In the digital age, some stores still print receipts on light fragile paper that can blow in the wind, or fall out of your pocket while running in the rain. E-mailed receipts are better, but any store that has a Rewards card like Kroger (QFC, Fred Meyer), GNC, and O'Reilly's Auto etc. can track your past purchase without a receipt. I lost my receipts to a purchase of two gas cards at this site in Everett, WA, and the updated timeline follows: 2/18/2018: Purchased two $100 ARCO Pump Passes. Clerk was new. He had to call a boss over the phone. Twice. He had never sold any before. It was Sunday evening, the line was long, people bought lottery tickets ahead of me, and I just wanted to get home. I ran in the rain to my car. I never tried out the passes. 3/15/2018: Tried the gas cards at another location, and they said I had to return to Everett with the receipts. The cards weren't activated. 3/20/2018: Supervisor took my cards. I explained I didn't have the receipts, but was sure the cards would show up in her point-of-sale system. She said she would take care of this. 3/22/2018: Supervisor pulls out a "Daily Book Report" and says they weren't over $200 cash on February 18th. She showed me the section on "sales of cards" for that day, but it was actually a report of the use of such cards for gas purchases in odd dollar amounts, not for the sale of cards themselves (such as in multiples of $25). She agreed to help me find the clerk that sold me my two cards. 3/23/2018: I returned Friday evening to talk to him. Due to a language barrier, I had a hard time getting the clerk to try to remember me from when I bought cards the month before. No luck. A female clerk called the District Manager, and left her phone on speakerphone. Over the phone I heard that manager scold her "These people are just scammers." 3/26/2018: BP USA (aka BP America) took over ARCO and now owns the familiar gas stations all over America. However, a third party contracts to run the AMPM stores on site. Until December of 2017, Convenience Management Services Inc. of Texas ran this location. The City of Everett gave me the name of the legal owner of this location and it matches the President of C.M.S.I., so I gave him a shout via the Internet, and he directed me to someone at BP who could help. I was eventually forwarded to Sharon Pratt of BP. 3/29/2018: I got ahold of SVM Cards via
[email protected] since they ship the ARCO Pump Passes to the AMPM stores. They were able to take my card numbers, look them up, and sent me a screenshot that showed the exact date, time (in Central Time), and location of my purchase. I forwarded all this to Sharon Pratt. 4/4/2018: I now have two new $100 cards and an extra $50 more in gift cards. After reviewing their cash register journal, ARCO Store #07028 REALLY WAS over $200 on February 18, 2018! 4/5/2018: I have increased their rating from 1 star to 2, but I am not giving a perfect rating due to the way I was treated at this actual location. From the incompetence of the new clerk, to the rude comments, to the way the supervisor did not know any skills of accounting to audit her own books... Dear Reader I spent days going through my shredder scraps looking for the old receipt, making phone calls, doing Internet Research, and so on. I wouldn't have found the prepaid gift card vendor and gotten a digital proof of purchase if the name and description of SVM Cards hadn't been on a grip site like this.
