Customer not always right when bringing home the bacon

THERE have been many letters criticising Morrisons with various complaints about poor service in different areas of customer satisfaction. Also there are letters from satisfied customers who are happy with their local store.

For over 30 years I called on many grocery outlets (in my capacity as sales and marketing for a major manufacturer) and I had a good relationship with many store managers, and staff, who sometimes “let off steam” and told me of the foibles and faults, from customers, that they had to endure and sometimes suffer, in silence.

The letter of complaint from Keith Sturdy (The Yorkshire Post, March 22) is an example of strange customer attitude. He wrote that he bought two packs of a bacon product reduced by 50p from a smaller discount store.

Without checking the receipt, when he got home he noticed that:

A) He was overcharged 90p per pack;

B) There was a different weight on the pack and also (b) there was a “wrong description” of the item.

So he decided that wrong labels had been used on their production-line.

I would ask him why he didn’t check the packs before placing them in the basket? I would also suggest that he bought the wrong pack.

His wife returned to the store with just the receipt and asked for a refund and the store manager was “unapologetic” in rightly asking for the products as well which is perfectly logical – who, in their right mind, would give a refund to a person who waves a receipt and just says that they were overcharged yesterday, without any proof?

It is quite reasonable and does not infer “pulling a fast one”.

I know the company in question and in my experience they are excellent in dealing with refunds, even after a mistake.

I have always disagreed with the adage that “the customer is always right”.

Spending money should not guarantee the customer a brief respite from honesty and fairness.

From: David M Adams, Huddersfield Road, Barnsley.

IT wasn’t very bright of Morrisons to recently announce price cuts of £1bn in their price war against the other supermarkets.

The implication behind this is that their prices were too high in the first place and their customers won’t be best pleased.