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The HD I'm talking about is in Santa Clarita.

They really are the same all around the world... I have to go to no less than three big box stores to get everything I need for a proper job sometimes!
Store A sells pre-cut Moeller bus bar and connector clips for the phases but not the neutrals (Moeller DIN-rail breakers with switched neutrals can either be wired using wire links on the line side or their bus bar, flat pieces of metal about 1x10mm with tabs that clip onto the bars for each terminal). Store #2 sells the all the clips (even a lot cheaper than store #1) but they don't have as much as a single stick of bus bar.

Neither of these two stores sells flush-mount junction boxes IP44 or higher (outdoor use). Store #3 does, but they don't sell any of the aforementioned stuff because they seem to be part of a German chain and only sell the German Moeller range, where the switched neutral breakers are 2 modules wide instead of 1 1/2, which means the cheap pre-cut bus bar commonly used for single pole breakers works, but they don't have the neutral bar to go with it (Store #1 occasionally sells it, but no more than that).

RH1,



Not the same Person!!!

Thanks for the reply, too!

Scott

Just to follow up ...
I've been able to learn that there's quite a bit of shuffling and other nonsense going on at the higher levels - store manager and beyond. The store staffs are pretty much at loose ends, just doing as best they can, without the direction or guidance they need.

In short, the 'poor help' issus lays squarely in the lap of management - which has absolutely no interest in addressing the matter. Indeed, 'corporate' has the time to inspect parking lots for wind-blown debris, but not to address their advertised goal of having 'trade pros' in the departments.

Our largest UK boxstore is 'B&Q', which with it's mail order wing 'Screwfix' has a lion's share of the market. Some years ago their policy was to only recruit young people, until it was pointed out that most of senior management and the board qualified for free Senior Citizen bus passes! Permission was grudgingly given for 2 stores to employ some old fogeys on the shop floor. Amazingly, those stores immediately went to the top of the sales charts! Those old timers had the one thing an energetic but acned youth ain't got - experience. Customers with questions instinctively homed in on Grandpa, for after all, what would someone younger than your son know about hanging wallpaper or what size wire to get? So, you got good advice on a product, the ancient one would tell you how to, sell you the right amount of the right stuff and then point you to the tools rack, the consumables, the ladders - you get the drift. And of course they came back for other stuff as their confidence improved. QED. Having skilled 'managers' is useless unless there is a source of experience and common sense on the shop floor for them to manage.

Now chaps, don't knock the US of A too hard! My friend Robert just got back from visiting his aging folks in Detroit, [he never went home after USAF service], raving about the vast range and real low prices at the box stores. Had me drooling I can tell you, after the miserable experiences shopping for tools and matl.s we get here. Surly un-cooperative unsackable staff, little stock, wait weeks for delivery of basic items, vastly inflated prices [ EXAMPLE: a basic Legrand din-rail 3ma differential main breaker I saw just today, 231 EUROS = US$320!! ], get turfed out of stores at midday for their 2+ hour dinner break, "..never heard of it".. "no demand for it".. "we don't carry that! ..."
I can get stuff delivered from New York via t'internet faster than from 3km up the road, at half the price inc. US Mail, with the added pleasure of a follow up email telling me to "have a nice day"! Cliché it may be, but I usually do when I get me a parcel!

I've probably told this big box story here before, but here goes again while we are on the subject. I asked for a piece of 4/0 SEU cable to be cut, about 20 feet if I recall. They were a bit short-staffed, so the smock-boy advised me to finish my shopping and he'd have it ready for me in a few minutes.

When I came back, it still wasn't ready. The nice guy wrote up a slip for me to take to the cashier with the understanding that he'd bring it up to the front in a few minutes. Sure enough, just as I finished paying, another employee was there asking me if I needed any help with the cable. I thought this to be a bit strange since he still hadn't produced the piece of cable. When I asked, he told me it was waiting outside as he asked me what I was driving. As we exited the store, it all started to make sense.......

He had gotten a lift and brought around an entire 1,000 foot reel of this cable. Sure enough, the guy wrote up the cut slip with a part number for the entire reel quantity, not the per-foot number. I could have very easily had them load the reel into my truck and I could have driven away. I didn't do this, but if I did, I'm sure nobody would have had a clue what had happened.

I would imagine that this happens far more often than we even know. This also explains some of the ridiculous prices for certain items at these stores. They have to calculate an incompetence factor into everything they sell.

I've had similar experiences ordering solid bare copper wire at HD. It slips a lot through the counter without moving the measurement dial.


Bill

Ive gone to HD to buy some 2/0 wire, and the guy cutting it writes down the SKU for #2. Tried correcting him 3 times, but he insisted he was right.

I resisted the temptation to go back and buy the rest of the roll...

If it's 3mA I understand the price
30mA go around 50 Euros here (2 or 4 pole, 30mA, max. 40A). And I thought the electrician who wanted 140 was crazy... maybe attempting to sell an S or G type.