This one pales in comparison to some of these on here, but I used to manage a vape/e-cigarette shop. Quite a few of the products we sold were electronic devices, and often we'd get products that are D.O.A. Probably more often than what should be acceptable.

Usually, if I'd just get done selling a $15-$200+ device to someone and while testing found out that it's malfunctioning or broken, I'd immediately switch it out with another of the same and ensure it worked. We were told that we can send any broken products back to our main warehouse/store to get them repaired by the manufacturer, so there would be no loss. Turns out, they never sent a single item out, so everything was counted as a loss. I was never told this and went by original company policy to send back broken products with our paper inventory reports and all.

Eventually, I got my boss tearing into me for causing lots of profit loss from "giving out freebies." I asked him what I should do then. He said "If it's broke, tell them they can send it off themselves to the manufacturer. We can't do anything about it."

Few things. These are smoking cessation devices. People use these to quit cigarettes, and would need to use it immediately and daily, most likely, if they're heavy smokers. Regardless if they wanted to use it casually and spend quite a bit, it's still a broken item I'm selling them with no returns. Manufacturer repairs take weeks, if not several months. And often, things never get sent back to you for various, shitty reasons. So basically, I'd be telling a customer "Hey, sorry about your ~$150 purchase that you can't use. Buy another or deal with it."

I kept doing what I was doing. And I gained quite an awesome mass of customers for the way I ran my store, people who claimed that they wouldn't even step foot in our other locations. I ended up getting fired over it in a dickish way. My one victory is that I've had a good handful of my regulars promise to never return there because they did that. And seeing how the business is still rapidly plummeting downhill, it makes me smile.