Circuit City "Empty game box"

soliddragon

soliddragon

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So I go into Circuit City last Wednesday, to preorder Super Smash Bros. Melee, i had to get two as one is a gift for my little brother, the upside being of course the $10 giftcards. My whole plan was to get the giftcards and use them to buy Army of Two when I go to pickup Smash Bros. on Sunday.

SUNDAY

I go to CC like 20 mins after they open, figuring I'll beat the crowds. Having experienced their sometimes suspect customer service counter; where even though I have something preordered, they never have it on hold, and have to go get it off the shelves. I go and pickup the two copies of SSB off the shelf and I also get one of their associates to grab the last copy of Army of Two for 360 that was in the display case.

With all 3 games in hand, I go to the Customer Service counter with my preorder reciept for SSB in hand. There are two kids in front of me, who are also picking up SSB, and it takes about 15 minutes for the CS Rep to ring them up. There is apparently some problem with their system ringing up the SSB game and the $10 giftcard preorder bonus, so every transaction has to be essentially re-entered manually, so it will take some time for them to ring up each of these preorders (this task is assigned to one person behind the counter, while the 2 other CS reps are only doing regular CS stuff like returns and the like)

So after waiting for the 15 minutes, she has to ring up my transaction, and that takes around another 15 mintues, but to me it was fine, I got my two $10 giftcards, and applied them to my Army of Two purchase, and I am happy. Or so it would seem at the time.

I walk out with my 3 games in hand and jump in my car, and head unto the highway (I live 30 mins north of CC, and its the closest one to me). Now the fun begins, I had noticed that my copy of Army of Two felt really light, but as it's an EA game, and they seem to be fond of the 1-4 page instruction manual, i didnt give it much thought. As a video game nerd, I love to rip into my games ASAP, and kinda like to look at the disc art and manual as I drive home. So imagine my surprise as I open the game box to find NO GAME inside the damn box.

The game was shrink wrapped, had all the Xbox security seals on it, but all that was inside was the manual, and instead of a game, one of those see through plastic CD things, the kind you get when you buy a spindle of CDRs or something. So what would you do dear reader? I got off the highway, and headed back to CC, keep in mind, the amount of time elapsed between leaving CC and getting right back was about 10 minutes.

I go back up to the counter and pretty much all the CS reps are there, and I explain the situation, that I just bought the game, not 10 minutes ago, and opened it up to find that there was no "Game' in the box, I brought back all the wrapping and the seals. They are all giving me the OMG look. Apparently one of the supposed CS reps behind the counter is the manager, and he looks right at me and goes "There's nothing I can do for you." I'm pretty much flabbergasted, it takes me a couple seconds to digest his response to this situation. "There's nothing you can do for me?!" Now I used to work in CS, I admit it's been a while, but if a CUSTOMER has a concern about whatever, i feel you should hear a customer out before just attempting to shut them down.

On top of that, his nonchalant "blow off" just rubbed me the wrong way. I say, I don't want a refund, I JUST want the game i spent my money on, I just want an exchange, his response..."No.". I ask him is there another manager I could speak with, he claims to be the "store manager", "Ok." I think to myself. I again explain that I JUST purchased the game 10 minutes ago, and opened it to find that the game was missing, he goes "I don't know how long it takes to open a game, and take the disc out, but it's probably less than 10 minutes." That really fires me up, this guy is calling me a thief to my face, "I just purchased almost $200 dollars in software from your store and you want to call me a THIEF?".
He says "I'm not calling you a thief, but we've had this happen before", "Well, that's not my problem" I state, I go on to ask him does that mean, that I have to CHECK everything that I buy at your store, by opening it in front of a manager, to ensure that I have the actual product I purchased and not just an empty box?

At this point I'm really fired up, I mean, me, the consumer having to FIGHT with a store to receive product that I rightfully purchased. I understand that this is a weird situation, but I'm not lying, and I didn't steal the damn game. So I bust into the fact that I have shopped here for years (Which I have) and bought several thousand dollars worth of merchandise from them ( which I also have, TV's, stereos, etc). This goes on for a little bit, but he eventually comes around, and says that he can see how passionate I am about the whole thing, and he'll allow an exchange. Meanwhile I'm thinking (yeah buddy, you're doing me a REAL favor!). Turns out the copy I got was the LAST one, (of course!), so he wants to issue me a refund, but instead of that I ask, can I just get the PS3 version instead, and he was willing, so In the end I got my game, not the version i really wanted, but one with an actual game inside the case.


In the end, I understand if you are a store where people often attempt to steal from you, by claiming that the game they just bought was empty, and demand a refund. But on the same token, I feel that you have to take it on a case by case basis, especially when all this customer wanted was the actual game he payed for.


Sorry for the LONG writeup, I just wanted to get this off my chest, as the way the manager initially handled it REALLY bothered me. What do you guys think? Every had this sort of thing happen to you?
 
I can see both sides, but the manager handled it really poorly, and I would have done exactly what you did.

I wouldn't have left without the game or refund.
 
typical csr who almost accused you of being a theif. it seems like at CC, their store comes first, then customers. it sucks that you had to get the version you didnt want. what i would have done is save that sealed and return it later to get the 360 version.
 
Damn that sucks. Im now opening everything before I leave the store.

I once bought some Mozart 2-CD set, and a disc was missing, from CC also.
 
When I bought Mario Kart for the DS I went home, opened it, put in the game and BAM.. Ping Pals!! I went back to Circuit City with my DS in hand and showed them my situation and thankfully they exchanged my game without any problems.

I would have just taken the refund and got the version you wanted because I know the graphics on the 360 tend to look better then the PS3 version.
 
I see the managers point but still it was 10 minutes and youve been shopping with them for years. I would have yelled and raised a fit untill I got the game or a refund just like you did.
 
If I was in your position I would have flipped my lid after the manager inferred that I stole it.

Absolutely would have gone apeshit until I got what I paid for.
 
I work at 'guest service' at Target, and I've had someone come in with an empty God of War 2 saying that it didn't have a disc. They just bought it that day.

We just took another GoW2 out of the case and gave them the disc, and marked the empty box as a defective item. No big deal.

Now, if they bought it 2 weeks ago that might be different.
 
this same thing happened with my friend who bought "the royal tannembaums" on DVD from CC. he got home and there was no disc in the case, eh went back and luckly they believed him. but its a tough situation, how can you prove that?
 
It happened to me with a GBA game. The box was slit open at the top and someone took out the cartridge (the box was in one of those big plastic security cases so I didn't see the slit when they put it in the bag). I noticed it about 5 minutes later. It was only a $4.96 game but since it was the last copy, I got a refund
 
yes this has happened to me. i got gta san anderes from my cc and went home and opened the game. it looked straight legit but to my suprise there was no game. its an inside job by those shitbirds that stock the warehouse. i would say they use an exacto and carefully slice the package in 1 piece or maybe they have some extra stickers or something like that. but anyways i had to fight with them for 20 minutes and now i say fuck you to all these fucking places and i buy all my shit from amazon. its cheaper i dont have to pay tax and more importantly i know that when i buy games they are actually in there fucking case
 
[quote name='Dezuria']I work at 'guest service' at Target, and I've had someone come in with an empty God of War 2 saying that it didn't have a disc. They just bought it that day.

We just took another GoW2 out of the case and gave them the disc, and marked the empty box as a defective item. No big deal.

Now, if they bought it 2 weeks ago that might be different.[/QUOTE]

Its my understanding that when a store sends an item back as defective, they lose no money as they just send it back to the manufacturer and get sent a replacement. Its not a big deal unless the store decides to declare it as a loss rather than defect.
 
[quote name='cdietschrun']If I was in your position I would have flipped my lid after the manager inferred that I stole it.

Absolutely would have gone apeshit until I got what I paid for.[/quote]

Same here. Thankfully i have never had anything like this happen to me.
OP should have opened the PS3 Army of Two on the spot if he didn't.
 
rule 1 of customer service- never, ever, ever imply the customer stole something. Assuming that the 'no-disc' thing is a common enough scam at that store to warrant not accepting exchanges, that manager could have easily stated it was a policy from the regional manager or something and it was out of his hands. Very poorly handled by him.

