Fuzzy Math

I have long since lived by 2 notions:

1) Not everyone is cut out for college.

2) If you work at McD's, Burger King, Staples, Walmart, you work there for a reason. I.E. you're a teenager with few discernable skills looking to make some money, you're a senior citizen looking for a low stress job, or you are from #1.

I ran into the last one as the manager of a Staples store yesterday. So this past weekend I bought a 5370DW brother printer. I'll leave tax out of my numbers just to make things round easier. The printer was regularly $250 minus an instant rebate of $50. I had a $25 coupon off $150 so I effectively paid $175 for the printer right there. The catch is they also had a $50 off if you traded in an old printer. Once the printer came in, I was to take my old printer into the store and they'd credit me back $50 bucks. So I was prepared to pay $125 for this printer when I clicked submit.

So yesterday my printer came in. I went to the store and told the guy I need my $50 rebate on a trade in printer. So here's what he did. He credited me back $250 bucks for the old printer. I said you realize I only pay $175? He didn't say a word, said just sign. So i did some quick thinking and realized he was going to credit me $250 then charge me $200 again and I would net out my $50 bucks. So I sign my credit payback of $250.

Then he rings up the printer again with the $50 rebate. Only he rings up a Brother 5370D(not DW) which was regularly $250 with a $50 off instant rebate. Then he took off the next $50 for the printer trade in. So he only charged my $150 on the charge back.

So the final total was initial charge of $175, credit of $250, and then charge of $150 = $75 out the door plus tax for the printer. Dude just completely screwed Staples out of $50 bucks i was more than prepared to pay. I even pointed it out to him and he still did it. So either he's really nice and wanted to give me an even better deal than I had, or...

Seriously, not everyone is cut out for college.