Pensioner accuses supermarket of theft

A 60-year-old pensioner, Mma Thabang Angelina Telite, of Loliwe informal settlement outside Mapleton, has accused the staff at a leading supermarket in Dawn Park of stealing R800 she wanted to send to her destitute sister in Soweto.

Using the back of her hand to wipe tears running down her wrinkled cheeks as she spoke, Mma Thabang, related how she still curses the day she walked into the Money Market Kiosk of the Shoprite store at the new Dawn Park shopping complex one Tuesday morning in August to send money to her younger sister in Soweto.

According to Mma Thabang, she had decided to send R800 to her sister in Naledi, which she had promised her after the death of their mother.

“I went to the Shoprite Store at the Dawn Park Shopping Centre where I approached one of the assistants at the Money Market counter to help me with the transaction”, said Mma Thabang.

Mma Thabang explained that before she went to bed that evening, she called her younger sister in Soweto and gave her details of the amount she had sent, as well as the pin code her sister had to use to release the money.

But, she was surprised when her sister called her the next morning and told her she did not receive the money.

The pensioner went back to the Shoprite store to enquire why the R800 never reached her sister, and instead of being helped, she claimed she was mocked and ridiculed by the staff who, she said, treated her like she was “mad”.

“They made me sit in a corner in the store and made fun of me”, she said tearfully.

Showing Kathorus MAIL a Shoprite receipt for the R800 transfer transaction, which includes the R10 levy fee added to the transaction, Mma Thabang blamed the shop assistant who assisted her with the transaction that day as the person responsible for her

woes.

She also blamed the supervisor, a woman by the name of Gloria, who she claimed failed to listen to her complaint.

Mma Thabang, claimed it was Gloria who told her that her R800 had been “withdrawn” by someone at the Shoprite store in Brakpan.

“Gloria and the other employees told me to go and claim my R800 from the Shoprite store in Brakpan. They couldn’t explain how the money ended up at the store in Brakpan, when I had given instruction that it was to be sent to my sister in Soweto?” said an angry Mma Thabang.

Contacted for comment, Shoprite’s Customer Service spokesperson Devan Currie, asked Kathorus MAIL to provide details of the transaction so that Shoprite’s management could investigate.

According to Capt Pieter Eben, of the Dawn Pak SAPS, his fraud detectives are currently investigating more than a dozen fraudulent money transfer transactions involving pensioners at the Shoprite store in Dawn Park.

“We’ve already approached Shoprite to come forward in helping us with these investigations,” said Eben.