Sorry for all your trouble- here's a tip for the future- if you're suspicious of a box being empty (or just want to be cautious), hold the back of the box to your ear and tap on it. You'll be able to hear the disc on the hub inside if it's there- works on DVDs and games. (In fact, it works better on games since the manual cuts back on noise from the case itself shaking.) it doesn't work very well on UMDs, and obviosuly won't work if the disc is off the hub- but you'd notice that anyway.

If you're not sure what to listen for, grab 2 games and take the disc out of 1 case, then do the tap thing. It's pretty distinct, you'll catch it right away.;)
 
Sound like fun.. go to GameStop next time!

You can use the 10% off anything coupon found in these forums... you'll save even more off of your new games!
 
Pretty much I have had to take people at their word, one customer got a box set of DVDs missing one, I had a replacement available so swapped it out, otherwise I would do all the leg work with the various companies to get a replacement DVD.
(I am a small operation) and all I can provide is customer service.

About the only time I have not believed a customer was when I was told a DVD did not work and they tested it in a couple different units. (upon examination of the DVD I found a nice circular scratch near the inner ring,) I did not replace this DVD as their player was to blame, I have never seen a new dvd with circular scratches before.

But yep some stores make it real hard to get things resolved but as long as you keep at it, they will usually do the right thing in the end.. but will piss you off along the way.
 
[quote name='DuelLadyS']rule 1 of customer service- never, ever, ever imply the customer stole something. Assuming that the 'no-disc' thing is a common enough scam at that store to warrant not accepting exchanges, that manager could have easily stated it was a policy from the regional manager or something and it was out of his hands. Very poorly handled by him.

Sorry for all your trouble- here's a tip for the future- if you're suspicious of a box being empty (or just want to be cautious), hold the back of the box to your ear and tap on it. You'll be able to hear the disc on the hub inside if it's there- works on DVDs and games. (In fact, it works better on games since the manual cuts back on noise from the case itself shaking.) it doesn't work very well on UMDs, and obviosuly won't work if the disc is off the hub- but you'd notice that anyway.

If you're not sure what to listen for, grab 2 games and take the disc out of 1 case, then do the tap thing. It's pretty distinct, you'll catch it right away.;)[/QUOTE]

That method isn't as good anymore. It's fine for PS2/XB games (never tried it with 360 and the PS3 has clear cases) but it won't work for a Wii game. Wii game cases hold the disc perfectly still, preventing any movement. This also doesn't work in some other cases (double disc PS2 games or PS2 games with a thick/a lot of manuals and inserts).
 
I actually shake sealed games before I leave the store. Most of the time you can hear a game rattling around in it.

My CC is pretty bad. I found a "Display Box" of VP2. Went to try and buy it, took them 15 minutes to try and find it. They didnt have it. Went back in a week later, and I see the same "Display Box" of VP2 out on display.
 
Can see it from both sides, and have actually seen this happen also. Guy bought a pc game from me, can't remember the game. Left the store, little more then 15 minutes later the man returned with the box and everything except the game was not in the case. It was a pc game which came with more then one disc and only disc one was missing. As I sold the game to the guy I knew when I saw it that it was factory sealed and theres no way someone opened it up and stole disc 1. Also since the man was older and a gentle men I had confidence in him telling the truth, plus since it was multiple discs why would he just take disc 1. None the less my store manager wrote the game off as defective and returned the money to the man.
 
[quote name='chakan']Found your problem.[/QUOTE]

No kidding. The CC near me has a horrible manager just like the one the OP experienced. At this point I think CC should be avoided regardless of what deals they are offering.
 
[quote name='Hybrid5006']Sound like fun.. go to GameStop next time!

You can use the 10% off anything coupon found in these forums... you'll save even more off of your new games![/QUOTE]

Now that's great. With the new Gamestop Gutted™ guarantee you'll always be assured that the disc is in the case!
 
