Part 2:
FINALLY, on Tuesday, the 7th of FEBRUARY, almost a month after my purchase, I get a call. Now, the call couldn’t have been at a worst time. I was stuck commuting in the middle of freezing rain storm. Tracks have frozen over, so the trains aren’t working. Shuttle buses take forty minutes to arrive and I have to pass on 3 of them because there are way too many people. A 30 minute commute becomes a 2 hour commute, my hands are cold to the point where my phone doesn’t recognize my fingers, and the umbrella of the woman beside me freezes over in front of my eyes so that when she closes it later, the ice mold of her umbrella shatters over her head.
I get a call.
M=me, CS=customer service(if you can call it that)
M: Hello?
CS: Hello. Can we speak to OP?
M: That’s me.
CS: Hi, we’re calling from Xara about a social media post about not being able to return an item?
At this point, I’m like thank god, at least something good will come out of this horrible day
M: Yeah?
CS: Yeah, we’re not going to refund you.
M:....what do you mean?
CS: We checked your receipt against our inventory and there are no discrepancies.
M: Well obviously not. Your inventory is going to say that because my receipt shows a skirt was sold. That’s the issue.
CS: Yeah, well there’s no problem with it so we’re not going to refund you.
M: At this point, this is becoming such a hassle that I’ll just keep the jacket. You can’t even refund me the $20 I was overcharged?
CS: No because you paid $80 for that skirt so there’s nothing to refund.
M: Okay, so if I bought this skirt, I would like for you forward me the camera footage of me paying for the skirt. The time and date is on the receipt.
CS: Oh, no, we don’t check cameras.
Wtf? They don’t check the only place that has the evidence?
M: What do you MEAN you don’t check cameras?
CS: That’s only for the company heads.
M: That’s not true. There are many situations in which a store would need camera footage to be accessible.
CS: We do not check cameras.
M: So then why did two different managers at two separate locations mention that cameras would be checked?
CS: Well, they lied to you. Is there anything else I can help you with?
Now as I mentioned, he caught me at a horrible time. I was freezing, already in a shitty mood, and really not up for arguing when I was barely holding my phone so I said no and hung up. But mind you, I was FURIOUS.
I’ve been doing the best I can, have been as cooperative as possible, and this is how I’m being treated? I was almost 4 weeks into dealing with this which meant my receipt would expire soon, and if I’ve been getting so much resistance for doing everything right, god forbid they have a legit reason to turn me away.
So with two days left, and a eight of my hard earned dollars at stake, I decide for one more, final, dramatic push. At this point, I don’t care if it gets me banned because I know I’ll never be shopping there again.
The next day, I grab my stuff, and rile myself up the entire day. I piece together my plan, from the moment I step in to when the credits role.
I was up to the register and ask for the manager. The cashier asks me why and I explain the situation to her. She waves and mumbles something in a general direction towards two people. One of them is the same manager who I spoke to last time and I prayed for someone else, anyone else because I knew she would tell to fuck off before hearing me out a second time. Luckily, the other person, a man, turns .5 seconds faster and ends up being the one who comes over. The cashier briefly explains what I told her to him and then he turns to me. Here I go, I think to myself. One last attempt.
And I start BALLING. SOBBING, full out rivers on my cheeks. Now this manager is faced with a short, petite girl crying in front of him. He tries to calm me down and promises he’ll figure this out for me. He takes my receipt and what does he do? He runs to CHECK THE CAMERAS!!!!! SOMETHING THAT COULD HAVE BEEN DONE WEEKS AGO!!! WITHIN TEN MINUTES, I HAVE MY $80 BACK AND A SINCERE APOLOGY FROM THE TWO DUDES WHO HANDLED THE SITUATION AS QUICKLY AND SWIFTLY AS POSSIBLE WHILE THAT ASSHOLE MANAGER FROM BEFORE STOODBY AND WATCHED IT ALL UNFOLD. I WAS TURNED AWAY THREE TIMES OVER THE COURSE OF A MONTH FOR SOMETHING THAT COULD HAVE BEEN DONE IN 10 MINUTES!!!!!
Once I left the store, and wiped the fake tears, real ones started coming, like all that pent up frustration was coming out all at once. To some people, $80 may not be a lot. But to a broke university student who has a dog who needs $80 monthly shots to be able to walk, it means the world. I just can’t believe that I had to argue with three different people and be led on and blatantly mistreated over the course of an entire month for a mistake that was 100% theirs, where I cooperated 100% and even went extra miles to get them anything they needed to resolve the matter. The fact that I had to fake a mental breakdown after a month of struggle to get back $80 dollars that I was literally scammed out of is unbelievable. And had I gotten that same manager a second time, I would not have it to this day. Thank you to those two guys who helped me. Fuck the actual company and their devotion to hire the most incompetent of people for all positions.
Needless to say, I will never even consider going into Xara again.
This was one hell of a first, and last impression.
Buyer's beware.