Office Depot Workers Told To Lie To Customers?

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dagas said:
I knew they did what they could to make you buy stupid overprices extras, but outright lying, no wonder people rather buy online.
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Read customer reviews, research the product, buy online, cut out the scam artists. Consumer = WIN.
 
I used to work at the office depot in Nanuet, NY for a couple months holiday Season of 2007. They told me not to sell laptops to customers on black friday unless they were buying accessories or a service plan. I ended up getting fired and cheated of $200 in commissions and bonus. They never hpaid me that. I hope they get liquidated like Circuit city. the managers are idiots, the majority of the clerks have no product knowledge and they use the wrong terminology. they call a desktop computer a CPU. No that is the tower the computer itself.t eh CPU is a chip inside the box on the motherboard. bunch of schmucks really. I also had this fat A-hole manager who would rush me out of his office and slam the door in my face. I have never been so disrespected in my life. And I had to come with him with a complaint almost every week becuase he;d mess up my pay check and it took me 6 weeks to get my first pay check when it normally takes 3. talk abotu incompetence and abusive people.
 
there's some good posts in this thread



toasting in an epic phread.


btw, i hate shopping at BB, if they do lose money on certain things, they definitely try to make up for it by marking up other things over 9000%

but yeah, i'd like to see BB go under, their product selection is shitty at best and the service is even worse.
 
heatlesssun said:
This is why I couldn't be a sales person. Sorry to hear about this. My only comment about this is however is that you should have gotten input from a manager, even if you had to throw something at one of them and MADE one of them make the decision as you knew that you were headed for trouble. Even if they had written you up, it would have been on their instructions and I really doubt that a manager would write up an employee for doing what they said because in effect they'd be writing themselves up and more than likely they'd have just let it go.

Over the years I've found that when you're a peon you have to find the right balance of asking permission and forgiveness. It sucks and in the end all it is a game but its critical to working in corporate America and having some peace and keeping a job.

I'm not giving you any grief, just some friendly advice and support. Anyone that's worked for a while has been in a similar spot.
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This is exactly why I work in receiving at my current retailer - I don't have to put up with that shit anymore. I wasn't versed in the ways of how retail operated back then in a corporate run environment. Prior to that I had worked for small businesses whose management were...human, and understanding, I guess you could say. I had figured that a manager who saw a situation that would lead to the kind of position I was put in would have intervened so that I wouldn't be damned one way or the other. That was my first lesson in learning that managers in retail are not on my side.

Had I known then what I know now, I would've just put everything on hold and gotten a manager to settle things in a way that would've shifted the blame on them. I've learned those same lessons with time. And hopefully it'll be something I won't forget even when I move on from the current flavor of hell I endure now.
 
I work at an Office Depot, and while I do hear some managers make comments like the ones in the article, we still sell computers with or without extras. Though unlike the article, we are actually out of stock just about all the time. We only get a few pallets of product in per week, and of those pallets only half a pallet might be computers. We usually only get 1-2 of each SKU.

I'm really not surprised that other stores are doing it though.
 
Kristofff said:
Stfu you man child, jesus. Then, grow up and join the mature adult world after you've finished stfu-ing. You voting with your dollars has nothing to do with you going into a store where you know its policy to sell you as much crap as they can and being an asshole to the workers who are simply working for a paycheck.

Also, No One Cares About You You Are Not Special.
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What are you talking about?
Please show me in this thread where I said I was disrespectful the the workers.
Then go back and read the rules because your name calling is not appreciated .
 
I was an Office Depot employee just before this manic stupidity set in and started to destroy the company. Some upper management weenie came in from a paint store chain (Sherwin Williams, if I recall) and brought the sales philosophy over from there, since after all, all retail stores are identical, so what worked in one should work in the other, right?

Of course, that's ignoring the fact that SW is a pretty small specaility store and OD is a large general office supply and "business machine" (Yeah, their term, I was a Business Machine Specialist) store. They wanted an associate to meet someone right when they walked in the door and walk them around and give them personal attention at all times, ignoring the fact that the majority of the associates only knew that comptuers were "the big heavy boxes we put on the top shelf in the back." SW never experienced the sorts of rushes that OD sees every year around the July/August timeframe during back to school.

Anyhow, the point of all this is that when that guy came in (I swear it was at something like the COO level), his policies started eroding what was a not-bad place to work. I distinctly recall when the big push for the Product Protection Plans started, and they started "counseling" employees who didn't sell them. One of my co-workers summed it up rather nicely at an employee meeting where the store manager was bitching us all out for not selling enough and telling us to push, push, push them down the customer's throats. He raised his hand and asked, "When are we all scheduled to go down to the used car lot for our sales training?" The manager immediately dismissed the meeting and was rather pissed for the rest of my time there.