Honestly, I'm surprised the manager gave in. I haven't had a positive CS experience at Circuit City in years. Typically, they just blow you off and go hide in their office.
 
[quote name='soliddragon']
Sorry for the LONG writeup, I just wanted to get this off my chest, as the way the manager initially handled it REALLY bothered me. What do you guys think? Every had this sort of thing happen to you?[/quote]

Have you written to corporate?

The jackass resolved it eventually, but it was still only after the accusatory tone and you not taking that bullcrap. You shouldn't have had to bring up your purchase history in order to get reluctant service.

If you haven't opened it, return it to another CC that has the version you wanted originally.

CC can be the pits. They've lied twice about trying to contact me about a store pick-up item not being available. They've also charged me for an item that wasn't available and only refunded when I brought up the discrepancy on the pick-up receipt.

Unfortunately, suspicious eyes are cast both ways because of thieves and scammers. I swear it seems like it is more rampant nowadays.
 
Speaking of contacting corporate, is it best to call them or send an email? My local CC is horrible for a number of reasons:

1. Unwilling to price match
2. The entire game section is not alphabetized nor do they have dividers between games. It's like shopping at Big Lots.
3. The store just opened but no one goes there. The Best Buy across the street always has more cars in the parking lot
 
so when are we, as a community of gamers, going to stop giving CC our money? They've dicked many of us over, many many times. I dont even bother trying to get anything thats in their ad, as its never in stock. I gave up on them a while back due to poor service and selection, and gave up on gamesh!t a year and a half ago due to consistently poor service.

the best recourse we have is hitting them in the pocketbook. if our whole community pulls out, i think its enough lost business to shake them up a bit.

i know a lot of people hate Best Buy as well... i've personally yet to have a bad experience there, either way, there are alternatives. Amazon has been throwing gamers a bone constantly over the past year +... they receive about 85% of my gaming business...

anyway... lets rise up brothers! no more CC! no more piss poor customer service!
 
[quote name='callmesteam']so when are we, as a community of gamers, going to stop giving CC our money? They've dicked many of us over, many many times. I dont even bother trying to get anything thats in their ad, as its never in stock. I gave up on them a while back due to poor service and selection, and gave up on gamesh!t a year and a half ago due to consistently poor service.

the best recourse we have is hitting them in the pocketbook. if our whole community pulls out, i think its enough lost business to shake them up a bit.

i know a lot of people hate Best Buy as well... i've personally yet to have a bad experience there, either way, there are alternatives. Amazon has been throwing gamers a bone constantly over the past year +... they receive about 85% of my gaming business...

anyway... lets rise up brothers! no more CC! no more piss poor customer service![/QUOTE]

Best Buy gets bad rap due to the blue shirts giving people misinformation and overselling the damn PRPs, but if you can avoid both of those scenarios it's not a bad place to shop at most stores. Of course a bad manager can ruin anything though. Either way, my local Best Buy is way better than CC. They've been willing to attempt price matches for me and if they can't price match they'll still try to reduce the price in an attempt to make the sale.

CC just doesn't give a shit. What the OP says is true about ordering something ahead of time and picking up at the service counter. I ordered a flash drive for in-store pickup and I waited at least 20-30 mins while people whizzed through the normal checkout lines. What a waste.
 
[quote name='NTolerance']Speaking of contacting corporate, is it best to call them or send an email? My local CC is horrible for a number of reasons:

1. Unwilling to price match
2. The entire game section is not alphabetized nor do they have dividers between games. It's like shopping at Big Lots.
3. The store just opened but no one goes there. The Best Buy across the street always has more cars in the parking lot[/quote]

I'd write to corporate versus calling so there is a copy of what you actually wanted to convey. Calling leaves no full paper trail to go back to. Snail mail is when you are really serious.
 
[quote name='eliter1']Same here. Thankfully i have never had anything like this happen to me.
OP should have opened the PS3 Army of Two on the spot if he didn't.[/QUOTE]

Oh I most certainly opened up the PS3 copy right then and there!

[quote name='Hibiwa']Have you written to corporate?

