A man has been asked to return a $10,000 pair of Bloomingdale's diamond earrings, a $5,000 watch and a Louis Vuitton bag he purchased with store credit gifted to him by the department store because of a glitch that handed the man, and some other customers, tens of thousands of dollars in credit they shouldn't have received, according to a published report.
The glitch sent customers in Bloomingdale's loyalty program emails Friday that apparently mistook their reward point balances for dollar amounts, according to BuzzFeed. Customers who had earned 10,000 "Loyallist" points under the program, which would normally equate to a $25 gift certificate, were granted $10,000 in credit, the website reported. The man who bought the earrings ended up with a $25,000 store credit and others earned upwards of $10,000 by accident.
Bloomingdale's acknowledged the glitch in a statement to NBC 4 New York.
"A small subset of Bloomingdale’s Loyallist participants were accidentally issued rewards gift cards with amounts that were clearly incorrect,” a spokeswoman for the store said. “The company caught the mistake last week and is re-issuing replacement gift cards with correct amounts. The company is in contact with its customers and has apologized to those affected."
The shopper who bought the diamond earrings and other merchandise told BuzzFeed he was expecting a gift card but not in the amount of $25,000. He told the website he went to the midtown location to see if the credit was real; it turned out it was and he walked out with $17,000 in merchandise.
The shopper got a call from Bloomingdale's the next day saying he needed to return the items, according to BuzzFeed. The department store told him he'd get a $100 gift card if he brings the merchandise back and be banned from the loyalty program if he refuses, the website reported. He has yet to make the returns, BuzzFeed said.
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According to BuzzFeed, the terms and conditions in Bloomingdale's loyalty program don't indicate whether customers must return items bought because of a glitch. The company declined to answer BuzzFeed's questions about that.
A shopper at the Upper East Side store Tuesday said they'd be immediately skeptical of an offer that seemed that good to be true.
"I would definitely question it," said Janice Sluzirz. "I wouldn't want to pay it back."
Another customer said, "I would not spend it. One zero too many."
Bloomingdale's is owned by Macy's.