Board 8 > Costco worker just tried to pull a pretty good scam on me.

(+) Yeah! (+)

I'm not a member of Costco so I was paying with a gift card. I hand the guy the gift card, he turns the key so that the cash register will check me out without a membership. He starts typing something and then checks me out. The total was $80. I pay and he asks if he wants me to have him throw away the giftcard because it has no money on it. I say sure, he doesn't throw it away but puts it under the register.

I then realize, wow that's a high bill and I know the gift card had $30 on it because I just used it at the photo center. I look at the receipt still by the cashier as he's helping another customer and sure enough he didn't apply it. I give the receipt to my wife to look at and as she's looking at the dude is staring at us while still helping the customer. My wife mentions that the gift card amount wasn't used and he immediately grabs it from what should have been the trash but wasn't and says the money is on the card without so much as verifying it himself.

Of course we sit down and verify the card ourself and yup the $30 is on it. Essentially he was attempting to steal the gift card. I presume what he was typing earlier was the gift card number and checking how much was on it and whether it was worth it to attempt stealing it.

I guarantee this guy has done this before and absolutely gotten away with it when the bill is something higher like 200 or 300 dollars. At that point it's harder to mentally add up the cost and realize $30 or whatever is missing. Even if you do, chances are you realize when you get home or if you mention it to management you will get 'it must have been a mistake' which is what we got. Clever scam.
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Did you say anything to management about it?

Edit: Oh, I also read it closer. Whoops. That sucks.
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Please tell me you got him fired.
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...did you at least report him? A cashier I used to supervise ran this kind of thing a couple years ago and we had to do all kinds of detective work to prove she'd done it multiple times so that we could just fire her without question. You might be able to help people build a case if you rat this guy out.

Sorry read it closer now, that sucks.
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OliviaTremor posted...

I'm not a member of Costco so I was paying with a gift card. I hand the guy the gift card, he turns the key so that the cash register will check me out without a membership. He starts typing something and then checks me out. The total was $80. I pay and he asks if he wants me to have him throw away the giftcard because it has no money on it. I say sure, he doesn't throw it away but puts it under the register.

I then realize, wow that's a high bill and I know the gift card had $30 on it because I just used it at the photo center. I look at the receipt still by the cashier as he's helping another customer and sure enough he didn't apply it. I give the receipt to my wife to look at and as she's looking at the dude is staring at us while still helping the customer. My wife mentions that the gift card amount wasn't used and he immediately grabs it from what should have been the trash but wasn't and says the money is on the card without so much as verifying it himself.

Of course we sit down and verify the card ourself and yup the $30 is on it. Essentially he was attempting to steal the gift card. I presume what he was typing earlier was the gift card number and checking how much was on it and whether it was worth it to attempt stealing it.

I guarantee this guy has done this before and absolutely gotten away with it when the bill is something higher like 200 or 300 dollars. At that point it's harder to mentally add up the cost and realize $30 or whatever is missing. Even if you do, chances are you realize when you get home or if you mention it to management you will get 'it must have been a mistake' which is what we got. Clever scam.

I agree that is a fucked up situation, but I wouldn't rush to judge.

He may have just messed up.

Some retailers have employees put gift cards used under the register now to turn in at the end of their shifts.

Either way, glad you caught it.
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Man, I really hope you reported that scumbag.

Edit: read more closely. That sucks
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that bothers the shit out of me. costco is one of the best brands, really disappointing for them to employ scammers like that.
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I like how three of the first four posts were all "did you report him? edit: read closer, that sucks"

Paratroopa1 posted...

I like how three of the first four posts were all "did you report him? edit: read closer, that sucks"

mine was satirical
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I'm confused why people are saying it sucks. He got the card back with 30 dollars on it, it just didn't get used on THIS purchase, right?
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Inviso posted...

I'm confused why people are saying it sucks. He got the card back with 30 dollars on it, it just didn't get used on THIS purchase, right?

the "sucks" part was that management didn't care

If hes stealing from the store and not from customers, why care?
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WazzupGenius00 posted...

If hes stealing from the store and not from customers, why care?

Wut
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If the manager didn't care then I'm fairly positive I would've jumped him after he got off
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Punnyz posted...

