Is Autozone screwing me over?

[Grocery Cart]

February 9th I went into Autozone to get a new alternator for my '89 240sx. My good friend went in and bought it with his card because I was at school. He actually did it all; took it out, bought it, then put it on and picked me up from school. I paid him back when I got home.

Fast forward a month later, it went out on me three weeks ago.
Monday of last week I brought it in because I got the 3 year warranty with it. How this work was they returned the money to my friends bank account and we had to use that to pay for the new one. Usually it takes about 24 hours for the transaction to go through.
Well here we are almost two weeks later and still nothing. We contacted Autozone and each time they said there's nothing they can do, it's been done and it's in the banks hand. We called the bank a few times and they say they haven't see anything, but bring them the receipt and they'll put the money through. The receipt that showed the money was returned, was given back to my friend when I gave him his card. He lost it a few days before this.
Well yesterday we FINALLY got through to Autozone that something was wrong, and they told us to come in today because the Manager would be in. I've lost receipts for ordered items plenty of times. All I ever had to do was go in and ask them to print me another one. 10 minutes. Done. That simple.
Well we went in and told her what was going on. She ran my name, my number, my friends name, his number, and his debit card number.
She told us there was no record of me or him EVER buying ANYTHING from that store. Or any Autozone for that matter.
So yeah, that pissed me off. We left the store, called the bank. They told us there's nothing they could do. My mom called the store because she works at a bank, she talked to the store manager (the other manager left). She didn't say anything about what was going on, but asked the man about a purchase that was made, and yada yada yada. She did mom stuff.
A few minutes later, she put the phone on speaker. The guy called out everything I, and my friend have EVER bought at autozone. Then she told him what was going on, and he kind of went blank. He said to call back tomorrow to talk to the manager, because she'd be in.

Has anyone ever had a problem like this??
Was this lady trying to screw me over because she didn't want to deal with this? Or could there somehow actually be a mistake? We gave her all the information on the card, his number, and my number plus our names multiple times. She kept saying nothing would come up.

What can I do? I just want my car to be running again :bash:

[yellowxhoodie]

You can tell your friend not to loose receipts.

If he used his debit card it will be on his bank statement, get all the information you can on that transaction from the bank and bring it to Autozone, thats all I can think of.

[nekrodev]

Yeah, don't lose receipts for car parts and have your friend print the bank statement for that transaction.

Typical case of a lazy customer service employee.

[Grocery Cart]

We have on the statement he paid for it, what's not on is, is that they returned the money into his account. That's the problem. Without that I can't go get the part.

What get's to me is we've had lost receipt issues plenty of times, never has it been a problem until it had to do with them returning money.

[nismonismo240sx]

Sorry to hear this. I work at Autozone and they really don't want to screw the customer over. Cuz it'll always backfire. And what for really? They'll go thru great lengths to avoid problems with customers. I've seen cases like these go for months. Unfortunately you will sometimes get stressed out/lazy managers, depending on the location.
My suggestion is to keep at it. Gather up as much information as you possibly can. It's a new age where people loose receipts. It's irresponsible but it happens. Bottom line is the customer is always right. Might take a while though gl.

[benarovi]

i had this happen one time. it took like 4 days to get the money

[Dorifto-san]

If you know the day and time of when you went in and had the credit refunded to the debit card, bring this up when you meet with the manager. They should have a receipt log for all sales and refunds/credits. If they cannot find the transaction, make them refund the amount again. Make sure to keep the names of each key employee that you spoke with, and finally ask to have the district/regional manager's information if they don't resolve the issue. Keeping your patience and being polite will go a long way, however you are at an obvious disadvantage because you guys lost the receipt, but they should still have record somewhere. One thing I've learned is always keep your receipts! Have a box or file folder just for keeping onto them, you never know, some of them might be used as tax write offs! Good luck man.

