Walmart shelves in Springhill, Mansfield, cleared in EBT glitch


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MANSFIELD, LA (KSLA) -

Shelves in Walmart stores in Springhill and Mansfield, LA were reportedly cleared Saturday night, when the stores allowed purchases on EBT cards even though they were not showing limits. 

"Just about everything is gone, I've never seen it in that condition," said Mansfield Walmart customer Anthony Fuller.Springhill Police Chief Will Lynd confirms they were called in to help the employees at Walmart because there were so many people clearing off the shelves. He says Walmart was so packed, "It was worse than any black Friday" that he's ever seen.

Lynd explained the cards weren't showing limits and they called corporate Walmart, whose spokesman  said to let the people use the cards anyway. From 7 to 9 p.m., people were loading up their carts, but when the cards began showing limits again around 9, one woman was detained because she rang up a bill of $700.00 and only had .49 on her card. She was held by police until corporate Walmart said they wouldn't press charges if she left the food. 

Lynd says at 9 p.m., when the cards came back online and it was announced over the loud speaker, people just left their carts full of food in the aisles and left.

Walmart employees could still be seen putting food from the carts away as late as Sunday afternoon. "I was just thinking, I'm so glad my mom doesn't work here [Walmart] anymore, that's the only thing I could think about, those employees working, that would have to restock all that stuff," said O.J Evans who took cell phone video of the overflowing shopping carts at the Mansfield Walmart.

Evans believes it was natural human reaction that led people to fill up their carts during the glitch, but Walmart shoppers Stan and Judy Garcia feel very differently. "That's plain theft, that's stealing that's all I got to say about it," said Garcia.

Lynd says contrary to rumors, nobody was unruly or arrested and they were mainly there to help prevent shoplifting and theft. A dispatcher for Mansfield police also confirms officers were called in for crowd control at the Mansfield Walmart. She said the shelves were cleared out, forcing Walmart to stop selling food at 9 p.m. There were no arrests. 


There was, however, a huge mess left behind. Pictures and videos obtained by KSLA News 12 show aisles packed with shoppers emptying the shelves in Springhill. Another video shows what appear to be at least dozens of overflowing carts left abandoned in the aisles at the Mansfield store, against the backdrop of emptied shelves in the meat department.   

It all happened at the end of a day in which the EBT system went down in several states, including Louisiana. Xerox, a vendor for the EBT system, experienced a power outage while conducting a routine backup test in one of the company's locations. While the system was back up Saturday night, it appears that it was not functioning entirely properly in some areas. 

Kayla Whaling, a spokesperson for Walmart, tells KSLA News 12 that the company was "fully engaged and monitoring the situation and transactions during the outage."

"We did make the decision to continue to accept EBT cards (and purchases on WIC and SNAP) during the outage so that they could get food for their families."

Asked whether Walmart would be taking the loss on any food purchased on the cards that did not show limits, or on the perishable food left behind in carts, Whaling would only say that "we monitored transactions during the outage."

A spokesperson for the Louisiana Department of Children and Family Services says they take all allegations of potential fraud seriously, they are aware of the reports and they will be investigating.

According to a notice posted on the LA DSFS website on Saturday:

"While transactional systems maintained by DCFS contractors may have been impacted by today's outage, the systems that DCFS uses to track EBT card usage and identify fraud were still in place. DCFS vigorously investigates all fraud claims. Anyone suspected of fraudulently using public assistance benefits are investigated and prosecuted to the full extent of the law. The public is encouraged to report cases of suspected SNAP fraud by calling the DCFS toll-free hotline at 1-888-LAHELP-U and selecting option 7 from the main menu or by visiting www.dcfs.la.gov/ReportFraud."

 

http://www.ksla.com/story/23679489/walmart-shelves-in-springhill-mansfield-cleared-in-ebt-glitch?clienttype=generic&mobilecgbypass&utm_content=buffer2fe51&utm_source=buffer&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=Buffer

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There should be many, many arrests.

 

Theft is theft. Especially when they know they are in the wrong. There is ample traceability.

 

Accountability is something the U.S. lacks.

Yes. Very Very much so. No one is held accountable for their actions

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I had to look up EBT cause I had no idea what it was, and I'm sure I'm not the only one so I'll provide a little info:

 


Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) is an electronic system that allows state welfare departments to issue benefits via a magnetically encoded payment card, used in the United States and the United Kingdom.[1]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Benefit_Transfer
 

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^ see related article:

 

https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1181799-electronic-benefits-system-fails/

 

EBT can include food assistance, cash assistance, medical assistance, and unemployment compensation.

