Sears customers: Head's up

[yendi]

I've just verified that this is true.

In a nutshell: If someone knows your name, address, and phone number (all public info), they can see your major appliance purchases at Sears.

Anyone can do this.

Wow.

If your data is available there, I'd suggest contacting them immediately.

Comments

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

I wonder that they can keep track of it all, when they couldn't keep track of our address or even believe it existed, even after they delivered the first - damaged - major appliance. They also managed to forget the address after their managers promised to send out gift cards to make up for the inconvenience.

Only thing I've bought from them since was a filter for the Craftsman wet/dry vac.

[yendi]

Yeah, the Consumerist has ongoing stories about how badly Sears handles deliveries. That said, I'm sure they keep accurate information for those times when they want to get money from you (via a catalog sale, for example), as opposed to when you want to get something from them. Companies are funny that way.

[ex-yakaveng.livejournal.com]

My information is there. Now I'm pissed. Who else can we contact to ensure that they remove it?

[yendi]

That, I don't know. My best guess would be someone at Sears corporate, but I'm guessing they do their best to make sure that anyone helpful can never come to the phone.

Just received this...

[ex-yakaveng.livejournal.com]

By the way, given that I just accessed my purchase history, the bit about "until then, the purchase history look-up will be unavailable" is obviously BS...
-------

Dear [yakavenger],

Thank you for your recent e-mail. Please be assured that we understand your frustration, and sincerely apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced.

Manage My Home is accelerating our plan to build in additional security measures to ensure that customers will be able to access their Sears purchase history only after successfully completing an additional validation step. We expect these additional measures to be completed within about a week to 10 days – until then, the purchase history look-up will be unavailable for customer use.

By sharing your concerns, you have enabled us to address the issues and provide feedback to the appropriate person. Truly, your remarks provide forthright feedback that will enable Sears to achieve excellence in everything we do.

We appreciate your business, and value you as a Sears customer. We certainly hope you will continue to make Sears your choice for quality and value.

Again, we thank you for taking the time to contact our office with your concern. We appreciate your business, and value you as a customer. We certainly hope you will continue to make Sears Holdings Corporation your choice for quality and
value.


Sincerely,

Dylan C.
Sears Holdings Corporation

Re: Just received this...

[yendi]

Sheesh. At least they're acknowledging screwing up. But lying about blocking access doesn't impress me much.

[litch.livejournal.com]

a friend of mine has been trying to get her washer fixed by sears (http://athene.livejournal.com/377011.html?style=mine)

[yendi]

Ick. Yeah, that reminds me just how much retail is not fun.

[robyn-ma.livejournal.com]

Hmm.

*checks*

...what were you thinking when you bought that Bacon Transmogrifier Set??

[pbristow.livejournal.com]

Presumably, "Mmmmm... Transmogrified bacon...." =:o}

[yendi]

Exactly!

Sears.com spyware

[sionainn.livejournal.com]

Ooooh... it's worse than that (he's dead, Jim):

Sears.com is distributing spyware that tracks all your Internet usage - including banking logins, email, and all other forms of Internet usage (http://community.ca.com/blogs/securityadvisor/archive/2007/12/20/sears-com-join-the-community-get-spyware.aspx).

Seriously... WTF?

Re: Sears.com spyware

[yendi]

Oy. Not a good week for them.

[jmspencer.livejournal.com]

Well, either I'm an idiot or they've somehow patched that hole in the last few hours...

[yendi]

They seem to have patched it (thankfully).