[Grocery Cart]

If you know the day and time of when you went in and had the credit refunded to the debit card, bring this up when you meet with the manager. They should have a receipt log for all sales and refunds/credits. If they cannot find the transaction, make them refund the amount again. Make sure to keep the names of each key employee that you spoke with, and finally ask to have the district/regional manager's information if they don't resolve the issue. Keeping your patience and being polite will go a long way, however you are at an obvious disadvantage because you guys lost the receipt, but they should still have record somewhere. One thing I've learned is always keep your receipts! Have a box or file folder just for keeping onto them, you never know, some of them might be used as tax write offs! Good luck man.

I have all my receipts. I knew it was a bad idea to give the receipt to the friend that's lost his debit card 4 times the last month... haha.

But anyway, what Autozone is trying to say is that neither me or him have EVER bought anything from them.

[Dorifto-san]

Request to have both the store manager and whichever shift manager who was able to pull up your purchase history present when you go in to meet. Let them know that if the issue is not resolved you will contact the district/regional manager and work with them to get the issue resolved.

[LOUD240]

A friend of mine had a similiar problem and what was happening was that a couple of the emplyees were refunding money into their personal accounts and whiping the customer transaction from the autozone system,the personel at that store completely changed a week later

[90white240]

Which autozone was it at dino?^^^

[Tommy]

Yeah sounds like a hassle. When I had a starter from them go out that still had warranty, all I had to do was bring it in and they looked it up. Then straight up just gave me a new one without question. Sounds like that store manager is just being a dick.

[jdmpure]

If you have one nearby...Advance Auto Parts will just straight up exchange the bad part for a new one... no hassle with refunding money and making you repurchase the part again. That makes absolutely no sense to do it that way...just some food for thought.

[Grocery Cart]

I expected it to be just a trade for a new one.. no big deal.

Anyways, we're going in and figuring this all out today.

[[email protected]]

If you know the date that you bought it on, they can pull up every transaction from that day. Because possibly the person that rang your friend up didn't put the warranty information in correctly, it may have went under a different number or something dumb. Also, the person doing the warranty swap did it wrong. There's your first problem. I worked at autozone years ago, and when someone came in with a warranty exchange, there is no refunding the money to their account or anything like that. It's simply testing the old part, and if it's bad swap it out.

You're probably dealing with a store full of idiots. Honestly most of those guys are usual retarded.

[Grocery Cart]

If you know the date that you bought it on, they can pull up every transaction from that day. Because possibly the person that rang your friend up didn't put the warranty information in correctly, it may have went under a different number or something dumb. Also, the person doing the warranty swap did it wrong. There's your first problem. I worked at autozone years ago, and when someone came in with a warranty exchange, there is no refunding the money to their account or anything like that. It's simply testing the old part, and if it's bad swap it out.

You're probably dealing with a store full of idiots. Honestly most of those guys are usual retarded.

Summed it up in a nutshell.
If you work at an auto parts store, at least know a LITTLE about cars..
I've gone in and asked for one thing and they would bring me to something completely different.

[HyperTek]

im surprised it doesnt have lifetime warranty? My dad bought a alternator for my blazer years ago and they just swapped it for a new one when i got the blazer running. I bought a starter for my 240sx back in 02 and occasionally got replacements easy.

I have never had a problem at Vatozone, its probably just that 1 employee you dealed with doing the refund that screwed up. If you guys talk to the manager again, ask them to investigate that employee (just try to give them a description of the person).

oh yeah btw, doing third party purchases like having your buddy buy the parts, sometimes can fall into wierd situations like this and really suck when you try to fix them. I lost over a hundred when i had my friend buy brake rotors for me years ago on ebay when i didn't have an account.

[ZenkiCam]

First off, autozone blows. In my experience everyone who works there is lazy as fuck. And that is bullshit saying they can't find your friend in the system. ANYTIME YOU PURCHASE HARD PARTS BEFORE YOU EVEN SELL THE ITEM IT PROMPTS YOU FOR A PHONE NUMBER! They can also use this customer profile to look up transaction history for that customer, dating back to 2 or 3 years. This is here for people who have lost receipts. And they should have never put money back on his card, they should have just swapped out the alternator, and if there was a difference in price being that you went with a more expensive one or cheaper one this time around that is the ONLY reason to put money back or take more money from his card. they should never have done a full refund. Fuck dealing with that store, go to corporate and deal with it there. Let them know how much of a nuisance this store has been to you. They will deal with them trust me. The DM AND RL will be in and out of that store weekly for a month. Should have came to advance, advance has a way more strict customer service policy and does things right the first time around. Good luck

-advance employee

[Jus Skott]

I use to work at autozone and it sounds like the manager might have had a lot of returns that day and didnt want the numbers to be effected, so you get one of the delay tactics. we don't have the part here, we don't have the cash, we don't have a warranty for that or the system is down.

