Food Stamp Shoppers Pick Walmart Bare After Glitch in Louisiana
Food Stamp Shoppers Pick Walmart Bare After Glitch in Louisiana, Food Stamp Shoppers Pick Walmart Bare After Glitch in Louisiana, Food Stamp Shoppers Pick Walmart Bare After Glitch in Louisiana, Food Stamp Shoppers Pick Walmart Bare After Glitch in Louisiana
Food-stamp frenzy backfires on Walmart: Retail giant left with shopping spree bill after computer glitch gave shoppers UNLIMITED funds.
WalMart is on the hook for hundreds of thousands of dollars of groceries bought by food stamp recipients after a computer glitch gave them unlimited funds on their government-issued credit cards.
In a spending spree described by local officials as 'worse than Black Friday,' dozens of welfare families with Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) cards picked bare the shelves at the stores in Springhill and Mansfield, Louisiana, in just a few hours on Saturday - carrying away up to ten shopping carts of meat and other groceries.
The Louisiana Department of Children and Family Services, which oversees the EBT program in the state, said WalMart could have instituted an emergency $50 limit for each customer, but chose not to.
As a result, the retail giant must foot the bill for all of the goods families 'bought' with their cards.
When Walmart employees noticed EBT cards weren't showing spending limits, they called the corporate office and were advised to allow shoppers to use the cards anyway.
Other stores in the towns temporarily closed or stopped accepting EBT cards. Wal-Mart instead called in police to help control the chaotic crowds of shoppers who flooded the store.
'It was definitely worse than Black Friday. It was worse than anything we had ever seen in this town. There was no food left on any of the shelves, and no meat left. The grocery part of Walmart was totally decimated,' Springhill Police Chief Will Lyn told ABC News.
Word spread across the towns about the loophole and hundreds of families flocked to the two Walmart stories.
Chief Lyn said he saw some families ring up bills up more than $700. The average monthly food stamp allotment in Louisiana is $136 per person.
'I saw people drag out 8 to 10 grocery carts,' Lyn said.
WalMart stands by its decision to let families take advantage of the loophole. A spokeswoman said whatever money the company lost from the spending sprees won't have animpact on the corporate bottom line.
'We did make the decision to continue to accept EBT cards during the outage so that they could get food for their families,' Walmart representative Kayla Whaling told KSLA.
The lack of card limits was due to a power outage during a routine maintenance test by Xerox, an EBT vendor. EBT cards contain government-funded amounts of money catered to each individual's financial needs.
There were no arrests made that night and witnesses told KSLA that the incident was a 'natural human' response to free food.
From 7 p.m. to 9 p.m., a frenzy of shoppers filled their carts to the brim with as much food as they could get their hands on.
When the cards came back online at 9 p.m., people abandoned their carts full of food in the middle of the Walmart and left as they didn't have the money to pay.
One woman who tried to ring up $700 worth of food only had .49 cents on her card. She was held by police for 'stealing' but was let go on the condition that she would give the food back to Walmart.
After the stampede Walmart had to stop selling food at 9 p.m. Their shelves were stark and both empty and full carts were left all over the store.
A spokesman for Walmart told KSLA that the company continued selling to shoppers 'so that they could get food for their families.'
When asked by KSLA whether or not Walmart would somehow be refunded for the loss of produce, Walmart representative Kayla Whaling responded that they were, 'fully engaged and monitoring the situation and transactions during the outage.'
Xerox told Marketwatch that there's an 'agreed and documented process for retailers like Walmart to follow in response to EBT outage.'
If the process was followed, Xerox will reimburse Walmart up to the dollar amount limit in any given state.
It is not clear if that process included letting the shoppers shop anyway.
Food-stamp frenzy backfires on Walmart: Retail giant left with shopping spree bill after computer glitch gave shoppers UNLIMITED funds.
WalMart is on the hook for hundreds of thousands of dollars of groceries bought by food stamp recipients after a computer glitch gave them unlimited funds on their government-issued credit cards.
In a spending spree described by local officials as 'worse than Black Friday,' dozens of welfare families with Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) cards picked bare the shelves at the stores in Springhill and Mansfield, Louisiana, in just a few hours on Saturday - carrying away up to ten shopping carts of meat and other groceries.
The Louisiana Department of Children and Family Services, which oversees the EBT program in the state, said WalMart could have instituted an emergency $50 limit for each customer, but chose not to.
As a result, the retail giant must foot the bill for all of the goods families 'bought' with their cards.
When Walmart employees noticed EBT cards weren't showing spending limits, they called the corporate office and were advised to allow shoppers to use the cards anyway.
Other stores in the towns temporarily closed or stopped accepting EBT cards. Wal-Mart instead called in police to help control the chaotic crowds of shoppers who flooded the store.
'It was definitely worse than Black Friday. It was worse than anything we had ever seen in this town. There was no food left on any of the shelves, and no meat left. The grocery part of Walmart was totally decimated,' Springhill Police Chief Will Lyn told ABC News.
Word spread across the towns about the loophole and hundreds of families flocked to the two Walmart stories.
Chief Lyn said he saw some families ring up bills up more than $700. The average monthly food stamp allotment in Louisiana is $136 per person.
'I saw people drag out 8 to 10 grocery carts,' Lyn said.
WalMart stands by its decision to let families take advantage of the loophole. A spokeswoman said whatever money the company lost from the spending sprees won't have animpact on the corporate bottom line.
'We did make the decision to continue to accept EBT cards during the outage so that they could get food for their families,' Walmart representative Kayla Whaling told KSLA.
The lack of card limits was due to a power outage during a routine maintenance test by Xerox, an EBT vendor. EBT cards contain government-funded amounts of money catered to each individual's financial needs.
There were no arrests made that night and witnesses told KSLA that the incident was a 'natural human' response to free food.
From 7 p.m. to 9 p.m., a frenzy of shoppers filled their carts to the brim with as much food as they could get their hands on.
When the cards came back online at 9 p.m., people abandoned their carts full of food in the middle of the Walmart and left as they didn't have the money to pay.
One woman who tried to ring up $700 worth of food only had .49 cents on her card. She was held by police for 'stealing' but was let go on the condition that she would give the food back to Walmart.
After the stampede Walmart had to stop selling food at 9 p.m. Their shelves were stark and both empty and full carts were left all over the store.
A spokesman for Walmart told KSLA that the company continued selling to shoppers 'so that they could get food for their families.'
When asked by KSLA whether or not Walmart would somehow be refunded for the loss of produce, Walmart representative Kayla Whaling responded that they were, 'fully engaged and monitoring the situation and transactions during the outage.'
Xerox told Marketwatch that there's an 'agreed and documented process for retailers like Walmart to follow in response to EBT outage.'
If the process was followed, Xerox will reimburse Walmart up to the dollar amount limit in any given state.
It is not clear if that process included letting the shoppers shop anyway.
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