August 6, 2009
Stores may refuse competition's plastic bottles
Question: I recently returned some empty pop bottles to a local supermarket. The store would not accept a couple of bottles that were a brand of pop sold by another store under their own label. Don't they have to take any bottles that have a paid state 5-cent fee?
Answer: No, they do not have to accept a bottle sold by a different store.
According to Iowa Code Section 455 Chapter 3, a dealer can not refuse to accept any beverage container or refuse to pay a consumer the refund value of a beverage container sold by that dealer.
"What this says is if they do not sell it, they do not have to pay the redemption fee," said Chuck Goddard, Solid Waste Agency administrator.
"Since they did not get the nickel deposit from their competitor's product, they do not have to redeem the nickel deposit for their competitor's product."
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http://www.thonline.com/article.cfm?id=252243