If the manager didn't care then I'm fairly positive I would've jumped him after he got off

Over $30?
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WazzupGenius00 posted...

If hes stealing from the store and not from customers, why care?

Reading comprehension: 2/10
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Shaduln posted...

Punnyz posted...

If the manager didn't care then I'm fairly positive I would've jumped him after he got off

Over $30?

yes

well, Maybe not jump him, I think I'm getting too old for that, but definitely threaten him
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$30 is a good chunk of change.
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I mean, sure, but worth physical violence over? Especially when you got it back? Eh.
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Paratroopa1 posted...

I like how three of the first four posts were all "did you report him? edit: read closer, that sucks"

I'm still confused what actually happened.

Guy fake-uses card, charges you the $30. Wife mentions something; guy snatches the card before you can. And then you...go sit somewhere and reason out whether or not the discount was applied, and then...?
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This is gonna sound lame but if he learns his lesson from this and doesnt do it again, Im glad he didnt get fired and potentially prosecuted.
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Shaduln posted...

I mean, sure, but worth physical violence over? Especially when you got it back? Eh.

Yes, he disrespected mah money!

He needs to learn his lesson somehow

Have you ever been poor as hell >_>
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EndOfDiscOne posted...

This is gonna sound lame but if he learns his lesson

I don't think he did
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Wait, you can go to Costco without a membership if you have a gift card?
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azuarc posted...

Paratroopa1 posted...

I like how three of the first four posts were all "did you report him? edit: read closer, that sucks"

I'm still confused what actually happened.

Guy fake-uses card, charges you the $30. Wife mentions something; guy snatches the card before you can. And then you...go sit somewhere and reason out whether or not the discount was applied, and then...?

Guy said the bill was $80 when it was $50. $80 on gift card. Asks if he should throw away the card. Pockets the extra $30. Call him on it. Get the card back.
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azuarc posted...

Paratroopa1 posted...

I like how three of the first four posts were all "did you report him? edit: read closer, that sucks"

I'm still confused what actually happened.

Guy fake-uses card, charges you the $30. Wife mentions something; guy snatches the card before you can. And then you...go sit somewhere and reason out whether or not the discount was applied, and then...?

That's how it read to me
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Punnyz posted...

Shaduln posted...

I mean, sure, but worth physical violence over? Especially when you got it back? Eh.

Yes, he disrespected mah money!

He needs to learn his lesson somehow

Have you ever been poor as hell >_>

Admittedly no, but it's not like he goes "this person is poor, I'm going to scam them". They got their money back, no reason to escalate past telling a supervisor.
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Shaduln posted...

Guy said the bill was $80 when it was $50. $80 on gift card.

Maybe I read it wrong but it sounded like the card was $30 originally. Bill was really $50 but cashier told them $80, then fake-used the card to "bring it down" to 50, then they paid the difference some other way.

Yeah the cashier is clearly stealing money in any case, but I'm confused on the exact sequence of events how this happened.
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-hotdogturtle-- posted...

Shaduln posted...

Guy said the bill was $80 when it was $50. $80 on gift card.

Maybe I read it wrong but it sounded like the card was $30 originally. Bill was really $50 but cashier told them $80, then fake-used the card to "bring it down" to 50, then they paid the difference some other way.

Yeah the cashier is clearly stealing money in any case, but I'm confused on the exact sequence of events how this happened.

Here is what actually happened and why i said it might have been a mistake.

His bill was 80. He had $30 gift card. Cashier inputted card which should have brought it down to 50. Asks if customers wants card back. He says no. He puts under register as some stores do. Olivia takes receipt and says thats weird... that seems high. Finds out card was not scanned. He say yo you didn't use my card.

Reason why it is likely a mistake is: You can't check balances of a card during a transaction from my experience. You can only do it when not in a current transaction. That is why a lot of times a cashier asks if you know the balance on the card and writes them with sharpie on card after if you have a balance left.

He probably went to manually insert numbers for the card since apparently the card was not swiping, otherwise how didn't olivia input it himself, and he thought it went through but he put a wrong number in or so and it didn't work. It came up error but he just hit enter thinking it worked without looking. Asks if customer wants card back. He says no and he puts it under the register to turn in after shift in his deposit bag.

