Walmart's Piss-Poor Customer Service

Yes, another - lame - adventure at Walmart today.
I was in there today looking for an oscillating fan  a cheap one thank you - for the female tenant's room who was wanting one. 
I was distracted by the deli counter -got some ham, Pet center, got some more dog food.  The fans are in the far back corner of the store. 
I look at every fan there and decide on a metal fan, it was listed at $18.00. 

Take my stuff up front, buy it, thought the total was too high, I was charged $36.00 for this fan. 
I go back to the back.  There are no other fans like this one any where in that area.  The place I took that fan from? It was the only fan there.  I didn't know what to think.  I look very carefully for another of these fans somewhere else - I KNOW how Walmart functions, I don't want to look like an idiot.

No, no other fans like this one.  I call for a manager.  He comes up - didn't look like a manager, wasn't dressed much like one, either.  I show him the situation.  He says to go up front with him, he'll take care of it.
Okay, cool.  We're halfway up to the front when he stops me and says he needs to go check on something, he'll be right back.

In a pig's eye he was right back.  I think I waited there 5 minutes before I got disgusted and went up to the front, asking for the store manager.  While I'm waiting, this first manager finally shows up. I want nothing to do with him at this point and tell him directly to his face that I wasn't going to be dealing with him.  He didn't much care for my stance, but I have received such utterly abysmal customer service at Walmarts on so many occasions in the past, I just don't take it anymore. 

The store manager comes up - but he's a co manager.  I didn't want a co-manager, I wanted the general manager.  General manager isn't there today.  Great.  I look him directly in the eye and tell him that I think that being told to wait for a second and here it is 10 minutes later are 2 different things and that I wasn't happy about that, at all.  He explained that the manager I was originally was dealing with had come to him to ask for guidance.  I replied that this man had told me we were going up front and that he was dealing with it, not that he had to take a detour to go take a break somewhere.  He replies he wasn't taking a break, they had gone to the back to - whatever.  I found out whatever in his next statement:  The fan you got belongs with the fans that are right next to where you got yours.

No, sir, it does not.  Yes sir, this fan is identical to the fans that are next to it at the higher price.  I replied again, no sir, it is NOT the same fans as ANY other fan that is on any of those shelves.  He continues to argue with me.  I pointed at the picture, it showed a metal fan, the rest of those fans had PLASTIC blades and housing.  He gulped, stepped back, said "Oh".  "I KNOW what I'm talking about, I looked at every box there" was my immediate reply.  He did not apologize for arguing with a customer and in the end, being WRONG about his stauch assessment.  THIS is a store's co-manager? 

"Well, what do you want me to do about this?".  What kind of question is that to a customer? Isn't he supposed to offer whatever he's going to offer, or refuse to offer anything, or what?  I asked him if he WANTED to do anything about this?  Yes, he said, what do you want?  I want the price that the damned sticker on the shelf SAYS it is - $18.00, not $36.00.  He doesn't want to deal with me, I was totally unimpressed with this guy.  HOW a man with that kind of attitude gets to be a store's high level manager, I have no clue.

He takes me up front to the customer service desk.  There is a VERY long line there.  It takes them forever to deal with customers at that place, I know this from experience.  I couldn't believe that this guy was going to make me wait even LONGER - in this huge line - to deal with this after I have already spent CONSIDERABLE time on this issue already.  But that's exactly what happened. He went up to the counter, spoke to an associate, turned to me, said she would deal with me.  Yes, she would deal with me after I waited another freakin' 20 minutes.

Screw that.  I called the number on the sign - customer service always has phone numbers listed up there. I have encountered in the past associates telling me that the general manager isn't there and then finding out that yes, the general manager IS there.  I called and asked for the name of the manager that was on the sign.  I get 3 different people - I ask each one if they are the general manager.  No.  On the 3rd person, I informed her that I have asked now 3 times for the general manager, she informed me she was not there.  I asked for the district manager's number.  "He's on vacation".  You've got to be kidding me.  Is there anything I can help you with? NO.  I asked for the district manager's number again, I don't care if he's on vacation, I"ll leave a blooming message. 

She persists, what's the problem, can I help?  I decided to give it a try, although she isn't on the same level as the co-manager, perhaps she is empowered anyway.  I explain the entire situation to her, including the fact that this store's manager left me waiting in this long line.  She said she would be right up, and she was.  There's a lady standing in front of me in line.  She is alllllll ears.  She listened to my phone call and my conversation with this woman, plus had heard the short interaction there with the co-manager.  She was totally agreeing with me.  I simply said to her another example of Walmart's great customer service.  She went right off: she's had a bookful of bad situations with customer service at Walmarts as well.  This is, of course, nothing surprising to me - AT ALL.  I imagine millions of people being treated in various shades of horrible service, probably a very low percentage of them actually do anything about it. 

The lady manager goes up to the counter, a man working behind the counter says in a very terse voice that "we already KNOW what to do", speaking with a scowl on his face.  Are you serious?  How does an associate talk to a manager like THAT?  Don't know, don't care, if he would have addressed me like that, all bets are off.  She's walking back and forth between me and the counter, she finally decides that I should be the next person to deal with.  No thanks, I said, these people have been waiting.  I'm thinking no way am I going to have those glares and stares aimed at my back while I pass them by to get this now-getting-exhaustively-long situation dealt with.  She offers me a $10 gift card for my trouble.  I immediately said yes and thank you.  Not turning anything down at this point. 

I get my $18.00 plus the adjusted tax, but no gift card.  The lady had gone off to yet another manager and I could hear her discussing this manager leaving me standing in an aisle, waiting for an eternity.  I was about to walk off, if they aren't going to give me the card, I'm leaving.  She turns and comes up to me - dunno what set that off, asks if I received my gift card.  No.  She gets it for me.

It turns out that it IS a $36 fan, but no, there were no others like it in the store.  It WAS in an $18 shelf - all by itself.  I invited them all to look at video surveillance to verify that this is where I found the fan, I didn't move it from somewhere else.  In reality, there WAS nowhere else to move it from, all the other shelves with fans were totally full and they were totally different than this fan.  After the gift card, the $36 fan cost me $10.

Doesn't really matter, though, the service is the same: crappy.

Take the deal, yes, take the nonsense, no thanks.