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Message:: [QUOTE="lizjewel, post: 2632983, member: 13874"]Monday and I can't go to any thrifts because Co-# has closed them in our area. And it's very, very hot here too [No/Ctrl FL, USA]. And 2 hurricanes/tropical storms waiting to hit us. So I'll get this off my chest instead. To stick to the topic the subject is an item that should never have been in the inventory of this particular thrift shop, or any shop for that matter. It got one chance to sell, to the wrong person: my husband. This is probably the ugliest experience I've had with a thrift shop, ever. After it happened I boycotted ALL thriftshops with the same name in the entire US, and still do. How it happened: My [now, late] husband, then on disability but still able to get around, was out shopping for food in our exurbia neighborhood while I was at the office in the city. He got the idea to stop in at a local thrift also, just to look around. He spied a khaki trench coat that he thought I would like, wanted to surprise me. To him it looked good, he paid US 25.00 for it. Me trying it on at home found it way too small, very narrow in the shoulders in a 1970's style. Not only that, what hubby had missed, was that a/ it was a man's coat (buttoning, people, will tell you), and b/ it was full of mysterious dark stains near the hem, especially in the back, outside, and on the lining. Like someone had not have time to get to a restroom it looked. Hubby saw that and was heartbroken. I'll take it back, said he, tomorrow. As it turned out I was going shopping the next day, a Saturday so I offered to. I thought maybe they'd be nicer to a woman who obviously got a gift she couldn't use. I was aware that returns were not approved but I hoped they'd see my good reasons. They did not. NOT RETURNABLE. I nodded and agreed, suggested I just pick out something else for $25 that I could use? NO WAY. NO RETURNS, NO EXCHANGES. The manager was a mature woman, just like yours truly. I appealed to her sense of fairness, pleading that my husband had not looked properly at the garment, not seen that it was a man's coat or the hideous stains. She seemed to get a little less rigid and suggested that I "..donate it back to the shop." I thought about for a minute and asked if I could have a donation receipt for tax purposes? "No, we don't give those out here, this is a religious charity. A donation should be a true gift in the eyes of th..". I stopped her there, scooped up the miserable garment and left. To think that she should force the same horrible item on someone else if she got it back made me gag! I couldn't even look at it long enough to put it in the trashcan and wait for pickup after the weekend. The coat went on a wood and debrise bonfire we were burning anyway that Saturday. What did we do in those days without Internet when we wanted to complain high and loud? Well, I was always against shouting from the rooftops or Neapolitan style, from a balcony, so I typed a nice letter without typos, telling them my story in chapter and verse, and addressed it to the national headquarters of the charity. Did I get a reply? No, nor did I expect one. But guess what else I did? I told all my personal friends about my experience. The charity closed that outlet within the year. Probably not due to my complaint but, I have always wondered how many others also were poorly served there. I won't mention the name but it's an international chain of charity shops and it doesn't have the letters g or w in it. And it's probably a very fine organization if they'd only hire people who would know how to run their shops with a little compassion whether religious such or not.[/QUOTE]

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