ZenkiCam (http://zilvia.net/f/members/zenkicam.html) I can't say you're completely wrong there, but a fair amount of zone employee's are lazy as fuck, or stupid as hell. Can't tell you how many of the managers I have went round and round with about repairs and general maintenance. Thy think since they took autozones ase cert that they know all, but actuality, half of the fucks have never laid their hands on a car. In the 4 years I worked there, I've seen about 20 batteries hooked up incorrectly, fucking the electrical system. Seen managers try to talk down and degrade part time employee's that work as a mechanic full time in respectable garages. Tell Top engine builders in the area that they don't make the part that they are looking for (was for common sbc 350) and so on. Then theres my personal rants that I won't get into on this thread.

[fliprayzin240sx]

So bought a shitty alternator from Autozone that went out in 1 month and you want to use another one of the same shitty part?

[DALAZ_68]

only 3 yr warranty? pretty sure its lifetime unless its valuecraft model... (sadly im currently a drone for em while im in school)


that sucks man...

[EhrikETFG]

I work at advance and when something is defective if youbhave a receipt or your number is in the computer we swap it out right there or as soon as it gets in

[O3DigitalBath]

So much nonsense in this thread...


First off no alternator has a 3 year war. They are either 1 year or lifetime.

Second if you paid with debit the refund would come back as cash money. If you used your debit card but ran it as "credit" thats when it would go back to an account. This can't be messed up as its automated and no way the employee could divert the money to another account...there isn't provisions in the system for that of any kind. (the story mention in the thread of this happening simply isn't true, someone along the lines didn't know what they were talking about with that).

IF the part was refunded to your account the employee's would no longer find the part as being sold to you. When employees in the store go to look up history files they are only viewing parts (generally under a phone number) that still have warranty on them. So if it was refunded it would be purged from that history.

At the store level there is no way for them to find a record of your transaction by just the card used to make the purchase, If you know what day the item was originally purchased they could go through the Electronic Journal Logs and find the exact transaction looking through all transactions on each register.

IMO its highly likely you guys used a different card than you think you did and are looking in the wrong place...just cause that sorta mixup happens very frequently. If this isn't the case - lesson learned to keep receipts for larger purchases.

Eitherway a phone call to the district level by someone should clear this up instantly, if anything they may even just do a paid out for the $$ to get the issue off their hands. Thats your options at this point, not keeping your paper work means you screwed yourself in this case, but its not anything a phone call can't clear up in a few minutes.


-I've worked just about every job possible in a store there and other competition parts stores before and still work like 1 day every few weeks for the company.

[Touge180]

I'm with 03DigitalBath i've work in a parts store for 4 years everything he said is correct just go to cooperate and this will get settled quickly.All returns come out of the stores budget which= the store mangers bonus.

[Tom25666]

she's a woman. there's your problem :D

[280zx2by2]

Judging by the OP's understanding of his own situation... I don't think he has a fucking clue what is going on.


We need mom in this thread.



Worse case scenario you get your money back on a merchandise card.

[Kom3t]

I would just keep Bugging them... I would never let any money just get lost like that...

[Banana_Cute]

Can i borrow your phone number so i can get a new alternator when this is all done and settle with?

[JohnnyDrfiter22]

I used to work at auozone when i was 18, ive scene this happen a few times. It would be just that someone behind the counter fat fingered the phone number. They should be able to check by phone, you need to physically go to the store have them bring up all the info in front of you. Or go to another autozone and check with them.

[h2v7]

read thread title.

assumed answer was yes.