Crass Makro management

It has taken me a week to get on here and share my experience with Makro Springfield because I've been so angry and defeated by what transpired last weekend. On Saturday the 26th of June, we went to Makro to buy the Bubblegum Tablet for my very tech-savvy niece who is also Autistic as it's her 4th birthday coming up and that was supposed to be her gift. I searched the internet and found that only Makro sells it. We were supposed to get it at the Cornubia branch but didn't and ended up at Springfield, what a devastating mistake! The lady who helped me with my purchase was so polite and even asked about my "daughter", she told me that there's a 1 year warranty and sent me on my merry way. She did not open the box to see that everything is functional, which I had no problem with at the time because I figured that Makro is a reputable establishment and I'll just bring it back should anything be wrong, mistake number 2. When we got home that evening, just before 6pm we unwrapped everything to see our little girl's reaction and she was beaming with excitement, however, we could not let her play with it and so she let it be. The tablet didn't switch on so we put it on charge and thought it'll be fully charged by morning for her to play with. A couple of hours later, we tried switching it on to see that it is indeed functional, the screen flashed rapidly and I took a video of it thinking this might be a problem. It switched on and we set everything up like connecting it to the WiFi and getting her an email address to use the Play Store then we downloaded some apps for her and we really liked the tablet, we then left it to finish charging. By midnight the tablet still was not full and in fact had only charged until about 30% MAYBE and we thought it odd but decided to keep it on charge. My initial thought was "Wow! Our phones really used to charge this slow???" I figured that we had gotten too used to these fast charge gadgets of today. When we woke on Sunday the 27th at around 8am the tablet was only on 92% and that's when I had decided that I will be returning it. Before doing so, I thought I'd message Makro on their Facebook account to explain the problem and seek some advice but they didn't respond until the next day. So we packed up the tablet and off we went to Makro to solve the issue, little did I know that this is where my nightmare would start. I walked into the Returns department, took a seat and waited to be called for assistance. I cannot remember the name of the lady I spoke to but she was the ONLY one who greeted me. I explained to her that I had bought that tablet for my daughter just the day before and in all the time that we had it, it was on charge but never reached capacity. She opened the box, took everything out and proceeded to put the tablet on charge and leaves it there for a few minutes. I told her that I would love to keep the tablet because I like it but the way it charges is not normal. She then says that these tablets charge slowly and that's just the way it is, which to me says "It's working perfectly, I don't know why you've returned it." Which also implies that I'm lying or don't know how electronics work. I told her that that is far too slow for my liking, I have never seen an electronic have to charge for that long and I refuse to accept that that's normal. She then tells her colleague about the reason for my return and states that in those few minutes, it hasn't charged. Her colleague then fetched a fast charging adaptor and put the tablet to charge, it had charged something like 4% in 5 minutes and I was called over to have a look and indeed it was charging, to which my response was "Then it must be the charger." I was not going to be telling anybody how to do their job so I left the ladies to use their discretion and do with that information as they saw fit. The lady who initially helped me says that the tablet is charging fine so she doesn't know what the problem is and seemed like that was the explanation I had to accept, not even that they will change the charger. She then says that she's gonna have to send the tablet in to be checked for the fault. I absolutely refused for that to be done because that tablet was brand new, there is no way that less than 24 hours after purchase, I'm going to accept that it must be sent in for checking and repairs. I would accept that if I had bought it 6 months ago or something crazy like that, but certainly not 24 hours ago. I told her that if that's the case, I want a refund, she said she needs to call her manager to explain. I told her that I don't need any explaining, I just want a refund and they keep the tablet and find out what the problem is but they will not keep my money and leave my kid without a tablet. While waiting for this lady, a couple who had purchased a kettle came in and explained that the kettle isn't switching on. The guy helping them said he needs to send the kettle in to check what the problem is and then repair it. Then it hit me, Makro is actually running a **** because there is not a damn thing you could buy from them that they would actually refund you for, even if it were returned 30 minutes after purchase. Their return policy is nobody gets their money back, I think the people working