They did a contest for a few months, see how many PPS you could sell as a store. First month, I think we did somewhere around 50. We were told to shoot for 60. The next month, we hit 75, we were told to shoot for 100. We all looked around at each other and agreed to do it one more month. We hit 125. Management said the new goal was 150. The 4ht month, we sold 15. We all collectively gave management the finger for creating goals and then ratcheting them up every month we met them, just so they could chew us out for not meeting them.

And as for accessories, while this started out as a massive joke, it backfired one time on us. The running joke with the employees was that when someone came in to buy a pack of paper, you'd ask them "Do you need a copier to go with that?" All well and good until one of the employees actually asked a customer that. And the customer thought for a second, and then said, "You know, I do." We were all in a bit of shock, and unfortunately management decided to hold that up as a shining example of how it should be done. If we'd done that kind of pushy sales, their numbers would have tanked even further.

I went back a few months ago to my old store, and it was just depressing how far it's fallen since I was there nearly 10 years ago now. A sad statement of how a company goes for the short-term dollar and loses long-term customers.
 
If I have to come back in here one more time, this thread is getting closed.
 
Tim said:
If I have to come back in here one more time, this thread is getting closed.
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I don't see what's wrong with the posts since you last came here. They look reasonable to me. At least you should point out specific posts that you don't like.
 
1. Retailer/company caught doing shady shit.
2. Shady shit aired to the world on internet.
3. People get pissed.
4. I stare blankly at the screen surprised that this still gets a rise, and make a mental note about X company.

Unfortunately almost every company that deals with the masses (I'm talking THE MASSES, not a specific subset e.g. Newegg and tech people) ends up playing the same game:

Manipulation Tactics <---------------------------------------------> Honest Business
(get for what you can, drive in hidden fees, etc)

I guess the manipulation shit pays off b/c just about every large business I can think off leans way "left"... it is pretty damn funny when it catches up with them though.
 
"Salesmen lie to customers!"

That's news? :p

You guys really think that everything that guy at Future Shop tries to sell you are things he genuinely thinks you need and will benefit from owning? That you really need the ESP regardless of the mfg's lifetime warranty? :D
 
Similar sh!t happened to my wife. She goes into BB to buy a low end laptop. They say it's out of stock and are expecting a shipment that afternoon. She pays for it to hold it when it does arrive (stupid). She goes to pick it up later that day and they tell her it's out of stock.
She wants her money back, but it will arrive in check form (payed with cash=stupid) in 5-10 days. She gets pissed off and starts talking down on the salesmen. Then one of them magically makes one appear from the back room.
I'm thinking "this is not a shoe that you can't find in the backroom of Macy's, this is a laptop that gets inventoried and tracked". WTF
 
The small handful of times I've used BB for computer purchases (ultra-cheap systems for older relatives) the sales people have been extremely helpful even though I politely made it clear that I was only interested in the computer itself.

The TV salesmen pushing their $100 6ft HDMI cables that "are required if you want 1080p" are a different story though.
 
HOCP4ME said:
I've bought two laptops from my BB and they didn't even try to sell me "extras" (except the extended warranty).

One was out of stock, so they gladly had another store hold it for me.

I'm starting to think I'm just really, really lucky when it comes to BB.
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Or you're just one of the people (like myself) who are fortunate enough to be near a Best Buy that doesn't suck.

I bought my last 3 laptops from the same Best Buy, from the same sales guy even. Made me feel bad knowing he wasn't on commission. The first time I bought something, I spoke with him for a while and asked for his input. I could tell that he liked the type of conversation that he was having (with someone who was just as geeky as him) and he helped pare down my decision a lot. He did apologise and say "I have to ask..." and I just politely said "No" to each of his questions. That was the end of it. He also let me open up the boxes in-store at the repair counter to check for dead/stuck pixels and any other defects that I would want to return the item for.

Second laptop, bought it for my parents. Same deal. He asked, I politely said no, he let me check for pixels, that was the end of that.

Third... again. Same deal.

My timing is pretty good so I tend to run into him a lot... but based on what I have experienced from other employees in the computer/laptop area, I wouldn't have a problem with anyone else helping me. The biggest factor, I'm afraid, is that it's a very well performing store... if it wasn't doing as well, I could see the pressure being put on.

If you happen to be near a store that is in a good location and gets a lot of regular business... then yeah, you may end up having a much better shopping experience.

