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Safeway Inc. has agreed to reimburse some
“rewards” members and pay a fine after overcharging customers at a gas station in Campbell, according to the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office.
Safeway has repaid customers whose credit cards bills showed higher amounts taken out than on charge slips in more than 700 transactions at a Safeway gas station on Hamilton Avenue in Campbell, Deputy District Attorney Francisca Allen said.
The chain, in addition to reimbursing the rewards customers, also paid a civil penalty of $46,650 while not admitting any liability or wrongdoing and cooperating with prosecutors, Allen said.
The district attorney’s office learned about the overcharging in fall 2011 from a customer who noticed a discrepancy between what a gas receipt from the Hamilton gas station showed and what was charged on her credit card bill, Allen said.
The discount price for her gas, when she used her rewards card, showed up on the printed receipt from the gas pump but not on the credit card bill she received later, Allen said.
The investigation revealed that a new but faulty software program would infrequently trigger a disruption and cause the undiscounted price for gas to be charged to credit card companies, Allen said.
Prosecutors found out that the glitch was also at Safeway gas stations in Pleasant Hill and Palm Springs that used the same software, Allen said.
While more than 700 overcharges were evident at the Campbell station, less than 30 erroneous sales took place each of at the Pleasant Hill and Palm Springs stations, Allen said.
Safeway repaid the customers by issuing credit to their rewards cards equal to what they were overcharged, Allen said.
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I noticed this a month ago at the Dublin gas stations. The sign posted $3.79/gallon, and I was charged $3.89/gallon. I thought I didn’t have enough “gas reward”, that’s why I was charged $0.10 higher. Can someone explain to me how do I get the most out of the Safeway reward card or the gas reward? At the pump, there’s a note that says, hold the “yes” button for a few seconds to get your “gas reward.” It never works for me.
Busted! – There are 2 prices posted. If you pay cash or use your ATM for payment, you start out .10 lower per gallon then if you use a ‘credit card’ as payment. If you didn’t get your rewards discount, either you had none available, or you didn’t complete the rewards process correctly.
In all fairness, they started the “tiered” pricing based on payment method quietly, and without much publicity. Signage was weak and best, practically nonexistent. They recently changed their signage to show cash/ATM vs. Credit card pricing. That may explain some of the difference between the discrepancies, however, in my opinion it’s just a ploy to make more $. I do not know how much they are charged for credit card processing, for I believe the extra 10 cents PER GALLON more than covers it. On a $60 fill-up, at $4/gal and 15 gallons, they get an extra $1.50 per customer. 12 pumps, and it’s an extra $18 per, what, 5 minutes? Assume 10 cycles an hour, and that’s $180 per hour. They are earning several thousand extra dollars, per station, per day. I can see why they followed Arco in this path. Costco, the “other” high volume, lower cost per gallon station, doesn’t even accept credit card other than AmEx. Bottom line, this is a profit center as far as their gas stations are concerned. The stations were profitable BEFORE THIS, so it’s just extra revenue. Does it go to pay union wages or whatever? That’s a whole other question. Bottom line: the consumer decides with their wallet.
I agree with Busted…..The last two times i’ve purchased gas at the safeway on bernal, the price posted on the street was not what was printed on my receipt. Gas rewards just don’t seem to take off any $ or cents.
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