Spitball Army

Contestant #2:  Office Depot assistant manager

The ever-diminishing space on my external hard drive compels me to go to my local Office Depot in search of a larger, backup hard drive.  Yep, a backup drive for my backup drive.  That and a $15 bonus credit for Office Depot that has been burning a hole through my wallet and expires on 31 May, which happens to be today.  So, I go.  Notice that I say I am going to my local Office Depot outlet – this will be important later.

It takes me a while to find the hard drives.  Since I was last in this store looking at them, they have been moved to locked cabinets.  The products themselves aren’t visible on the shelves.  Instead, there is a display of information placards, each containing a description of each drive.  Below each placard is a slot with index-card sized slips of paper, to be taken to the checkout counter.  There, the clerk will get – or have someone else get – the item.

I choose a 1TB hard drive, thinking that a drive three to four times as big as my current one ought to hold me over for awhile – or until it breaks down.  There is one female clerk working at one of the three registers.  She is intensely preoccupied with an elderly woman who appears to be confused about how her coupons have been applied to her sale.  They are discussing this, back and forth, the clerk pointing to the line on the receipt, the customer lowering her glasses and holding the receipt to within an inch of her face, then shaking her head in exasperation.  I don’t mind waiting,  Really.  I’ve done my fair share of time on the clerk’s side of the counter and know what it is like.  I only hope that my time, when it is my time to be the customer, is treated with the same care that she seems to be giving the elderly woman.

The two come to an agreement, and I approach the register.  I tell the clerk that I am wishing to purchase an external hard drive, and I give her my slip of paper.  She tells me that someone will have to retrieve it from the back of the store, and asks me if I wouldn’t mind if she helps the customers behind me in line while I wait.  No, I tell her.  I don’t mind.  When I am being treated well, I have the patience of Job.

She helps two other customers before a young male employee comes store-forward with my hard drive.  He hands it to her and she begins the transaction.  I give her my credit card, my Office Depot $15 bonus credit voucher, and my frequent shoppers program card.  She becomes confused halfway through the process of entering the various barcodes and credits, and looks to the young man, who hasn’t left, for guidance.  It turns out that he is an assistant manager, and his name is Marlon.

Marlon motions to me silently to follow him to the third register.  He appears to be in take-charge mode and is going to process my transaction himself.  He enters the hard drive’s barcode and the price comes up on the screen.

“If you had come in here a day earlier, you could have purchased this for 99 dollars,” he says to me, referring to the $129 price tag.

Why in the hell would he tell me such a thing, I think to myself.  But I verbalize my thought differently.  “So, you’re going to offer to sell me this hard drive at yesterday’s sale price?” I ask him.  My question ends with a challenge, hanging in the air between us.

He chuckles, shakes his head between the left and right.  Silly customer.  “Nah.”  He continues unfalteringly to process my purchase.  “No, I don’t have the authority to do that.”

“Well, when you say something like that to me, my first impulse is to tell you to cancel the transaction so that I can go home, go online and purchase the hard drive at yesterday’s sale price or better.  Instead, I’m here, keeping my business local, and getting taunted as a result.”

He does not reply.  He is obviously in a position where the only option he can think of is to maintain a defensive posture.  He shows this by not speaking or maintaining eye contact.  I sign the electronic credit card pad, take my hard drive, and leave.

I drive home, leave the hard drive in the truck, and go immediately to my office.  I log online and begin comparing prices on Amazon.com.  Within seconds, I locate the exact same item that I just purchased down the street, and Amazon has it for $99.99.  It is in stock and ready to ship.  I order it.  My e-mail confirmation comes quickly and efficiently to my BlackBerry, telling me that the drive will ship today by UPS 2nd Day Air , and that the total purchase price is $99.99.  No sales tax (local, or of any kind) and no shipping charges.  I lock up the house and drive back to Office Depot.

I walk in and go immediately to the register.  The female clerk is standing there, waiting for a customer to show up.  I imagine she didn’t want it to be me.

“Hi, again,” I say to her.  “I just purchased this and would like a refund, please.”  I hand her the bag holding the hard drive, and the receipt.

“Was it broken?” she asks.  Apparently, she has no idea what had just transpired between me and her assistant manager.

“No.”  I give her no more information.  I figure that the transaction is still warm, thus there shouldn’t be a need for a detailed explanation – sort of like the five-second rule when food falls onto the floor.  She proceeds to enter the information into the register.  About this time, Marlon approaches and takes over.  He has recognized me, and has been watching me since I walked back into the store.

He says nothing.  I speak first.  “I told you that you were giving me little choice but to do this.  I found one online for your expired sale price.  You just lost your store a $130 sale.”

“Yeah, well, you saved some money, didn’t you?” he says, dispassionately.

He hands me my credit verification and walks away before I have a chance to say anything else.  In his haste to be done with me, he credits me $15 more than I had paid, the $15 being the amount of the Office Depot bonus credit voucher that was to expire at the end of the day.  Thus, assistant manager Marlon loses not only a $130 sale for his company, but $15 of his store’s cash.