Store employee accused of taking vouchers NCT’s Jaemin gave to fans

Jaemin of K-pop boy group NCT Dream poses at a press event for the group’s fifth album at Lotte Cinema World Tower in Songpa-gu, Seoul, July 14, 2025. Yonhap

A store employee has sparked controversy after allegedly taking some of the gift certificates a K-pop star had given to fans.

The company has apologized and launched an internal investigation.

According to the retail industry, Jaemin, a member of K-pop group NCT Dream, sent fans 30 Shinsegae gift certificates worth 100,000 won each ($67) on the night of March 14 to mark White Day. He shared images containing the barcode for each voucher, allowing fans to claim them on a first-come, first-served basis.

Some fans who visited an E-Mart branch the next day to exchange the mobile vouchers for paper certificates found that a large portion had already been redeemed at the Gumi branch before the store opened at 10 a.m.

The news fueled online suspicion that a store employee had secretly taken the vouchers before opening hours, leading some fans to file complaints directly with Shinsegae Group, which owns and operates E-Mart.

After launching an internal investigation, E-Mart confirmed that an employee at the Gumi branch had preemptively redeemed nine of the vouchers.

Shinsegae apologized for the inconvenience caused to E-Mart customers and said the exact details were still under investigation.

“The company will take action in accordance with its rules once the investigation is concluded, and will strengthen gift certificate issuance and redemption procedures to prevent similar incidents from happening again,” it said.

This article from the Hankook Ilbo, the sister publication of The Korea Times, is translated by a generative AI system and edited by The Korea Times.