Recently, it seems someone in Illinois was detained at a computer store for not showing their receipt on exit, as many stores want you to do. They were detained by the security personnel. They were smart enough to call the cops rather than blow up at the employees, and the cop who did arrive made sure they were let go.
Here’s the article I read at the Consumerist
What’s truly disheartening is not this ridiculous and illegal behaviour by the store, but some of the raging idiots in the comments. I don’t even know where to begin:
- The main issue is the forcible, illegal detainment. It’s, um, illegal, and is definitely one of those rights that is held sacred in the US
- Comparisons to movie theatres don’t count – when you show your ticket at the theatre, it’s to gain entry, not to leave
- Innocent until PROVEN guilty
- “Just show your papers and get on with it” is a dangerous attitude
- It’s not overly litigious is you were DETAINED AGAINST YOUR WILL. THAT’S ILLEGAL AND WRONG.
- Shoplifting prevention is not my job, it’s the store’s.
- As should be common sense by now, most stores cannot enforce a “you must show your receipt to leave” policy – you need to provide prior notice. Costco and Sam’s Club are exceptions, because they’re a club that requires you to sign an agreement before you leave.
I could go on, but I’d only get too angry. One person even went so far as to suggest that without showing your receipt, the store should be able to hold onto your purchases until you show it! Property laws be damned, I guess.
My biggest fear is that the people who advocate giving up rights because, in their mind, keeping them makes you “a dick”, can vote, reproduce and generally participate in society just like the rest of this. Worse, roughly half the comments on a site about looking out for the consumer are of this nature. I’m really scared about what the rest of the population has deluded themselves into thinking.
Three things have come of me reading this:
- Don’t expect me to show my receipt on the way out anymore
- I’m not doing business with the chain in question ever again (mostly because of this, partially because of the ineptitude of their retail employees)
- Best Buy is now in my good books. Several stories in the comments show the overzealous security employees being fired on the spot, with THE MANAGER calling the cops if they were belligerent, and apologizing profusely to the customers for the treatment (One door guy went so far as to push a guy carrying a big TV, causing the TV to break… not smart, considering the TV wound up coming out of his pay, and the guy he pushed was ex-Military. Spitting on him was especially stupid…)