Page 13 - IAV Digital Magazine #564

iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine
Customer Who Bought 2 Coffees At Starbucks Hit With An Erroneous $4K Tip, Forcing Family To Postpone Trip To Thailand
By Antonio Planas
Jesse O’Dell called it a “moment of weak- ness” when he scooped up two coffees at a Starbucks’ drive- thru last month.
The Tulsa, Oklahoma, resi- dent paid using a credit card and said he selected the “no tip” option
on the coffee chains’ computer- ized system and shelled out $11.83 on Jan. 7 for a venti Iced Americano and a venti Caramel Frappuccino with a single shot espresso for his wife.
Unbeknownst to O’Dell, he was actually charged a whopping $4,444.44 gratu-
ity, which he did- n’t learn about until two days later when the credit card used at Starbucks was declined while his wife was shop- ping, he said.
“I entered no tip,” O’Dell, 36, said Friday. “But somehow there’s a massive tip on it.”
That’s when a
monthlong fight began for O’Dell to recoup the money. The ordeal even prompted the O’Dells to cancel a family trip to Thailand.
After learning about the colossal coffee charge, O’Dell said his wife, Deedee O’Dell, called the credit card com- pany and learned
about the tip at Starbucks. They then went to Starbucks to dis- pute the gratuity and were initially told it was a “legitimate charge," O'Dell said.
After speaking to multiple man- agers, O’Dell was told he would be mailed checks to cover the tip.
Two checks arrived in late January, O’Dell said. But they bounced.
“I’m going to go insane,” O’Dell said he told an area manager after explaining the checks were not able to be cashed.
O’Dell, who runs a nonprofit, and his wife, a gener- al manager at a restaurant, can- celed a family trip to visit Chonburi, Thailand, where she is from.
The couple has four daughters ranging in ages from 13 to an infant.
“I didn’t want to be traveling across the planet while we had thousands of dol- lars hung up somewhere,” he said.
iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine