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Article #809

Re: Beware: CompUSA Hard Drive theft! Don't buy there!

#809
From: Michael Williams
Date: Thu, 03 Jun 1999 00:00
35 lines
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In article <3756b7e4.13405616@news>, shootmeanote@hotmail.com.nospam wrote:
>There have been reports that at some CompUSA stores, shrinkwrapping
>returned merchandise and putting them back on the shelves is the norm.
>There's always a possibility that some jerk returned the package with
>an old drive substituted on purpose.  The customer return staff
>doesn't take but a quick look inside of the box most of the time,
>without really verifying what the exact contents are.  Fry's
>Electronics does it all the time, but they usually put a sticker on
>the reshrinkwrapped merchandise stating that it had previously been
>returned by a customer.  At least Fry's provides some sort of warning.

I don't think I look more or less trustworthy than the next guy, but I cannot 
recall the last time I returned something and saw the clerk open the package 
and verify the contents of the box.  I don't mean just open the box, I mean 
take out the contents and actually identify the product by model number. You 
can't do that for, say, an I/O card unless you actually take the card out of 
the wrapper and check the markings, but I have never seen this level of 
inspection.

It has occurred to me how easy it would be for a thief to substitute something 
else and not have it detected on the return.  It's one reason that I won't buy 
an opened box item (from Fry's or anywhere else) unless I can personally 
inspect all the contents before I purchase it (or decide that it's cheap 
enough to waste my money on).  If the item is shrink-wrapped, I try to figure 
out whether it could have been re-wrapped by the store by examining the fit & 
finish of the wrapping.  If it's different from all the other wrapped 
packages, I'll choose another box just to be safe.

Am I the only one who is surprised that stores don't inspect returns more 
thoroughly?

--
email: mikew 99 @ my-dejanews.com
phone: 650 857-6939
WWW: www.bigfoot.com/~mikew99
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From: mikew99@my-dejanews.com (Michael Williams)
Subject: Re: Beware: CompUSA Hard Drive theft! Don't buy there!
Date: 1999/06/03
Message-ID: <7j73fs$8cm$4@ocean.cup.hp.com>
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References: <37569810.7A767D11@inter.net.il> <375798af.4709303@news.erols.com> <3756b7e4.13405616@news>
Organization: Hewlett Packard Cupertino Site
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage,alt.comp.hardware,alt.comp.hardware.homebuilt,ba.market.computers,misc.forsale.computers.storage