The jackass resolved it eventually, but it was still only after the accusatory tone and you not taking that bullcrap. You shouldn't have had to bring up your purchase history in order to get reluctant service.

If you haven't opened it, return it to another CC that has the version you wanted originally.

CC can be the pits. They've lied twice about trying to contact me about a store pick-up item not being available. They've also charged me for an item that wasn't available and only refunded when I brought up the discrepancy on the pick-up receipt.

Unfortunately, suspicious eyes are cast both ways because of thieves and scammers. I swear it seems like it is more rampant nowadays.[/QUOTE]

I am thinking of writing a letter to their corporate offices, if anything just to confer my unhappiness with the way i was initially treated. I mean, I'm a 30 year old man, and I wasn't even wearing my 'gangsta bandana OR baggy shorts that day :) And I still felt as if I were treated as some sort of miscreant.

Thanks for all the responses guys.
 
my experiences with best buy, while not perfect have been far better.
they occasionally do something stupid but it gets sorted out. their managers seem to care far more abotu customers than my expereinces suggest cc managers do.
also its easier to go up the food chain at bb than cc.

I havent been into a cc since the shit with speedy, and i have no intentions of doing so.
 
[quote name='blackdog60']Pretty much I have had to take people at their word, one customer got a box set of DVDs missing one, I had a replacement available so swapped it out, otherwise I would do all the leg work with the various companies to get a replacement DVD.
(I am a small operation) and all I can provide is customer service.

About the only time I have not believed a customer was when I was told a DVD did not work and they tested it in a couple different units. (upon examination of the DVD I found a nice circular scratch near the inner ring,) I did not replace this DVD as their player was to blame, I have never seen a new dvd with circular scratches before.

But yep some stores make it real hard to get things resolved but as long as you keep at it, they will usually do the right thing in the end.. but will piss you off along the way.[/quote]

Actually, I bought a DVD box set once and yes there were circular scratches on it and it was brand new.

I've found CC to be unhelpful if you're looking for a particular product. I once asked if they had a game in stock and their response was "Check the shelf. If it's not there, we don't have it".

And soliddragon, did you move or something?
 
At least it didnt ruin your x-mas lol..

I bought Blade III on sale awhile back...I let it sit for a few weeks before watching it.

I was bored and decided it was a good time to watch it and when I opened it, I was staring at 2 bonus discs.

Too much time passed to go and complain so I open my dvds and games before I leave the store now.
 
Lulz. Reminded me of a time when I bought FFVIII from Best Buy, I didn't get around to playing it till three months after I bought it. So, here I got slowly beating the game and then I insert disc 4, I got an error saying that I inserted the wrong disc. I reset my psone and found that the content of the disc is the disc 2 of The Legend of Dragoon instead of disc 4 of FF8. Keep in mind that the disc had the FF8 disc 4 label printed on it. Needless to say I'm way too late to even get a chance for a game exchange. So I just let out a quiet ha..ha..ha.
 
[quote name='ajnk']Lulz. Reminded me of a time when I bought FFVIII from Best Buy, I didn't get around to playing it till three months after I bought it. So, here I got slowly beating the game and then I insert disc 4, I got an error saying that I inserted the wrong disc. I reset my psone and found that the content of the disc is the disc 2 of The Legend of Dragoon instead of disc 4 of FF8. Keep in mind that the disc had the FF8 disc 4 label printed on it. Needless to say I'm way too late to even get a chance for a game exchange. So I just let out a quiet ha..ha..ha.[/QUOTE]

Wow, you took it well. I would have had a nuclear meltdown. :bomb:
 
You know whats really sad? I got better customer service from the lady on the phone when I ordered my HDTV because I had just gotten approved for my CC card than I do in the store.

Seriously, I've worked retail almost my whole life. I've never seen as large of a bad batch of employees as Circuit City. Both in the one I shop at and from the stories I see here. They must seriously treat their employees like dogshit, because it seems like very few are ever happy.
 
I see more and more negative things about circuit city than ever. Truth be told, I couldn't care less about them as a company, but it seems that they're on their way out within the next few years.

