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What does the olem think of putting our shopping experience on line? (if it’s news worthy)
There is a fine line between toelis (for a purpose) and lashon hara (slander) is there a way to do it correctly?
I will give one example without the stores name.
I live out of the Brooklyn area, when I moved here I spent $10k on furniture from xyz in Brooklyn, now I would like to add some pieces and they’re rude and extremely unaccommodating.
I can’t just go somewhere else because I want the furniture to match.
Wouldn’t customers living outside of Brooklyn, need to know that if you’re “out of town” xyz shouldn’t be the fist place to shop?
Yes there is certainly a fine line, and on one side of the line is Gehinnom. This is a widely read public forum. If you don’t want to cross the line you need to be expert in the Halochos of Loshon Hara.
This is not a good idea
Let people decide where to shop for themselves. Just because you dont like it doesnt mean they wont. They dont need your influence in thier purchases any more than they need the store-trying-to-sell-it-to-them’s influence. At least they are just trying to make a living you have no reason for telling people how good or bad a buisness is. Altough I am sure there are exceptions!
Chesed, if asked by someone, I would mention that they should find out if the company delivers regularly to your area or if an arrangement can be made. That way, you aren’t really saying anything bad about the company (since you seem to like your furniture), but you are ensuring that someone asks the right questions.
I’m no expert on LH though at all.
I had the experience of being told by someone not to shop in a store which I love and continued to patronize anyway. I later found out from a mutual friend, that the person who spoke to me had a bad experience because she tried to use an expired credit (over a year past the expiration date which was clearly printed on the credit slip) in the store, and the (new) owners explained they could not honor something that was issued by the former owners and had passed WAY beyond the expiration date. She became miffed, to say the least, and voiced her rather angry opinion of what they could do with the credit slip, and stomed out.
Personally, I feel a) it should be against the law to put an expiration date on a credit, since the money WAS paid and the services were not utilized and b) it is not good business to alienate a potential new customer for any reason. That being said, the expiration was printed in black and white in large letters, and the person should not have tried to pawn it off on the new owner, especially a year after it was not even valid.
oomis, Putting aside the entire issue of “to tell or not to tell”, if someone is due a store credit, for what reason should such credit “expire”? i.e. if someone bought a gift certificate, or returned merchandise and instead of getting a cash refund received a store credit, why should the customer lose their value due to an artificial expiration date?
The 2nd issue in your story was the fact that the store changed ownership. But typically a new owner assumes all of the existing business entity’s account receivables as well as account payables.
BS”D
While al pi halacha bankruptcy is problematic, it is entirely possible that the store changed hands because of a Chapter 7 bankruptcy in which those credits were wiped out.
Still, with such an expiration date (which is legitimate as you have no idea where the customer got the credit – for instance it could have come from a Chinese auction to which owner #1 donated it), there was no reason for the store to honor it.
A6KB: So your taaina that the store had no obligation to honor the credit is based upon the change in ownership? If so, do you see a legitimacy for an expiration date for a store credit, assuming no change in ownership?
BTW, if we accept that a change in ownership wipes out the business’ obligation to honor previous credits, does that not lead to the conclusion that debtors to the store have no obligation to pay the new owners?
(Debts owed to the store from prior to the change in ownership.)
“if someone is due a store credit, for what reason should such credit “expire”
That’s exactly how I feel! But – the store claims that people cannot expect to wait forever to redeem a credit, and if it is specifically printed ON the credit slip that they have informed them in writing what the store policy is. I totally agree that it should be redeemable forever, since the money WAS spent at the store and no goods and services were obtained in the end. Also, if a donation is made by the store, that is very different from an actual credit slip for paid for and returned merchandise. The donation absolutely MAY have an expiration date. The store owner is nice to give the donation, he should not have to wait forever for his kindness to be utilized. A credit however, is not a kindness, it is a business transaction because an item was returned. Likewise a gift certificate that has been paid for, should ALWAYS be valid, or else the store is stealing money from the unsuspecting giver of the gift. Their claim is that they posted that the certificate expires in x amount of time. I think that is ethically wrong.
BS”D
Joseph, no, not if the store credit is given for returned merchandise. In that case, it is essentially money due to the purchaser and cannot expire because it is reimbursement for cash spent at the store.
However, if it is a prize or incentive for which no money changed hands, I fully understand why it would be limited. I would not give unrestricted credits as a prize for a Chinese auction, for instance, because all I can probably legally get is my tax deduction if the scrip is actually redeemed and some not very effective advertising. In this day and age I cannot assume that I am even getting a repeat customer from the scrip.
And a regular change in ownership is one thing whereas a bankruptcy purchase is another thing altogether. Again, law and halacha differ regarding a bankruptcy and this is way past my knowledge of either.
Now, that poses another question. Assuming this is credit due to the original purchaser because of a return, and there was no bankruptcy, and the change of ownership occurred during the period of validity of that scrip – there is a serious problem for the new owner if the scrip was counted and adjusted for as a liability at purchase.
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