‘Tis the season for holiday shopping, and San Diegans are hitting the malls with lists in hand.
And that means it’s time to remind everyone to protect themselves and their wallets by checking and double-checking their sales receipts to make sure they’ve been charged the correct price for all those things that they’re buying.
Regular inspections conducted by the County Department of Agriculture, Weights and Measures show that price-scanning errors happen, and that most of the time they cost consumers money.
“The same advice applies to the holidays as applies to every shopping day: always check those receipts immediately and notify store management of discrepancies,” said Dianne Jacob, who helped start the County’s price-scanner monitoring program in 1999. “It also helps to bring the newspaper or Internet sales advertisements with you to stores, and to remember that retailers aren’t allowed to charge more than their lowest advertised price.”
Making sure that customers are checking receipts helps businesses as well. Price errors can come from simple mistakes such as store crews forgetting to put sales and other price changes into store-computer databases.
“With the increase in products sold during the post-Thanksgiving Day sales, mistakes can be made,” said Lisa Leondis, Agriculture, Weights and Measures’ director. “If the price you are charged varies from the posted or advertised price, that’s the time to bring it to the attention of the clerk or manager of the store.”
Agriculture, Weights and Measures protects consumers countywide by conducting inspections each year — 69,000 last year — to make sure the machines that scan, weigh and/or measure the things people buy are accurate, so people get what they pay for and they can accurately compare consumer goods in the marketplace.
Last year, the department reported that 25 percent — one out of every four — of 1,400 businesses inspected had scanning errors. In some cases, those errors actually benefited customers by charging them less than full price. But the department also reported that customers were more than three times as likely to be overcharged, and that for every $1 in undercharges there were $5.33 in overcharges.
Customers who find price problems can easily report them by contacting the County’s Agriculture, Weights and Measures department at 1-888-TRUE SCAN (1-888-878-3722) or by sending an email to sdcawm@sdcounty.ca.gov.
So, Happy Holidays — and double-check those receipts!