Footnote: I was joking with the sales guy when buying my first laptop, but I asked him if I could use the online connected display models to check and see which of the final three had WinXP drivers available for download... he led me over to the Mac tucked away near a corner and told me to have at it. One of the three had WinXP drivers and I bought that one. It was already marked down (last closed box, 9 month old model, new ones had replaced it) and I made a crack about not wanting to pay the Vista tax. He took $50 off at the register and it was credited as a "Geek Squad Service." I ended up getting the thing for 30% off. He was the one that pointed me to this model in the first place. (Asus G1, still using it, probably the "best deal evah!" system for me.) It was on display in a "leftovers" section and I didn't quite notice it. So yeah. Great guy. Reminds me of the older days of dealing with up and coming B&M stores that were computer based. Just remember, if it's a rather expensive item, you probably CAN haggle the price down. Some employees are allowed.

Unfortunately, the rest of the store can be a bit of a pain with people hovering and trying to upsell. I just politely decline and that's all I hear about it. Acknowledge it's part of the job requirements and don't make a fuss over it. I don't, they don't give me a hard time for it either.
 
This is one the very reasons I *hate* the commission system. It tends to push people into doing dishonest things just to make the sale and commission.
 
qdemn7 said:
The attitude displayed by some people who are either present or former retail sales people toward the customer is simply appalling. You act as if the customer were the enemy. The customer is the entire reason you have a job. The old saying "Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me" still applies. You might "make your numbers" one time by shafting a customer, but there's a good chance you will never make a repeat sale with that customer. Not only that but your bad behaviour, no matter who tells you to do so, has the chance of driving the customer permanently away from the entire chain. All this just more proof of a business culture in the US that is corrupt and broken from the very top, to the very bottom. If you want proof as to why banks, investment firms, mortgage companies, etc are failing, it's dishonesty like this on a macro scale. Nothing matter but "making the numbers".

No wonder B&M sales are falling while online sales are rising.

PS, read my sig.
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This is exactly why I avoid BB like the plague and am sad that CC closed it's doors.
I know a lot of people here disliked CC, but I actually found good service and good prices at my local CC, whereas BB treated me like shit AND always cost more (and now without competition, it can only get worse). Therefore, I was always happy to check out CC and spend my money there if I was going to make an electronics purchase at a B&M.
Sure, sometimes I got a good deal on a loss leader, and sometimes they got there markup, but they got my REPEAT business.

(At least until right before the end, when the attitude changed at my CC and they too treated me like crap.)


And all the boohooery in here from some of the salepeople is lame. Obviously now is not the time to quit your job, but that doesn't mean you can't be actively seeking alternative employment if company policy is whack. Trust me, I've worked my share of corporate sales jobs, and they blow so move on, literally.
 
another note is that BigBox chains took off because they could offer lower prices than smaller specialty stores at the sacrifice of customer service and knowledgeable sales staff. Well, that's exactly what the internet is these days. The best price, but nobody to help you in your purchase.

Maybe we'll just see a resurgence in smaller specialty stores since no B&M can ultimately beat internet pricing and the only major benefit anymore is customer service.
 
Meh, I see a bunch of posts blaming management and employees, but few mentioning the customers. We at the [H] tend to forget there's a world of stupid people out there that doesn't know any better. There are people that will believe salespeople when they say Monster Cables is the monkey's uncle and buy them. There are people who will believe that $250 will make their purchased computer 25% faster if you let Geek Squad set it up.

Marketing managers are just good at being puppet masters, and the only real victims are the knowledgeable people of the [H] and other technologically savvy people. 99% of the real world will never know the difference.
 
Nothing new. Best Buy and Circuit City (or used to hahahaha thats what you get suckers!) do the same thing. I went to buy a notebook from each of them and both wanted to charge me 150 extra bucks for some BS "security" software I would never use and wouldn't sell me the computer without it, even though it said they had 9 in stock at Best Buy and 5 in stock at Circuit City. The girl was almost going to cry at Best Buy when I told her what I thought of her BS. Then her "manager" came up and started treating me like a noob. I almost kicked his balls up to his eye sockets but it was funner to laugh in his face and embarrass him in front of his employees and all the customers by calling out his BS and backing it up.

Cruised over to Staples and got the same machine for less than the sale price of either of the other two and the kid only asked me once if I wanted their extra crap and I told him no way man. No pressure or nonsense or anything.
 
