...to think I should be sold a pair of shoes for the price on them, and not a HIGHER price??!

[lololizzy]

I went into a very well respected department store today that is meant to pride itself on good old fashioned customer service; in fact it's considered to be one of the backbones of this town..it's certainly a big pull for both tourists and residents alike.
Anyway....having made a purchase in a different part of the store, i wandered to a certain brand of shoe concession area... and found a pair of rather upmarket flipflop style shoes that i liked. Turned them over...price said £25, but this had been crossed out. Price written in over the cross-out, £35. Checked other pairs and this was the same. Bear in mind these are rubber flipflops. Being a good name, £25 you'd kind of expect, but i'm not paying £35 just for a bit of rubber.
I have myself worked in retail for nearly 25 yrs, and forgive me if i'm wrong and the laws have recently changed, but isn't this illegal practise? I called an assistant and she admitted that it was indeed, but it wasn't her power to change prices. I asked for a pair in my size and said i would take for £25 but not £35. She referred me to who i believe to be assistant manager, behind the till.
She said i could only have them for £35! Again i pointed out this was illegal and if prices had gone up, they needed to resticker them but not leave them out displaying two prices.. (being that it wasn't a sale and was actually an INCREASE!)
She was having none of it and was rude throughout, no apology and in fact a rather contemptous smirk on her face.
Obviously i didn't buy them, and came home and rang trading standards..only to find them closed...
So...who was BU??

it is true that they should have been re-labelled, not a higher price written over it. i think you're right that that is illegal

however, they can refuse to serve anyone they like, so if you say "i want them for £25" they are within their rights to say "sorry, you can't buy them"

I would like to know which department store this is, which is so well respected that it thinks it can get away without giving customer service training to its staff...............and I bet their head office would, too.

After all, being polite to frequently cantankerous, unreasonable and rude customers doesn't come naturally to most of us, especially teenagers!

it's not representative of the rest of the store, aloiseb, which is why i was so surprised.

£25 for a pair of flip flops!

That is all.

Sorry to disapoint you and say that they have the right to change and correct the price since you did not pay yet for the item, does matter what was written on it, they was crossing the first price, so the second was clear, even if its higher.
when VAT increased, i went to argos to buy something, in the catalogue and the price check mashine, was less than what they ask for in the till ( this was just next day after vat increases, the prices was not change yet on the catalogue), and also i watched in watch dog that once you are inside the shop and did not pay yet for the item, they have the right to put the price they want, but once you pay for the item, is yours even if they relize there is mistake just a second after.

not actual flip flops and are tough plastic all over rather than rubber.. just the shape is flipfloppy, should've described better..thong shoes i guess!

oh, yes i get the picture now, they are expensive, i find them in john lewis for £34.99, they are very good.

It wasn't misleading, OP said it was clear that the price had been increased, so it wasn't illegal.
Perhaps the prices had just changed but they had to wait for a delivery of new price stickers and so had to change them by hand in the meantime.

Poor customer service though.

Poor customer service. Concession assistant manager may not have had sufficient training from Head Office as to how to deal with such instances.

The concession let the department store down in terms of customer expectations. So the department store might want to look at if they will continue letting rent the space.

YANBU to be annoyed. YABU to expect to pay the crossed out price.