Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 1,272, Returning and Exchanging Merchandise.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 1,272.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
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This episode is a dialogue between Spencer and and a woman who works at a store about returning things to the store that were bought there.
Let's get started.
Hello, how can I help you?
I'd like to return a few things I received over the holidays.
I do for this item.
It's unopened and unused.
Let me see.
I can give you a refund, but there will be a small restocking fee.
Really?
I'm afraid so.
Okay, that's fine.
I also received this one as a gift, but don't have a receipt.
Let me look up that merchandise in our system.
It looks like it was a clearance item and it was a final sale.
I understand that.
The best I can do is to allow you to exchange it if it doesn't fit, or give you store credit.
What about this?
Let me see.
That item was purchased on our online store and it can't be returned to a store location, only through our website.
And this, it doesn't work.
I'm sorry, but that was also a clearance item and was sold in as-is condition.
Can I help you with anything else?
Only if you can visit the other three stores to return the rest of my gifts.
You didn't get what you wanted for the holidays, huh?
My family and friends have great senses of humor.
But how many gag gifts can one man own?
Our dialogue begins with a clerk, C-L-E-R-K, saying something to Spencer.
A clerk is a person who works, usually at a store, who helps you buy things there, who takes your money.
This clerk begins by saying to Spencer, Hello, how can I help you?
How can I help you is a normal way that someone such as a clerk would ask what you need when you come into a store.
Spencer says To return something to a store is to bring it back either to get money or or to get something else, maybe the same item.
If you bought a shirt and it was too small, you might return it to the store to get a bigger shirt, or you might simply return it to get your money back.
That is, they would give you the money that you paid for it back.
Now, in the case of Spencer, he didn't actually buy these things from the store.
He received them over the holidays.
The holidays refers, in the United States, to the Christian holiday of Christmas and the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah, during which people often give gifts.
The clerk says, okay, do you have gift receipts?
A receipt R-E-C-E-I-P-T is a piece of paper showing where something was bought and how much was paid for it.
Stores usually give you a receipt when you buy things from them.
A gift receipt is when you buy a gift for another person but include a piece of paper from the store a receipt in case the person wants to bring the gift back.
Yes, in the United States it is not uncommon for people to give a gift with a receipt, in case the person doesn't like the gift.
It's a little strange, but it has become common in the last several years.
Spencer says...
I do for this item, meaning he has a gift receipt for one of the items I-T-E-M-S or things that were bought from that store.
He says this item or thing is unopened and unused.
Unopened means not opened.
In this case, it refers to something that is in the original box or package that it was when it was first bought from the store.
To say something is unused, U-N-U-S-E-D, means it has never been used.
You didn't take it out and use it for an hour and then put it back in the box.
Sometimes stores will only accept returns, that is, allow you to bring something back for money if it is unopened and unused.
If you bought a shirt, put it on, wore it to a party, took it off and then brought it to the store to get your money back well, that would not be an unused shirt.
You used the shirt.
The clerk says, let me see, meaning let me look at it.
She says, I can give you a refund for but there will be a small restocking fee.
A refund R-E-F-U-N-D is money that you get back because you return something or because perhaps you aren't happy with what you bought.
Now this is a refund, but it's not going to the person who bought the item.
It's going to the person who received the item, in this case Spencer.
The clerk says there will be a small restocking, R-E-S-T-O-C-K-I-N-G, fee, F-E-E.
A restocking fee is a small amount of money that a store or company will charge you or will take away from your refund for accepting the item back.
You don't get 100%, in other words, of the money you paid.
The store is going to keep a small percentage.
They call that a restocking fee.
To restock means to take something and put it back on sale the shelves of a store, or to put it back where it can be sold again.
This is quite common nowadays.
If you buy electronic goods such as a computer, the store will take the computer back, but it won't give you 100 of the money.
It will keep some of the money as a restocking fee.
Spencer is surprised by this.
He says, really?
The clerk says, I'm afraid so.
I'm afraid so is a polite, formal way of saying yes, especially when you are telling someone something that the person doesn't like or is not happy with.
Spencer says, okay, that's fine, meaning no problem.
He continues, I also received this one as a gift, but I don't have a receipt.
The clerk says, let me look up that merchandise in our system.
To look up. is a two-word phrasal verb meaning to find something.
In this case, to find something on a computer system.
The word merchandise, M-E-R-C-H-A-N-D-I-S-E, is a word that means things that you buy and sell.
It's a general term for anything that is sold.
So in the title of this episode, we have returning and exchanging merchandise.
Merchandise is something you buy at a store.
The clerk looks up the merchandise, the item, the thing that Spencer wants to return, and says that it looks like meaning it appears this thing was a clearance item and it was a final sale.
A clearance C-L-E-A-R-A-N-C-E item is something that a store sells, usually at a very low price because it is getting rid of that particular kind of thing.
It is no longer going to be selling that particular item.
In order to get rid of them, it has a clearance sale.
The clerk says that this item was bought as a final sale.
A final sale means you can't bring it back.