 

There should be many, many arrests.

 

Theft is theft. Especially when they know they are in the wrong. There is ample traceability.

 

Accountability is something the U.S. lacks.

I have no doubt that the over-payments will be deducted from the welfare cardholders in the coming months. ;)

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So we feel that they need some helps and provide them with EBT, then they turn around and become criminals?

They need to arrest these people.  If not, then just record how much they charged this time, and then skip their monthly EBT 'till everything is balanced out.

 

Also Walmart should be also charged for this as well.  They sure knew there was something fishy, but they still allowed it going through.

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I grew up around that area, and yes, there are VERY many "self-entitled" people in that part of the US. Everyone walks around thinking that someone owes them something, either because of their racial background or hell, just about anything...heck, they'll even make stuff up on the fly, and not even bat an eyelash. Wrong is wrong, however. What a shame! I've even seen people intentionally walk out in front of cars just to try to scam insurance companies so they could receive a settlement. (Seems to have gotten worse in the 13 years I've been gone from that area, too. I still have family in that area, and lemme tell you, I feel bad for them more and more every single day.) Pathetic if you ask me.  :crazy:

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I stood behind a lady at the grocery store yesterday, holding her iphone 5, and watched her pay with her EBT card as she looked through her wallet that had probably 6 different credit cards in it.... She bought about 10 bucks worth of candy with it.

 

Made me sad.  Severe penalties should be handed down to those involved.

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I stood behind a lady at the grocery store yesterday, holding her iphone 5, and watched her pay with her EBT card as she looked through her wallet that had probably 6 different credit cards in it.... She bought about 10 bucks worth of candy with it.

 

Made me sad.  Severe penalties should be handed down to those involved.

 

Not only that but I've seen people with golden chain and some driving Mercedes S Class car using ebt card to pay for candy's, chips and drinks. 

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Not only that but I've seen people with golden chain and some driving Mercedes S Class car using ebt card to pay for candy's, chips and drinks. 

 

Yup, I am for helping people who actually need it for temporary assistance, disability, or whatever.  The problem is there is almost zero checking or accountability for what the money is actually be used on or by whom.  

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There's a $50 limit that's put in place when they systems go down. Walmart ignored this limit and is on the hook for the rest of the money. I don't think anything will happen to the people involved. 

 

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/walmart-shelves-emptied-food-stamp-shopping-spree/story?id=20563982

 

That being said, I think both parties should be penalized. The ones emptying the shelves knew what they were doing was wrong and Walmart knew what the protocols for such an event were. 

 

Also, having worked retail for several years before my current consulting job, the fact that they just left carts full of groceries there and tore the place apart ****es me off to no end [almost as much as someone leaving a cart in a parking spot when the cart return is 3 spaces away].

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There should be many, many arrests.

Theft is theft. Especially when they know they are in the wrong. There is ample traceability.

Accountability is something the U.S. lacks.

Nothing will come from it. Just our tax dollars being wasted.

######ers

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Not only that but I've seen people with golden chain and some driving Mercedes S Class car using ebt card to pay for candy's, chips and drinks. 

Those are called drug dealers.

 

They don't show any income so they can qualify :p

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Nothing will come from it. Just our tax dollars being wasted.

Arresting people isn't going to be any more cost effective, especially if jail sentences are involved. That's not to excuse their actions, I'm speaking from a purely pragmatic perspective.

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Seriously, wtf.  As much as I'm going to come down on the people abusing the obvious glitch, Walmart should have stopped all the transactions dead in their tracks once they saw what was going on.

 

Just goes to show how there are so many people out there blatantly abusing social programs like EBT and will resort to these tactics in a heartbeat rather than be appreciative at all.  Tax dollars wasted.

 

Can't help but have the old "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." saying pop into my mind at times like this.  Maybe we should just stop with the handouts.

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You could drop a suitcase of stolen money into a crowd of people anywhere and they would go ape over it as long as they don't think they will they get caught.

 

This is true anywhere really, so I'd say that this is typical human behavior.  Not everyone will do it, but a lot will and it doesn't matter which country you try it in.

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Nothing will happen to them as the law says if a financial institution makes an error that benefits you, you are not required to give back the money. But I think there is an upper cap to that, its not $700 tho, more like 6 figures.

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