Economy

A Tip For Christmas Shoppers

By Alison St John / Reporter

Published November 26, 2010 at 9:00 AM PST

This story was published more than 14 years ago.

If you’re out shopping this weekend, be sure to check your receipt, preferably BEFORE you leave the cashier. County inspections show errors are more common than you might think, and they are not usually in you favor.

More than one in five stores inspected by San Diego County showed price scanning errors on their receipts. Bob Atkins, the County Sealer of Weights and Measures, says customers were more than two and a half times more likely to be overcharged than undercharged

“Not enough of us check that receipt while we’re still at the register,” Atkins said. “We’re in a hurry, we’re trying not to hold up the line, and all too often we find that there’s been an error when we get home.”

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Atkins says errors tend to increase during the holidays as more items get marked down, and more cashiers are new hires.

He says it’s not legal for cashiers to ring up purchases on a display that is not visible to the customer.

He recommends customers carry a small notebook to write down what they expect to pay, and deal with any discrepancies with the cashier on the spot.

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Alison St John currently serves as a general assignment reporter and occasionally co-hosts KPBS Midday Edition. She fell in love with KPBS Radio when she arrived in San Diego in 1985 and first heard NPR. She has been a voice on KPBS Radio since 1989, and has served as a news reporter for radio, TV and the web, as well as anchoring, hosting, producing and editing. Alison has reported on stories about North County and was based in the KPBS' North County Bureau. Alison covered the metro beat during the critical period of the San Diego City pension crisis, and the education beat while Alan Bersin was the controversial Superintendent of San Diego City School District. She covered health when the industry was converting to managed care and told welfare reform stories in the late 1990s when Clinton was “ending welfare as we know it.” She has covered land use issues extensively, looking at the challenges of meeting a growing population while preserving community character, and developing a better transportation system to meet environmental concerns. She has done many stories on the military in San Diego, and the series she edited on the challenges veterans face returning from active duty to civilian life won “Best of Show” from the San Diego Society of Professional Journalists. She occasionally hosts the KPBS Roundtable and KPBS Midday Edition. Alison has won awards from the San Diego Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press TV and Radio Association, and the California Golden Mike Awards. Alison was born in Tanzania, brought up in Scotland, and earned her degree in psychology and sociology from Durham University in England. Her postgraduate diploma is in student counseling. She worked in England, Nigeria, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and Japan before moving to the United States in 1981. She now lives in Oceanside and enjoys how her community is growing and changing.