Corath said:
I went back a few months ago to my old store, and it was just depressing how far it's fallen since I was there nearly 10 years ago now. A sad statement of how a company goes for the short-term dollar and loses long-term customers.
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I love capitalism, I really and honestly do.... BUT..... what I've noticed lately is a trend that I don't like. Everything is about numbers (eg, money). EVERYTHING. Customers? Employees? F them! The investors must make their money! The company I currently work for has been around nearly 100 years. It has had good success for most of that. A few years ago they thought it would be wise to go public.... yeah... way to go. We used to give the customer %110 and make sure they were happy. Now, its all about the bean counters. Instead of spending my days innovating new ways to keep customers happy and offer new services and easier ways of doing things for them, I spend it writing up reports and reports about reports and KPI's to make sure the investors are getting their moneys worth out of us. Meanwhile, we've lost most of our customers and are giving them no incentive to come back. Our CEO even said going public and joining with a bigger company was the worst decision he's ever made. It ruined his company that he built up. Its all about the shareholders, everyone else be damned.

Capitalism rules, but I think these overly greedy &#9829;&#9829;&#9829;&#9829;&#9829;&#9829;&#9829;&#9829;s need to suffer and the companies die off.
 
It is rude they are doing this but there is a reason some stores are doing this. Generally the margin on a Laptop for a store's overall profit is 1%. So if you get no extras with said laptop you get 1% total profit from that sale. Adding things to the laptop purchase suddenly your store makes a buck.

This is really rude of stores that refuse laptop sales without accessories but I see why some are attempting this.
 
Cyrilix said:
I don't see what's wrong with the posts since you last came here. They look reasonable to me. At least you should point out specific posts that you don't like.
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That was my bad. I missed a flaming post while I was going through this thread yesterday, and only deleted it this morning. I thought it was later in the thread.
 
turbogeek said:
Well, that's exactly what the internet is these days. The best price, but nobody to help you in your purchase.
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Really? Because I find that the Internet is a much better resource for product reviews and tech support help than any store. In fact, it's a lot more unbiased, because in a store they want you to buy the most expensive items.
 
I think people fail to realize that companies like Staples, Office Depot, etc make negative (read: loose money) on selling laptops these days. It doesn't surprise me at all that the staff would be told to lie about in stock. If they sell laptops to YOU, the consumer, with no attachments consistantly guess would be out of the job? Don't blame the sales staff, blame corporate.
 
I worked at Office Depot for 5 years (3 full time and 2 part once I got my career going). Indeed I did have a number of instances where management would instruct me to lie about the availability of an item based on what attachments a customer was or wasn't interested in. This was all in an effort to boost their attachment rate up, which would have a direct impact on whether or not members of management would receive bonuses.
 
qdemn7 said:
The attitude displayed by some people who are either present or former retail sales people toward the customer is simply appalling. You act as if the customer were the enemy. The customer is the entire reason you have a job. The old saying "Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me" still applies. You might "make your numbers" one time by shafting a customer, but there's a good chance you will never make a repeat sale with that customer. Not only that but your bad behaviour, no matter who tells you to do so, has the chance of driving the customer permanently away from the entire chain. All this just more proof of a business culture in the US that is corrupt and broken from the very top, to the very bottom. If you want proof as to why banks, investment firms, mortgage companies, etc are failing, it's dishonesty like this on a macro scale. Nothing matter but "making the numbers".

No wonder B&M sales are falling while online sales are rising.

PS, read my sig.
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I thank my lucky stars that my store has managers that live and breath and teach all of us what you just said:

"The customer is the entire reason you have a job. The old saying "Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me" still applies. You might "make your numbers" one time by shafting a customer, but there's a good chance you will never make a repeat sale with that customer. Not only that but your bad behaviour, no matter who tells you to do so, has the chance of driving the customer permanently away from the entire chain. All this just more proof of a business culture in the US that is corrupt and broken from the very top, to the very bottom."

They constantly warn us of this:
"Nothing matters but 'making the numbers.'"

We are trained that if we "wow" the customer with great service, no matter what they buy, the numbers will eventually come, and they are. Several months before our Circuit City went out of business we were a top performing store in our region. We continue to be on top versus stores of our same small size. We've been #1 for like four months in a row now, and we finished the fiscal year with a 7% (maybe even 10) positive comp while almost all our peer stores report negative comps.

Now the district managers - the ones that operate our store and the 12 others in our district - have tried to crack down on us in one area where we considerably "underperform" - price overrides. Our store is dead last in our district when it comes to discounting product. We mark things down and price match competition more than any other store, period. They even took away override numbers from many of the supervisors to try and cut it down. STUPID. We're in a market now where people are going to shop around, especially on a big ticket item. Our GM has some freaking balls. He flat out told me that if it's even one dollar above cost, we'll price match it to earn our customer's business, even if it's an item at circuit's liquidation sale - which officially we're not supposed to do.