It likely was an error that luckily you caught.

In the event of it actually being a scam, that would be the most idiotic scam ever and that guy would be fired in no time.

Long story short. Likely just a mistake.
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-hotdogturtle-- posted...

Shaduln posted...

Guy said the bill was $80 when it was $50. $80 on gift card.

Maybe I read it wrong but it sounded like the card was $30 originally. Bill was really $50 but cashier told them $80, then fake-used the card to "bring it down" to 50, then they paid the difference some other way.

Yeah the cashier is clearly stealing money in any case, but I'm confused on the exact sequence of events how this happened.

Gift Card had 30 on it.
Bill was 80 and should have gone down to 50 but the card was never applied.
Cashier tried to hide the card under the register to take home later.

This seems like a scam that couldn't possibly last very long because any reasonable person is going to notice a decent amount of money not being applied to their bill right?
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Was this guy a liberal?
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I can't tell how intentional it was without a few details being cleared up.

Corrik posted...

You can't check balances of a card during a transaction from my experience. You can only do it when not in a current transaction.

You can where I work. I don't know anything about Costco.
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Yeah, the "under the register" part really doesn't lead me to buy accident.
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As somebody who has worked loss prevention at a few places, it's actually a fairly common scam in retail when people have gift cards and seem like they aren't paying attention/have a high total and may not notice

Basically, the total was $80. What this guy did was pretend the total was $80 AFTER using the gift card, implying the total was originally $110. Thus, he was hoping they'd pay the $80 like they did and then he could keep the unused gift card.

When people have a high total, a lot of things, just plain aren't paying attention, etc... People who run this scam will pretend that they already used your gift card, and that the total they tell you is the total after the gift card amount was taken off... When actually, it's the entire total. Then, if the customer pays the amount and doesn't say anything, the employee gets to keep the gift card.

The reason it's common is that it's hard to catch unless the customer catches it, since the register will not show anything weird about the transaction. All pulling the records will show is: Total was $80, customer paid $80. If they notice, it's pretty easy for the employee to say it was a mistake.
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lordloki12 posted...

Gift Card had 30 on it.
Bill was 80 and should have gone down to 50 but the card was never applied.

And then they ended up paying the whole remaining 80 when they should have only paid 50, correct?
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Corrik posted...

In the event of it actually being a scam, that would be the most idiotic scam ever and that guy would be fired in no time.

It's much more likely he typed the numbers in to check the balance. When people steal money this way, they have to know exactly how much is on the gift card. If you have a $75 card and the bill is $80, you're going to notice right away. This is usually only done with partial cards so that they can take $5-15 on a large bill without anyone noticing. $30 on an $80 is insane and it's no wonder he was caught.

But the most telling aspect is that when confronted he didn't check the card or apologize. If I'm accused of something like that the first thing I'm going to do is run the card to see if the amount was taken out anyways, despite not being on the receipt. You have to make sure the customer didn't just lose money due to some malfunction.
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lordloki12 posted...

This seems like a scam that couldn't possibly last very long because any reasonable person is going to notice a decent amount of money not being applied to their bill right?

OliviaTremor posted...

I guarantee this guy has done this before and absolutely gotten away with it when the bill is something higher like 200 or 300 dollars. At that point it's harder to mentally add up the cost and realize $30 or whatever is missing.

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-hotdogturtle-- posted...

I can't tell how intentional it was without a few details being cleared up.

Corrik posted...

You can't check balances of a card during a transaction from my experience. You can only do it when not in a current transaction.

You can where I work. I don't know anything about Costco.

You couldn't at walmart when I worked there.
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kevwaffles posted...

Yeah, the "under the register" part really doesn't lead me to buy accident.

That said, this isn't necessarily weird. It depends what he means by "under the register." If he means literally underneath the register, that's weird. But if he means in the cash drawer/underneath the till, that's normal. A lot of retail places keep gift cards, now.
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Corrik posted...

-hotdogturtle-- posted...

I can't tell how intentional it was without a few details being cleared up.

Corrik posted...

You can't check balances of a card during a transaction from my experience. You can only do it when not in a current transaction.

