INVERCARGILL MITRE 10 RETURNS DESK ACCEPTS BARBECUE STILL ACTIVELY ON FIRE
Customer cited 'change of heart'. Staff cited the smoke alarm.
A Gladstone man wheeled a still-smoking barbecue into the returns desk of an Invercargill hardware retailer on Saturday morning, requesting a full refund on the grounds that he had 'gone off it'.
The unit, a four-burner purchased eleven days prior, was observed by staff to be venting visible smoke and what one employee described as 'the smell of a sausage that had given up'. The customer, who appeared to be in his early thirties and wore a nose ring this reporter found distracting, maintained the barbecue was 'as new'.
Returns clerk Shanna Beaumont, 24, told The Daily Yarn she'd seen plenty in two years on the desk but never a unit actively combusting. 'He'd wheeled it across the carpark on a trundler. Lid was warm. I asked him when he'd last used it and he said about twenty minutes ago. I said sir, it's still cooking. He said that's not my problem now.'
The man produced a receipt, a loyalty card, and what witnesses described as 'an attitude'. A duty manager was called. The duty manager called the assistant store manager. The assistant store manager called FENZ, who attended within nine minutes and expressed mild professional interest in the grease tray.
A store spokesperson confirmed the return was declined under the policy provision covering 'goods presently on fire', a clause they conceded had not previously required enforcement. The customer left without the barbecue, without a refund, and reportedly without apologising to the woman whose Hilux he'd parked behind.
The barbecue remains at the rear of the store, cooling. Staff have named it Kevin.
The unit, a four-burner purchased eleven days prior, was observed by staff to be venting visible smoke and what one employee described as 'the smell of a sausage that had given up'. The customer, who appeared to be in his early thirties and wore a nose ring this reporter found distracting, maintained the barbecue was 'as new'.
Returns clerk Shanna Beaumont, 24, told The Daily Yarn she'd seen plenty in two years on the desk but never a unit actively combusting. 'He'd wheeled it across the carpark on a trundler. Lid was warm. I asked him when he'd last used it and he said about twenty minutes ago. I said sir, it's still cooking. He said that's not my problem now.'
The man produced a receipt, a loyalty card, and what witnesses described as 'an attitude'. A duty manager was called. The duty manager called the assistant store manager. The assistant store manager called FENZ, who attended within nine minutes and expressed mild professional interest in the grease tray.
A store spokesperson confirmed the return was declined under the policy provision covering 'goods presently on fire', a clause they conceded had not previously required enforcement. The customer left without the barbecue, without a refund, and reportedly without apologising to the woman whose Hilux he'd parked behind.
The barbecue remains at the rear of the store, cooling. Staff have named it Kevin.