PSA: Walking out of Costco/Sam's

[CrayZee]

A few months ago I saw a good argument w/ a couple of Arab-looking customers..they were yelling at the door person and calling him a racist for making them stop and that they weren't stealing anything. The first thing I thought was, is it worth the few bucks per hour for that job...then again, they don't really do anything. They probably miss the items I do steal.

If the line is really long, I'll just walk out next time and see what happens. Sounds fun.

[Blarg]

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If the line is really long, I'll just walk out next time and see what happens. Sounds fun.

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Never thought about this kind of thing before, but this thread is making me ornery. I haven't really had to wait long before; what bugs me is if they make you start to scramble to point out individual items.

Maybe I'll just brush on past, next time, instead of wasting my time or feeling as if the burden is on me to prove I'm not a crook.

[Mad Steady Eddie]

Had a friend in law enforcement who says the same thing, you DO NOT have to wait in that line. Of course OP is saying AFTER u've paid for everything, you don't legally have to wait in that long-ass line just to show a receipt. Just get the eff out and it's all good.

[chopstick]

I worked at Costco for a while, including as a Loss Prevention agent.

If you want to keep walking, just keep walking. They cannot stop you, and will not (if they have been properly trained) as it opens them up to being sued for false imprisonment.

If they saw you steal something, they can try to stop you. Usually they will still not bother, because it just isn't worth the hassle. Depends on what you stole, obviously. A bag of candy is a lot different than five cartons of cigarettes. Most of the time, we just followed the guy out to his car and got the plate #, while calling the cops.


You guys would be surprised (or not) at just how many women would load up their Uber-strollers with stolen stuff, including having the kid sit on a bunch of DVDs or similar.

Ah, the retail days.

[Howard Beale]

I didn't read all the replies but it might be in their Terms and Conditions when you join that your cart must be examined.

[potato]

At Costco once the receipt checker noticed that I had been double-charged for an item I only had one of and saved me $20.

I always walk by the door nazi at Fry's and say "no thanks" as if they are trying to sell me something. A friend of mine dated a girl who worked the door at Fry's and she said that they are there more for the thieving employees than anything else.

[Perplexity]

This article is about exactly this issue:

http://www.lps1.com/bw.digg.html

[tuq]

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This article is about exactly this issue:

http://www.lps1.com/bw.digg.html

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Good read, thanks. The guy does seem incredibly nitty and I don't think I could bring myself to do the things he does, but at least he's fighting the good fight for all of us.

Also, I agree with his WTF at the Costco sign about checking receipts to ensure accurate pricing. That's like the most transparent excuse ever.

[Performify]

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you can basically just blow them off and walk out and they can't do anything. Now, I wouldn't recommend doing that all the time, but when there's a big slow line, it saves some time.

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100% standard and I'm surprised by all the negative reaction here.

I've been a Sams Club business account member for 12 years. I've shown my receipt at the door maybe a total of five times in twelve years.

99% of the time there's a singular employee working the door and he/she is almost always engaged with someone. I'll just always roll right by, and as already mentioned in the thread, if they ask "Sir can i check your receipt" I'll always respond with a polite and cheerful "no, thanks" or "that's OK" and keep rolling.

I've never, ever been challenged on it. Literally I'd say hundreds of visits.

Same deal at Best Buy if the cashier forgets to correctly zap your merchandise and you set off the detectors. Just keep walking, if you don't want to mess with it. As I understand it, though, there is a value to getting them to de-tag your merchandise there, though, in that sometimes you can get hassled trying to return items which haven't been de-theft-protected.

[JJNJustin]

This is kind of off the subject, but I found it kind of funny. I live in a prodominantly white suburb of Detroit, and we were shopping at a CostCo. Many white families were shopping for the holidays, baskets full of crap, breakfast cereals, food, etc. Carts were overstuffed, bottom rack full of bottled water. While waiting in the checkout line, I saw two black guys who were checking out and looked into their cart to see two huge bottles of Absolut Vodka, two huge bottles of cranberry juice, and two bottles of orange juice and nothing else. Definitely some cultural differences reflected in their shopping choices.

-J