You can where I work. I don't know anything about Costco.

You couldn't at walmart when I worked there.

It's changed at places like Walmart, Kmart, etc. lately. Now, you can check the amount on a gift card at any time by hitting price check and typing in the number.
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thundersheep posted...

Corrik posted...

In the event of it actually being a scam, that would be the most idiotic scam ever and that guy would be fired in no time.

It's much more likely he typed the numbers in to check the balance. When people steal money this way, they have to know exactly how much is on the gift card. If you have a $75 card and the bill is $80, you're going to notice right away. This is usually only done with partial cards so that they can take $5-15 on a large bill without anyone noticing. $30 on an $80 is insane and it's no wonder he was caught.

But the most telling aspect is that when confronted he didn't check the card or apologize. If I'm accused of something like that the first thing I'm going to do is run the card to see if the amount was taken out anyways, despite not being on the receipt. You have to make sure the customer didn't just lose money due to some malfunction.

If he looked at the receipt he didn't need to look at the card. Then again. Olivia didn't say he looked at it either.
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I don't believe for even a second that this was accidental

-hotdogturtle-- posted...

And then they ended up paying the whole remaining 80 when they should have only paid 50, correct?

Yes

-hotdogturtle-- posted...

lordloki12 posted...

This seems like a scam that couldn't possibly last very long because any reasonable person is going to notice a decent amount of money not being applied to their bill right?

OliviaTremor posted...

I guarantee this guy has done this before and absolutely gotten away with it when the bill is something higher like 200 or 300 dollars. At that point it's harder to mentally add up the cost and realize $30 or whatever is missing.

I think noticing the scam is more dependent on the total of the gift card you are using than the total amount of the bill. I think most people are going to notice or at least check unless they are just using the random 1.83 that was leftover on the card.
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To be fair, it's entirely possible to forget you didn't use the card if you price checked it, since your brain will fill in the blanks on a long day

But the fact that he didn't even check the card or look at the receipt after says it wasn't an accident
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Paratroopa1 posted...

I don't believe for even a second that this was accidental

Punnyz posted...

EndOfDiscOne posted...

This is gonna sound lame but if he learns his lesson

I don't think he did

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StealThisSheen posted...

But the fact that he didn't even check the card or look at the receipt after says it wasn't an accident

This, really.

I've done transactions where I keep the used gift cards off to the side until the customer leaves, literally just in case there is some post-transaction issue so I'll still have access to the cards. This guy held onto a card that, from his own mouth, was already used, yet as soon as he's questioned about the balance, says "here's the rest of your money, see ya".

If it were truly an accident, he would be operating under the impression that he had properly used the card, and would have re-checked it to confirm that he didn't use it like he thought he did.
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StealThisSheen posted...

To be fair, it's entirely possible to forget you didn't use the card if you price checked it, since your brain will fill in the blanks on a long day

But the fact that he didn't even check the card or look at the receipt after says it wasn't an accident

Any store with cameras is gonna catch this scam and fire them.on the spot. I err to this being a mistake, but i mean someone trying to scam you is possible.
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Back when I worked at Macy's we just stuffed the used gift cards under the register or wherever (as long as they were there at the end of the day), so that much isn't weird
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Corrik posted...

StealThisSheen posted...

To be fair, it's entirely possible to forget you didn't use the card if you price checked it, since your brain will fill in the blanks on a long day

But the fact that he didn't even check the card or look at the receipt after says it wasn't an accident

Any store with cameras is gonna catch this scam and fire them.on the spot. I err to this being a mistake, but i mean someone trying to scam you is possible.

You realize 99% of the time the cameras aren't actually being watched for stuff like that, right.

Unless he did something super obvious like pocket the gift card, the cameras aren't going to show anything out of the ordinary. It'd show him type in the card, and then it'd be all too easy to go "Oh, I thought I slid it but I guess not"
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DeathChicken posted...

Back when I worked at Macy's we just stuffed the used gift cards under the register or wherever (as long as they were there at the end of the day), so that much isn't weird

I have seen this at lots of places. Towards the end of my walmart run we started putting them underneath the register and they were added to the deposit bag at the end of the shift.
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