Harbor Freight — Attraction in Sumter

BUYER BEWARE. Do not shop at this store. I had the worst shopping experience of my life at the Sumter Harbor Freight. The power was out at my house so I bought two small generators last night. After reading the manual and prepping the generators with fuel and oil, neither of them would start. I spent over 3 hours troubleshooting without success. I'm an active duty Air Force pilot and have a mechanical engineering background so I was sorely defeated by the Harbor Freight generators. When I returned the generators, I was charged a 20% restocking fee which totaled over $240. The items were returned nicely in the original packaging with the fluids drained. The woman working the register did not disclose the restocking fee before I purchased the items and told me that the return policy was 90 days. When I got the managers involved they said that the restocking fee policy was clearly on the receipt, however I would never had bought the items had I known about the 20% restocking fee applying to defective items. The manager would not even refund me for the oil I bought to put into the defective generators! The managers told me to take my issues up with corporate. When I called corporate, I got to the high level service agents and they told me that they can do nothing and the store managers are the only people who can waive a restocking fee. This is absolutely criminal. The two managers were totally rude and dismissive and even tried to defend themselves when they are charging people for a defective product. What a great business model - sell defective products and then profit on the restocking fee. I've spent thousands at Harbor Freight over the last 15 years and I will never shop there again. I welcome Harbor Freight customer service to contact me to...

Usually I love this place but the customer service took a turn for the worse. Today I came in for a couple items and went to check out. Myself along with about 15 others all formed a single file line to wait on the only cashier open who was dealing with a return or something that was holding up check out. The manager called over a 2nd cashier and the man in front of me went over. I was finally next in line. When he was finished I took my step to the register and was told I cut the line by the cashier and some other person who was directly behind me previously was next. I was told by that person to go ahead and check out but I stepped back in anger. I was so mad at this point from the cashier belittling me for another's unfair actions. I waited for him to check out and sure enough, someone else decided to walk up out of nowhere but he let me go next. I tried to explain the line was all the way to the back and multiple lines didn't exist but I got no response. The cashier embarrassed me, handling the flow of customers improperly and the situation. I might be overreacting but I'm so tired of subpar customer service and others trying to take advantage of others while nobody values integrity, values or morals nowadays. Not to mention being wronged in front of multiple people when I was in the right, your cashier completely chastised me in front of a group of my peers. Not only is this poor customer service but poor representation of HFT to not address the flow of customers in the store. Stay 6ft apart makes it difficult to rationalize the manner in which they form...

UPDATE: The actual manager called me, he stated that his employees knew they were not supposed to hold items, it was first come first serve, he told me that he would be having a meeting with all his employees and the asst manager that I spoke with in the store. He also stated that even though my coupon had expired he would honor it and he was very sorry that we had went thru the experience that we did, the manager seemed like a really professional person and I commend him for stepping up.

Most unprofessional group of individuals I have ever met. They straight out lied to me on the phone then again in person, talked to the manager and he lied to my face. When I told him I had spoken with Corporate he said that those people didn't know what they were talking about, probably one of the rudest, most un professional managers I have ever met. I honestly think he was making up his excuses as we had our conversation, and he really has no idea what he is doing, therefore why would...