What sucks is that when big companies shut down (media play, circuit city, compusa, and fye (stopped dealing videogames to expand their anime section) in my area all that is left is target, walmart, tru, best buy, and gamestops. It's almost impossible to find a deal anymore.
 
I always...ALWAYS open the game before leaving the parking lot. The same thing happened to me with Zelda Wind Waker a few years ago and just recently with Mass Effect.No damn disk in the case.

I also always shake the game before leaving the store and seeing if the game came off the spindle. I bought SOCOM 3 the day it came out and the disk fell off the spindle and was scratched to hell from moving around inside the case. I got a replacement.
 
Going to sound like a bastard here but one time i bought a game from toysrus for ps1 and it sucked but of course you can't return it for that reason. So I bought another ps1 game that i wanted any my brother and I carefully removed the shrinkwrap in one piece and put it on the other game and since I always leave those seals on top the shrinkwrap pushed it down. When I returned it with the original receipt the guy carefully inspected it but never caught on and I returned it. Doesn't really apply to the post but oh well, you read it didn't you. At least I put the game back in before I returned it.
 
Have to say.. really odd you guys are getting Diskless cases from one store chain CC... i sell probably thousands of games in a week in Gamestop.. for well over a year.. i dont think we have ever had a game not in the case... unless it was employee mistake on a used game...
 
[quote name='sasukekun']I actually shake sealed games before I leave the store. Most of the time you can hear a game rattling around in it.

My CC is pretty bad. I found a "Display Box" of VP2. Went to try and buy it, took them 15 minutes to try and find it. They didnt have it. Went back in a week later, and I see the same "Display Box" of VP2 out on display.[/quote]


During Christmas it was hilarious watching soccer moms get pissed off when they'd see the display Wii boxes, get all excited "WOW THEY HAVE THEM IN STOCK! THIS WAS WHAT JOHNNY WANTED FROM SANTA!", run up to the counter, and get told they were display only.

I saw this several times at TRU and CC.

I've always wondered what might happen if I was to open a brand new game and find the disc missing. It's impossible to prove and with the number of scams/thieves out there I can see why retailers would not want to believe me.
 
I second the suggestion of shaking the case before you leave the store.

I know when I'm receiving movies and games for the sell at the movie store I work at I shake all the movies and games lightly just to make sure something is in there before I receive it.
 
The thing is that the op said there was a "blank cd you find in cd spindles" so how would shaking the case work when he would hear the blank cd shaking inside? I think there might be some kind of scam or something if game disks are being replaced with blank cds...:whistle2:?
 
During Black Friday me and the fiancee went 30 mins before the store opened and ended up waiting in the cold for about 20 more minutes in order to get 5 seasons of smallville for 15 bucks each (honestly one of the best purchases I ever made) and we get home only to find that season 1 is missing 2 discs. We try calling but to no avail (apparently they don't take phone calls during Black Friday) so end up having to go back out into the streets that are full of terrible drivers to get an exchange and they pretty much were reluctant to do so but they ended up doing it anyways. Besides, what the fuck was I gonna do with some random smallville discs if I had stolen them?
 
[quote name='Hybrid5006']Sound like fun.. go to GameStop next time!

You can use the 10% off anything coupon found in these forums... you'll save even more off of your new games![/quote]
And you're guaranteed to be offered a gutted copy! Let's not forget the hassle some employees put when it comes to figuring out how to use coupons offered from e-mails! :lol:
 
Only time there is every a problem with a coupon from the internet.. is when the dumb ass who printed it is to lazy to buy ink for his printer. For me at least :) Then i just dont take it.
 
oh shit... i have tons of unopened games/dvds/bds/hd-dvds should i be worried? shaking the case doesn't really help, since most discs are not loose. Weight-wise you can't really tell :(

even if you think the disc is in there, there's still this paranoid feeling that the disc is a bogus disc!

Now, taking a step further, even if you got a what looks like a legitimate disc, there's still a chance it's a fake (hell, bootlegs are harder and harder to tell now a day).

Sigh, unfortunate events i guess...
 
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