Negligence, Misrepresentation, and Costly Online Order Issue - Mall of the North Store

On the 29th of November 2025 I went to Game Mall of the North in Polokwane with my family to buy my wife the Samsung A26 smartphone that we saw advertised online for R3999.00 as part of black friday special. Upon our arrival at the store, the sales agent who assisted us informed us that the Mall of the North store sells the Samsung A26 smartphone for R4999, not the R3999 price we saw online. He further told us that if we need to buy the phone for R3999.00 we must buy it online and as soon as we make the online payment they will immediately give us the phone from the store since they have stock. I asked him twice if he was sure that we would be able to leave with the phone because my wife's phone was damaged and the website was saying next day pickup, he confirmed that he is certain they will give us the phone immediately. We went ahead and purchased the phone online while still in the store and showed the agent the proof of order. The agent then directed us to go and present the order to customer service.

Our nightmare began when the customer service agent told us that it's impossible to make an online purchase and collect the item immediately from the store. He indicated that it will take 1-2 days and because of weekends it can even take more days. The sales agent was then summoned to come and explain what he meant and he simply said that he thought it was possible to pay online and collect immediately since you are already in the store. We requested to see the manager and explained to her (the Manager) that we come from Ga Kgapane which is about 100km away from the store and therefore it will be very costly for us to drive back to the store the next day. The manager refused to take any accountability and indicated that the only thing that we must do is to come back the next day as she can only commit to issuing the phone the next day. We also suggested that we could collect the phone from Tzaneen Game which is not as far as Game Mall of the North, but she indicated that it will take even more days because we have chosen Mall of the North as a pickup location. We were left with no other choice but to drive back the next day since my wife had no phone and could not go for more days without a phone as it affects her business.

The worst part was that when they finally scanned the phone from the store, they found that the correct price was actually R3999.00, which is the same as online. It pains me to think that all this costly drama could have been avoided if the agent checked the price from the system when we first enquired.

The next day (the 30th November 2025), we drove 100km back to Game Mall of the North from Ga Kgapane with broken hearts. Although we did receive the phone, it did not bring us any joy because the very money we were trying to save by choosing a black friday special, we ended up paying for the extra 200km trip. I also tried once again to ask the Manager if the store will take accountability for this costly experience, however she indicated that she will not accept any accountability and that if I want to get her fired from work I must go ahead and report the incident, the same words she also uttered the previous day. She repeated these words despite me telling her the previous day together with the agent that first assisted us that I have no intereset in getting anyone fired from work, all I need is redress, not revenge.

I therefore request Game Stores to intervene and redress my financial losses as this has cost me and my wife an extra 200km of trip which was as a result of the store's negligence and misrepresentation of the company's online ordering processes.