “Yes, I would like a gift receipt,” if for no other reason than because if you say you don’t want a gift receipt, Bossy has no exposé.
But also because, let’s say, you don’t ever want Aunt Sadie to find out her new present from Target cost less than a tube of Bengay.
“Yes I would like a gift receipt,” say you. Says you? You say? This exposé stuff isn’t as easy as it looks.
Anyway, so now you give Aunt Sadie her present, and you provide her with the gift receipt in case she already owns a pair of Sock Monkey slippers.
Well. Did you know that most stores will not allow your Aunt Sadie to return her gift for a refund because you used a gift receipt? They will only let her exchange the item for something else in the store.
Who cares, you say? Well maybe Target is a bad example because Target has a wide variety of things available.
But say, as a random example, your 12-year-old daughter receives a gift from Lilly Pulitzer, and say she goes to return her gift from Lilly Pulitzer because it’s too small and while she’s in the store she notices that most of the clothes in Lilly Pulitzer are starched and pink and she’s not mad for starched and pink and then she does some quick math and determines that the cost of one Lilly Pulitzer vest could keep her in Sock Monkey slippers for the rest of her life so she asks you to walk to the register and get a refund from Lilly Pulitzer except Lilly Pulitzer won’t give you a refund because you are holding a gift receipt.
Just as a random totally made up example.
Gift receipts aren’t so much for the customer’s benefit as they are an insurance policy that the money will be spent in their store.
Down with gift receipts!
Hello? Comment section? Is that you?
The flipside to this is places like Toys R Us who do not allow returns or exchanges without a receipt. So if your 9 year old girl gets a tiny wooden thomas the tank engine train she is stuck with it (or in our case it becomes a donation to toys for tots). I’d rather the money I spent be used to get something then nothing.
Thanks for your solid investigative work, Bossy.
I remember Geraldo Rivera when he was just starting out on a local station in San Diego. Let’s just say he has not improved with age! That Al Capone’s vault thing was ridiculous, what a farce.
Well, that’s depressing – as most exposés are. I guess the trick is to try to wrench some cash out of said hideous store and then when they are clearly not only NOT going to give you cash, but they are only offering cents on the dollar in exchange, then you bust out the “gift” receipt.