Retailer More On Target With Coupons Now
CHICAGO (CBS) -- For four months, shoppers have complained that Target was short-changing them when they used coupons.
Now the retailer is making sure you get every penny you're owed, following a special report from CBS 2's Dorothy Tucker.
Tucker re-visited the retail chain, and it was a better experience. Instead of losing money, as she did during her earlier report on coupon-shopping at Target, she got the full value of her coupons.
Target, which cited computer problems as the cause, is changing the entire way it deals with customers and their coupons. At the top of the list, cashiers are now supposed to ask customers if they have coupons, although Tucker did not find shoppers who had been asked.
Target told its cashiers to make the inquiry, in a recent email. That was in response to shoppers' complaints about Target shortchanging shoppers by not giving the full value of a coupon.
Tucker went undercover last month and had the same problem. She had a $1.50 coupon off for three cans of soup, but the cash register only gave her $1.01 off – a loss of 49 cents.
Blogger Rachel Singer Gordon had a similar experience.
The company says it's working on a permanent fix for the problem, but for now it instructs cashiers to "process coupons one by one and check to ensure full value of coupon was applied."
Tucker went back to see if the system was working. She bought three more cans of soup, but this time when the cashier scanned our $1.50 coupon she got a red alert to "check the coupon." The cashier did, and Tucker got the full amount off.
In a statement to CBS 2, the retailer said it expects to have a permanent fix for the computer problem in the next 10 days. When asked why it couldn't have been corrected months ago, a spokeswoman responded, "It's a complex issue."