If you go into a store and you see a sign that says all sales are final, F-I-N-A-L.
That means that when you buy something, you do not have the option of bringing it back.
If you buy it, you can't return it.
Spencer complains that it's unworn, U-N-W-O-R-N.
We've had several words in this dialogue with the prefix un-, U-N-, Un is usually used to mean not.
So unused is not used.
Unopened is not opened.
Unworn is not worn.
Worn means that you have used a particular piece of clothing.
We use the verb to wear, W-E-A-R, to refer to putting clothes on your body.
I am wearing a shirt.
I am wearing pants.
If an item is unworn, that means you've never put it on your body a piece of clothing that has never been worn?
The clerk says I understand that meaning.
I understand that this piece of clothing has never been worn.
She says the best I can do, meaning the best possible deal I can give you, is to allow you to exchange it if it doesn't fit you, or give you store credit.
To exchange E-X-C-H-A-N-G-E means to bring something into a store that you bought there and get something very similar to that item.
I gave the example before of buying a shirt that is too small for you.
You go to the store and you exchange that shirt for a bigger shirt that fits you.
That is the right size for you.
The clerk says that Spencer can exchange this piece of clothing or she can give him store credit.
C-R-E-D-I-T.
Store credit is usually a piece of paper or some other way that the store gives you money that you can spend in the store for something else.
So you buy something for $10.
You don't like it.
You bring it back to the store.
The store doesn't give you $10.
It says, well, you can buy something else in our store for $10.
That's store credit.
Spencer says, I'll take the store credit.
Then he says, what about this?
Showing her something else.
The clerk says, let me see.
That item was purchased on our online store and it can't be returned to a store location, only through our website.
An online, O-N-Z, L-I-N-E store is a website where you can buy something on the internet.
Many stores have online stores as well as physical stores stores you can drive your car to and walk into.
Some stores don't allow you to buy things online and then return it to one of their physical stores.
And that's what the clerk is telling Spencer.
Spencer then shows the clerk something else.
He says, and this, it doesn't work, W-O-R-K.
To work here means to function properly.
If something doesn't work, it's broken.
It doesn't do what it's supposed to do.
A television that you can't watch because there's no picture is a broken television.
It doesn't work.
The clerk says, I'm sorry, but that was also a clearance item and was sold in as-is condition.
If something is sold in as-is condition, That means once you buy it you can't return it, even if it is broken.
Usually something is sold in as-is condition when it's already broken or when there's already a problem with it.
You can't buy it and then say, oh, it's broken.
I want to bring it back.
You bought it in as-is condition.
You knew that it wasn't perfect when you bought it and you can't return it.
Spencer is not very happy.
He says, all right.
The clerk then says, can I help you with anything else?
Spencer says, only if you can visit the three other stores to return the rest of my gifts.
Spencer is making a joke here.
The clerk isn't really asking him if she can do anything for him.
So when she asks if she can help him with anything else, she doesn't mean helping him go to other stores and return his other gifts.
She then says, you didn't get what you wanted for the holidays, huh?
Spencer says my family and friends have great senses of humor, but how many gag gifts can one man own?
A sense, S-E-N-S-E, of humor, H-U-M-O-R, is the ability to find things funny, to laugh.
He says his friends and family have great senses of humor, meaning that they know how to laugh.
They like to be funny.
But he says, how many gag, G-A-G, gifts can one man own?
A gag gift is is a gift that is intended to be or is supposed to be funny.
It's not a nice thing.
It's supposed to make you laugh.
Spencer's friends and family gave him a lot of gag gifts for the holidays instead of real gifts.
The joke here is that in the United States there is a famous store called Spencer's that sells mostly gag gifts.
Things like cups and mugs with funny sayings on them and similar things that people think are supposed to be funny.
Because his name is Spencer.
They gave him all of these gay gifts because there's a famous store that sells gay gifts named Spencer's.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
Hello, how can I help you?
I'd like to return a few things I received over the holidays.
Okay.
Do you have gift receipts?
I do for this item.
It's unopened and unused.
Let me see.
I can give you a refund, but there will be a small restocking fee.
Really?
I'm afraid so.
Okay, that's fine.
I also received this one as a gift, but don't have a receipt.
Let me look up that merchandise in our system.
It looks like it was a clearance item and it was a final sale.
But it's unworn.
I understand that.
The best I can do is to allow you to exchange it if it doesn't fit or give you store credit.
I'll take the store credit.
What about this?
Let me see.
That item was purchased on our online store and it can't be returned to a store location, only through our website.
And this?
It doesn't work.
I'm sorry, but that was also a clearance item and was sold in as-is condition.
All right.
Can I help you with anything else?
Only if you can visit the other three stores to return the rest of my gifts.
You didn't get what you wanted for the holidays, huh?
My family and friends have great senses of humor.
But how many gay gifts can one man own?
Our scriptwriter has a great sense of humor.
We thank her for her wonderful scripts.
I speak, of course, of the one, the only, Dr. Lucy Saye.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language Podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2016 by the Center for Educational Development.