in returns were told that the official line is "It needs to be sent in for checking and repairs." The lady who purchased the kettle refused to accept that, she said she needs to go home with a kettle. The gentleman leaves and returns saying that his manager said they can get a credit to buy a new one and she was satisfied with this. The lady who helped me then calls a manager who comes from inside the store, he does not even greet and he starts fiddling with the charger and also comes to the conclusion that he doesn't know what's wrong or how to fix it. They then took it upon themselves to fetch the witch that is Wendy Alexander who also arrives without greeting and directs all her questions about the tablet to her colleagues and not me, the person who bought it and returned it. She sits down and proceeds to wipe the screen of the tablet with a cloth, I hear her say to the first manager that there are scratches on the screen and this caught my attention because first of all, that is not the issue at hand AND that certainly was not caused by any doing of mine or anyone else in my home because it was not played with. I said "Excuse me??" She immediately got rude and said "Yes! Look at these scratches!" While shoving the tablet in my face. It needs to be noted that the screen of the tablet is plastic, not glass and it makes sense because it's a kid's device. Plastic is full of imperfections and the tablet was not opened in store to check that there were not scratches before. I did not notice any scratches which means Makro sold me an imperfect item and they picked up on that, not me but I was made to feel like a ********. I then took it from her to get it out of my face and tried to give it back to her, she refused to take it from me but instead sat back in her chair, folded her hands and said "No, I'm not taking it." I was floored at the attitude of a "manager" to a paying customer, my shock turned to anger and I told her that I want my money back, she shouted at me that "You not getting your money back!" She also states that the stats on the device is that it had been in use for a couple of hours and the time since it's last full charge was about 5 hours ago. Raging I said that the reason I'm here at all is because it has never gotten to 100% and it was switched on and set up, I did not buy for it to sit in it's box, it was bought to be used. I then used an unladylike word when speaking to her and she threatened to call security on me, she told her colleagues to call security. I took my phone out of my handbag and attempted to take a picture of her name tag to which she posed for the picture with her 2 fingers in front of her face and said "Take your picture." I said I want a picture of her name tag and she pulled her jersey to my face and said "Here it is! There's only one Wendy Alexander!" She then says "When you're writing your note on social media, make sure you mention how rude you were." I said I will be sure to mention how rude you were. She then says that there's a camera and it's been recording, I said good! I could not believe the crass behaviour from a female with mileage on her. So I hope someone goes and takes a look at that footage. I stood at that counter furious and humiliated, not being able to move because my kid's tablet was still plugged in. It was then decided that they would give me a new charger and be done with it. I accepted this, told the lady to pack up the tablet and I left, but before leaving I said that I would be back should the problem persist. My anger grew this week because my mother had bought a laptop in December of 2020 from Springfield Makro that started having problems about 3 months after purchase but still usable. However, the problems got worse so she returned it. She was told that they would get their technician to have a look at it and it would take about 10 days, this was on Wednesday the 16th of June 2021. On Sunday the 20th she received a call saying that the in-store technician could not find the fault so the laptop had to be sent to the manufacturer and that would take an additional 10 days. On Friday the 2nd of July, she again received call saying that their TAT has now expired and there is still no feedback from the manufacturer, so to uphold the store policy, they could either issue her with store credit or refund the purchase amount. She opted for a refund to find another laptop at a different store. She went there the following day and she was refunded an entire 6 months later of having used the laptop. So my question is this, is this normal Makro practice or is it just the one and only Wendy Alexander? Because I cannot understand how we could get polar opposite treatment from the same store. As a result of this, I know that I will not be using Makro Springfield ever again. I would discourage anybody from using any Makro at all if I could. Perhaps Makro should look at training their staff on customer care or refrain from hiring people with no manners or class. I cannot understand how Wendy Alexander was able to get a job, let alone become a manager. It's people like her that will lose Makro customers and give Makro a bad name. I am disgusted by the happenings of that Sunday afternoon and will not let this die here should Makro fail to address this.