Screw district's criticisms on our "price overrides." I mean I know that they provide my job and I am grateful for their training and support, and I know they can fire me and my managers. But our store's philosophy is bringing people back and making our store money. We continue to be profitable while the rest of the company suffers, and we'll keep doing what it takes to bring that traffic in. I can't even count all the customers I know by name that will pay a few bucks more just to shop from me and my co-workers (or the same price if we can match for them) rather than buy online. I wish all stores could have leadership like mine.
 
Derangel said:
If you've never worked retail you have no fucking clue as to how this shit goes down.
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i worked retail... gamestop did the same shit, lie to the customer to get a reserve or sale... as long as you get their money.

needless to say upper management spent a lot of time looking for ways to get rid of me...since i'm not a team player
 
HA! about 6 months ago i when into an office depot to buy a laptop they had on sale for $399
I called and asked if they had one in stock. they said yes, i get there and am ready to buy it
go up to a sales person and they ask me if id like warrenty accessories ext. i say no thanks,my CC doubles the warranty and i can get accessories later. They then inform me they're sorry but they're out of the laptop. I thought to myself i wonder if this douche bag is lying because i dont wanna buy shit? SO i told him you know what can you check if any others stores in the area have one? and make sure they have a few accessories instock too because i changed my mind. He talked to the manager and told me they found one in the back. i say okay great, me and the manager walk up to the register and the manager rings me up. i tell him i changed my mind i only want the laptop, im reporting his ass for bait and switching, calling corp, the BBB and he can get fucked :)

yep..its been happening for a whilleee
 
If you don't like lying to people, don't work in a job where your manager makes you lie to people or else you get fired.

If you don't like lying to people, but do it anyways to keep your job, that makes you no better than your manager so do not expect to get treated any better.
 
Crosshairs said:
What are you talking about?
Please show me in this thread where I said I was disrespectful the the workers.
Then go back and read the rules because your name calling is not appreciated .
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Crosshairs said:
Please don't kid yourself........its no big secret what goes on ....I never worked retail but plenty of my less than "intelligent" friends did.
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Here is where you set your agenda. Now kindly shut your trolling mouth and get the hell out of the thread.
 
newster said:
If you don't like lying to people, don't work in a job where your manager makes you lie to people or else you get fired.

If you don't like lying to people, but do it anyways to keep your job, that makes you no better than your manager so do not expect to get treated any better.
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Can't agree with this reasoning, at all. People do what they have to do to survive. Having a job where you disagree with some of the management tactics is better than no job at all. Hell, most working-class people probably find some management tactics at whatever job they do to be disagreeable, but it's not worth being unemployed. This also doesn't mean that they deserve to be treated like shit. They're just doing a job, same as everyone. If everyone tried to be as altruistic as you make yourself sound, we'd all be broke and unemployed. :rolleyes:
 
well stuff like this happens and the only way to prevent it is to shop somewhere else like staples or office max or online
 
I have to wonder how many of the people in this thread saying that if your employer has shady policies you should quit are the very same people who would complain about the huge spike in welfare claims this would create.

Not many employers are completely on the up-and-up morally speaking. A corporation has no obligation to morality beyond obeying the law of the land.

So would you have any employee who works for a company with shady policies quit? Where would they go to find this morally righteous employer? Lying to customers is bad, but destroying the environment or strong arming local business out is OK? Where do you draw the line?

IBM was ranked #3 overall on the 100 Best Corporate Citizens List this year. Let me tell you a story about a little town called Endicott, NY. IBM was born there, trashed the place, left and decimated the local economy. The cleanup effort is still underway over a decade after they left the area high and dry. If this is what the #3 best corporate citizen does, well what can you expect from the rest of them?
 
Typing this on my blackberry so it might have a lot of typos. Let me qualify my previous statement by saying I completely understand having to work at a job where there are policies you don't agree with. However, you can't have your cake and eat it too. If management tells you to do something shady and you do it, you are just as culpable. So I disagree with all these people on this thread who try to blame shift saying. "Management made me do it!" If you lie to me, I don't care who made you do it, you are a liar to me. I will treat you as I would anyone else who blatantly lies to me, not have pity on your poor soul for trying to make a buck at my expense as some of you would have. If you disagree, you are more than welcome to keep making your buck while losing a lot more business through your shady practices.
 
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