Wegmans website erroneously double-charges credit card purchase Rochester New York

I purchased a $250 gift card from Wegmans website on 6/5/07 using my visa check card. The gift card was for relatives who live in Rochester. On 6/10, I discovered that I was charged twice for this purchase, which indicates a serious problem with the reliability of Wegmans online gift card sales! Because I made the purchase with my visa check card, which debits from my checking account, if I did not discover the error in a timely fashion, I would have discovered it by bouncing checks!! I cannot believe that this kind of error can occur with an online purchase from a supposedly reputable merchant such as Wegmans.

On 6/10, I sent an email message about the error to gift_custserv@wegmans.com, and I received a reply from Stephanie Hagberg stating that she would look into it.

On 6/11, a customer service rep called me to say that my visa account would be credited and that 2 gift cards were already in the mail to me, but one of them would have zero value. I told the rep that the gift card was a GIFT that is being sent to recipients other than me. She then asked me if I wanted to contact the recipients to give them the number of the card with the zero value, or if I would like her to call them. I said that I would let the recipients know.

When I contacted my relatives that day, they had already received both gift cards, and they were overwhelmed by my apparent $500 generosity. They said that the cards couldn't have arrived at a better time, which made the task of informing them that one of the cards had a zero value extremely awkward and disappointing. I sent an email message to Stephanie complaining about the negative implication of Wegmans error.

On 6/15, I received an email message from Nicholas Wood apologizing for the error, and stating that a letter of apology would be sent to my relatives along with a gift card of unspecified denomination. I replied to Nicholas' message by thanking him as well as offering to pay $125 of a $250 gift card to make up for the error. Nicholas then responded to my message stating that a $25 gift card had already been sent with the apology letter. He said that he was going to send a fruit basket instead of the gift card but thought that the latter might be appreciated more by my relatives. A fruit basket?!

I cannot help but wonder whether the erroneous duplicate gift-card order was a scam rather than an error. In particular, if I hadn't discovered the error until after my relatives received both gift cards, I would not have allowed Wegmans to zero-out the value of one of the cards. In other words, I would not have informed my relatives of Wegmans mistake and let them keep the full $500 in gift cards especially because they came at a time when the extra money was particularly helpful.

After relaying my story to another relative, who lives in Rochester and shops at Wegmans regularly, she informed me that on several occasions Wegmans has erroneously double-charged her credit card when she has made purchases with it in the store. I wonder how many other people excuse Wegmans of these kinds of errors, or, worse, fail to detect them.

Needless to say, I am shocked and deeply disappointed with this recent experience. I have lost all respect for Wegmans.

Kathleen
Mishawaka, Indiana
U.S.A.