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Best Buy Scans Drivers License For Returns — No More Allowed For 90 Days

Posted by Soulskill on from the thank-you-for-your-business dept.

rullywowr writes "A customer with a defective Blu-Ray disc returns to the Best Buy store where he purchased it. After having his driver's license scanned into the system, he is now banned from returning/exchanging goods for 90 days. This is becoming one of the latest practices big-box stores are using to limit fraud and abuse of the return system — for example, the people who buy a giant TV before the big game and then return it on Monday. Opponents feel this return-limiting concept has this gone too far, including the harvesting of your personal data."

1 of 503 comments (clear)

  1. Re:When people abuse prices go up by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    So if your second TV is also defective, you can't return it because this 90 day delay outlasts the defective product return time.

    There are situations where this is a bad idea, but I have nothing against trying to crack down on the 'free rental' or 'free replacement' scams that drive up prices for honest buyers. The proeblem is, I don't know if there is any solution that won't have a greater detrimental effect on honest buyers than on scammers. Repeat scammers should be relatively easy to recognize in some data mining, so you can give them restricted return rights, maybe that would be the best way to handle it.

    I'm also curious just how much product is stolen through swapped return scams, I've heard it discussed, but nothing resembling an official dollar value.