Submitted by neilkelly t3_z1s6jn in WorcesterMA

I was shopping in the Price Chopper on W. Mountain St. last night, and noticed a pricing discrepancy. They had salmon filets prepackaged ready to go in front of the fish counter. However, I found at least three packages where the weight on the label was 1 pound more than what was actually in the package. I brought it to the attention of the front end supervisor as they did not have a manager available, but I figured this was something that folks should be aware of.

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Comments

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Ovaltene17 t1_ixdavqj wrote

Sounds like they are up to something fishy.

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sammydee44 t1_ixckzjy wrote

The Weights and Measures department in City Hall should be notified. Slap a fine on them

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neilkelly OP t1_ixcssnl wrote

Contacted them right after I left. They are sending an inspector out.

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cjboffoli t1_ixd4xne wrote

Good on 'ya. People are struggling enough with inflation without stores working to cheat them on top of it.

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Itchy_Rock_726 t1_ixeszsk wrote

Anybody thinking there is some nefarious Price Chopper led scam going on here is ... Entertaining? So much for the retail/food service worker solidarity popular on here. Someone fucked up because they were in a hurry or tired. Good to catch the mistake..bad to warm up the torches and pitchforks.

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masshole4life t1_ixfcc2m wrote

it could also be a worker stealing fish and fudging inventory.

if you've ever worked someplace where you make these packages and stickers, you know that genuine errors usually involve the wrong code resulting in a different unit price, not the actual weights of only a few packages.

if it were a calibration issue they would all be off weight.

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Vinc3d t1_ixhc1sr wrote

This is an industry problem from what I’ve seen in articles.

“The underweight seafood from Gonsalves is part of a persistent problem in the industry, though the company says any mislabeling is unintentional. Typically, frozen seafood is coated with ice to keep it fresh and minimize freezer burn. Some businesses in the supply chain add extra ice and include it in the weight declared on the label. Retailers end up charging for the water, and shoppers pay more money for less fish. While individual shoppers are shortchanged in small increments, cumulatively, excess water in seafood is a serious issue.”

“Rather than looking at this as 30 cents here and 30 cents there, we should be looking at this as a $69 billion seafood industry and these practices could be costing the industry and consumers tens, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars in the end,’’

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doublesecretprobatio t1_ixh2nsg wrote

any updates? have you and the boys downtown cracked this case wide open yet? any leads?

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No-Potential-1777 t1_ixek0r8 wrote

Did you bring your own scale to check the weights or are you just guessing that they were a pound more?

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sparr t1_ixell2u wrote

Seems pretty easy to compare if there are other correctly labeled packages.

Also, grocery stores have public scales in the produce dept, and the staff have scales in the deli.

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No-Potential-1777 t1_ixemzcp wrote

I was mostly kidding about using visual inspection of packages to say that a scale that has a weights and measures seal is inaccurate, but that doesn't translate well in text. I am very familiar with scales, markets, and the weights and measures department.

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neilkelly OP t1_ixeobl8 wrote

Several things. First, the packages labelled for a pound of fish contained what appeared to be about the same amount of fish. Second, holding both packages, you could tell they weighed about the same, and one wasn't double the other. Third, as /u/sparr suggested, I checked against the produce scale. Finally, I had the cashier weigh them on their scales.

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No-Potential-1777 t1_ixep5xn wrote

Yeah, they most likely left a second package on the scale while they weighed a few and were too lazy to notice or fix it

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neilkelly OP t1_ixhusmm wrote

I was there last night, I didn’t see any obviously overweighed fish. Take that for what it’s worth.

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