just baught an ipad from walmart, all sealed up so why get them to cut it open? 30 minutes later im at home opening it to find a zip lock baggy full of clay alogn with a block of clay where the charger should be!! immediatly went back and after many questiongs on who sold it this n that we finally got the refund...so before you buy ne thing including ipadsget them to open the box first, what a joke!!

Hi and welcome to forum!

I can't believe you found clay in the box. Did you report this to apple customer care, by chance?

Sounds like someone needed a new charger or lost theirs. Kind of a cheesey way to get one. Geesh!

When I buy gadgets, I check at the store to make sure that all the items (including accessories and manuals) are in the box, and that they're in good condition.

What the OP mentioned is a scam that's run on a lot of retail stores, which has led to them telling clerks to check serial numbers on hardware, etc., when returns and exchanges are made. They don't do it with unopened merchandise, though. And scammers know that they just need to get the weight right and re-shrink wrap an item to get it past a clerk. Sometimes they're inside jobs, too. In other cases, scammers will sub an old item for a new one.

There also have been reports of subbing scams done on merchandise that's delivered via UPS, FedEx, etc., with bricks or whatever being used by scammers to create fake weight for merchandise that's been stolen.

Thanks dbaux and KayKayKay-for bringing this to light. I had no idea that was happening. When I returned my android tablet-the clerk did a "scan" to see if the tablet was in there, but really just glanced at all the other things. Didn't really do a thorough check. I can see how this could happen.

At least by choosing Walmart and pick the right company to buy from.

Originally Posted by s2mikey

Sounds like someone needed a new charger or lost theirs. Kind of a cheesey way to get one. Geesh!

Eeeeyep....

Sent from my Verizon Black 64GB iPad 2 With IOS 5.01Update From NYC using iPF

Originally Posted by MelvinTopaz

At least by choosing Walmart and pick the right company to buy from.

...I think that it could happen anywhere...Walmart was just the unfortunate example for the unfortunate OP. Any store could have workers that are scamming behind the scenes, are too in a hurry to check returned merchandise or have dishonest customers. I certainly wouldn't want to only narrow down Walmart, since this may be activity that is observed elsewhere.

Future Shop, Best Buy, London Drugs and Walmart were all hit by this scam. The fraudsters had paid cash for the ipads and swapped the ipad and ac charger for clay. The fraudsters then placed want ads for market research jobs and they hired people to return these "ipads" back to the respective merchants to get the cash back under the guise of secret shoppers.

It was a scam and you unfortunately you ended up in the middle. The simple solution is control of property. If a product is sold then returned and is sealed it is difficult for any retailer to know that it was opened. I suspect after this very sophisticated scam that retailers wil be forced to change the way the handle returns and may have to use scanners to confirm the product is in fact in there.