Ever looked at your grocery bill and thought, “This can’t be right?” You might be onto something.
WRAL’s 5 On Your Side caught several local grocery stores charging full price for items that were listed as on sale.
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In May, retired Holly Springs teacher Jason Fowler purchased several items at the Harris Teeter on Village Walk Drive, including five Tostitos products listed as “Buy 2, Get 3 Free.” Fowler told WRAL 5 On Your Side that he wasn’t paying much attention at checkout, but when he got home, he realized his bill was much higher than he expected.
“I’m thinking, ‘Wow, those are some expensive chips,’” Fowler said.
Upon closer inspection, Fowler realized the Tostitos sale hadn’t been honored. In fact, he did the math and says he paid more than 120% compared to what he should have. He went back to the Holly Springs Harris Teeter and got a refund for what he overpaid, but he wondered if others had overpaid and never realized it.
“I’m thinking in my head, ‘If they rip people off $12 for each thing, there could’ve been a million people who bought those items,’” Fowler said.
A recent Consumer Reports investigation found shoppers were charged an average of 18% more than they should have been on “on sale” items at Kroger-owned stores, which owns Harris Teeter.
To understand just how common this problem is, WRAL 5 On Your Side went to three grocery stores.
- Aldi in Cary at 1315 Kildaire Farm Road
- Walmart in Cary at 2010 Kildaire Farm Road
- Harris Teeter in Cary at 2080 Kildaire Farm Road
At each store, 5 On Your Side shoppers chose three sale items, monitored the prices at checkout, and quickly found errors. At Aldi, peppers advertised at $2.49 were rung up at $2.95. At Walmart, a case of water advertised as $4.97 was rung up at its original price of $5.97. Interestingly enough, when 5 On Your Side went to Harris Teeter, everything rang up at the advertised prices.
After pointing out the mistakes, the cashiers at both Aldi and Walmart quickly fixed the prices.
In response to our investigation, a Walmart spokesperson provided the following explanation.
“We apologize for the inconvenience and are thankful to our cashier who was able to correct the error,” the Walmart spokesperson wrote. “The item you’re inquiring about during this time frame was coming off Rollback (a Rollback is a promotion on an item of at least 10% for a minimum of 90 days).
“The error was the timing of manually replacing the item tag and the barcode being updated in our system with the new price. While it doesn’t happen often, our associate was likely pulled away during the price change process which cause the short term gap.”
The Walmart spokesperson said the stores are adding digital shelf labels to its stores.
“Digital shelf labels help us automate the price changing process, so changes occur all at once versus individually,” the Walmart spokesperson wrote. “As you can imagine, this speeds up the process of conducting price changes in our store (without interruption) and enables our associates to focus on serving customers.”
WRAL 5 On Your Side has not heard back from Aldi or Harris Teeter after repeated attempts trying to contact them.
All three stores say they’re working hard to make sure prices ring up correctly. But what if you don’t catch a mistake? The stores often keep your money.
Here’s what you can do: It takes extra effort, but pay close attention to sale prices. Snap a photo of the sales tag so that you can double-check it at the register and have proof at checkout.
If you spot a problem, report it. The North Carolina Department of Agriculture’s Standards Division audits stores to catch pricing errors and fines stores with repeated problems. People can contact the division at 984-236-4751 or by visiting the North Carolina Department of Agriculture’s Standards Division's website.