Submission + - Wal-Mart scams Millions with gift cards. (rightanglebuilders.com) 1
Nathan Wiering writes: "Wal-Mart Scams millions.
By: Nathan Wiering.
Every year after Christmas thousands of shoppers return to the store to return items but this is not the only reason people return to the stores. There are also many people that go to the stores to purchase something with the gift card they received for Christmas. Today Wal-Mart's Gift card system went down in the early morning hours. I called around trying to get the exact time, but I was told they didn't know exactly when the system had gone down only that it had been down all day nation-wide.
Customers that came shopping at Wal-Mart with their gift cards weren't able to use the cards. Instead they had to either use another payment method or leave without the items that had just spent valuable time gathering. A majority of the people simply paid by another method, because they didn't want to spend all the time shopping a second time, figuring they would use the gift card for some other products.
When I called around I also asked when the system was expected to be back up. I was told they didn't know when the system would be back up. On the Wal-Mart website there was no mention of the outage which seems strange because the system went down nation-wide.
Is this just bad timing for all the people shopping with their gift cards on the day when the most gift cards are used, or is it a well planned scam made to earn Wal-Mart millions. I can't say for certain, but the facts point to a well planned scam. Whether a scam or not, this could possibly double Wal-Mart's after Christmas gift-card sales."