Call Kurtis: Why Won't You Take My Coupons?
TURLOCK (CBS13) -- Armed with a pink binder packed with hundreds of coupons, Sandra Cervantes ofTurlockis serious about saving money.
"I just don't believe in paying full price for retail," said Cervantes.
She knows all of her favorite stores' policies, and even carries copies of those policies whereever she goes. So you can imagine her surprise when she went to Target inModestoand had her online coupons turned away. "The cashier realized that the register was beeping and not allowing not only the Sunday newspaper, they were not allowing the online manufacturing coupons," Cervantes said.
Sandra was forced to un-bag all her groceries and line them up on the checkout stand. She went through each coupon one-by-one, pleading her case with two managers. They approved the newspaper coupons, but not the ones she printed from the web.
Cervantes said, "The first thing out of my mouth was 'Here's your Target policy. You do allow online coupons. She just glanced at it and was like 'Thank you very much but we still can't accept your coupons'."
Sandra recalled feeling overwhelmed, belittled and ridiculed.
The coupons she tried to use were printed from Coupons.com. They clearly state on the coupon that the retailer can check their authencity by logging onto a validation website.
"If they're a legitimate manufacturer coupon, there's no reason a store shouldn't accept them," said Frank Whitney with the Better Business Bureau.
Whitney does say there can be exceptions. "You may not be able to gang it with another offer. They may have a sale on that item already."
Last summer, Target made national headlines when customers across the country said stores were's giving them the full value of their coupons.
The Call Kurtis team put Target to the test, having an undercover producer buy three grocery items at the same store, using similar online coupons. There were no issues using them.
"All I wanted was an apology because of the feeling that they made me go through that night. It was not nice," said Cervantes.
We reached out to Target. They didn't have an explanation for what happened to Sandra, but they do say this has nothing to do with the coupon problem last year. A store manager contacted Sandra by phone and arranged a face-to-face apology. A spokesperson says Target stands behind its policy of accepting online coupons and is "continually educating the thousands of cashiers across the company on their checkout processes, including coupon redemption."
As for Sandra Cervantes, she just wants good customer service. "You want to feel special," she said. "You're doing them a favor of going to their store."
