Unfortunately I like to keep things complete in case I ever sell anything..

 

Kingdom Rhinox has shipped.

 

amazon sets shipped

 

Please keep in mind that:

No receipt exchanges/refunds are a tracked metric.

No receipt has an escape clause for the store/company to refuse the exchange/refund.

No receipt means you will get the lowest price that it has been sold for (which includes category promotions) within the past "x" amount of days (it will be a minimum of 90 days).

No receipt exchanges are YMMV if it's not the same item.

No receipt means that the refund amount will be placed on a store gift card (Target's are now merchandise return cards that are only good in-store).


There will be more restrictions in the future. Stores/companies are tired of the rampant fraud and inventory fluctuations (when it can or has to be resold and/or there is no manufacturer reimbursement when it can't be resold).

 

LPS at big box retailers are getting tired of our shit. Your name, face, and payment method are going to be indexed along with a profile and sooner or later there may be a reckoning for the people who engage in return fraud--by which I mean, returning TR Galvatron in the Kingdom Galvatron box, and otherwise ripping off the store directly; stealing LeBron heads, etc. You pass by so many cameras from the time you park your car to enter the store, walk around, shop, check out and pay, etc. While the drones at the help desk may be blase or uncaring or clueless, the loss prevention professionals are shrewd, suspicious by nature, morally repulsed by this type of behavior, and heavily rewarded by the company when they successfully bring cases that result in charges and convictions against abusers. Tread carefully!

 

Yeah, but there's a big difference between ripping them off like that and returning an item MISB which they currently sell, regardless of whether you purchased it there or not. I don't think that costs them anything.

 

Actually with Target if you used a credit card, you can create a Target.com account and add the card used as a payment method. Then go into in store orders and every purchase from every order from Target with that credit card shows up and if eligible can print a return bar code.

 

Oh for sure. I didn't mean to indicate that returning a perfectly fine product that they actually sell is the same thing. I should have clarified better.

 

Just can't bring myself to get Tricranius

 

If you didn't purchase from that company:

A plethora of merchandise that goes through the CS desks goes right back out to the sales floor. If you didn't that item from that company though, they have effectively purchased the item from you for the shelf label price which means there is absolutely no profit margin at all. It might be easy for someone to see that as a wash but, that exchange/return required payroll/time at the CS desk then payroll/time to be re-merchandised. One could argue "well they were getting paid and at work anyway" but I can assure you that every drop of that payroll/time could have and would have been better spent elsewhere even if this type of exchange/return only happened once in all of recorded history. Now, that will sound like hyperbole to a lot of people but anyone that has ever dipped their foot into retail or service will attest that payroll/time is next to nonexistent (due to cuts, abusing "banking hours" for managerial bonuses, and a lot of other assorted nonsense).


Automatic reduction in profit margin:

A lot of the stuff that goes through the CS desks get marked down (yes even if something is unused or MISB and, no it rarely makes any sense at all).

Then there are the items that have to be opened to verify the contents which they might or might not be contractually obligated to try and sell.

Then there are the items that can be RMA'd to the manufacturer (the reimbursement varies wildly based on the contracts).

Then there is D&D (defect & destroy) where the store/company has to remove the item from inventory as a defect and then physically destroy it beyond repair because the manufacturer will not accept any merchandise returns. These might or might not have reimbursements.


What all exchanges/refunds have in common:

Retail views the profit margin (vendor price vs MSRP vs the shelf price) like the MPA/RIAA view torrents. Anything that alters the profit margin (which wasn't a corporate decision like an ad/promotion) has to be punished.

If it sells poorly and has to go on clearance, it's the store's/employee's fault (because shit rolls down hill) for not selling enough due to poor customer service. The only exception to this is if it's widespread enough to be blamed on logistics and/or the company purchasers but retail is the blame game and the upper echelon is excels at it wasn't me. Anything that doesn't fall into that scope, is seen as fraud/theft or worse, that the fraud/theft caused the poor sales. The circular logic in retail is truly a sight to behold.


Wait, what about ads/promotions?:

They aren't designed for anyone to purchase only that item. They are designed to get you to spend far more than you had planned on and/or to get you to still spend the same mount spread out across multiple items. There are two reasons for this:

The first, is that they hope you will buy something else with it that has a higher profit margin. If you don't, it's no big deal because a bunch of price changes (that increased) rolled out with the ad/promotion to cover the loss.

The second, is that they are trying to reduce the loss in profit margin before something is destined for clearance and/or they need to clear inventory out before the end of the fiscal year in order to avoid being taxed on it.

Ads/promotions all have one thing in common. They are all exceedingly well planned even when they look like a haphazard mishmash of what even is this. It's the same psychological warfare than mobile games use. It works so well, that:

Almost no one could wrap their heads around when J.C.Penney completely removed ads/promotions and ditching the price changes (unless it was a permanent markdown) on 02.01.2012. The general population had no way to process that J.C.Penney had adjusted their prices to where every day was the lowest price you would ever see the item at J.C.Penney (barring a promo for the entire month and/or every 1st/3rd Friday and/or clearance). People literally thought they were being punished and always having to pay more while never having the opportunity to pay less and J.C.Penney couldn't get consumers to understand which resulted in massive drops in purchases as well as the P&L (profits & losses). J.C.Penny made one of the most pro-consumer moves in the history of retail and consumers responded with "hard pass, we want to continue with the status quo of being taken advantage of and rolling around in FOMO for the chance at that sweet dopamine spike and bragging rights about getting it cheaper".

 

Got my two Tricraniuses (Tricrainii?) in today! But seeing as my house, including my Transformers, is almost completely in boxes they too will remain in their shipping boxes for the next few days.

 

Yeah I don't like fossilizers. I did it for the blast effects and consider Tricranius a as free gift for buying blast effects LOL.

 

That's correct and, it's incredibly useful to the consumer and the LP.

I was only addressing exchanges/returns without a receipt that were purchased elsewhere (which is also applicable to a legitimate purchase there which the proof can't be obtained). I probably should have done a full comparison breakdown but, I didn't want to poor through everyone's exchange/return policies and the scope of the conversation was a lot more narrow.

 

Slag just shipped out without any prior notice of payment going through, lol.

 

Slag is coming to join Grimlock yay!

 

If I had not see the line on my bank statement, I would not have known until today when I got the "Your order has left the building" email. SLAG will be here MONDAY!!!

 

Tricranius Beast Power Pack - 2 left


Shattered Glass Megatron - 5 left (cancellations)


Maximal Grimlock and Mirage - 21 left


Sideswipe and Maximal Skywarp - 55 left

 

Still need the last two Seacons

 

Looks like the grimlock/mirage pack is the more popular out of the two

 

It came in stock more recently, which is probably the bigger issue. But that Grimlock is quite nice...!

I'm biased, though, because I'm a huge Sideswipe whore.