Someone correct me if I'm wrong. "Refurbished " in the Radio Shack Scanner World means "been to Ft. Worth and gone through". I've sent a couple of scanners to Ft. Worth to be repaired, and they come back repaired and almost seem better than new. I was told by a RS franchise owner that RS repair runs diagnostics and tunes the radio to spec before sending it back out.
That being said - I'm seeing a bunch of RS scanners on eBay claiming "refurbished". I contacted the seller and she said they came from various stores, and didn't know if they were really "refurbished" or just "Returned Units", but she would guarantee satisfaction & not change the listing.
Since I worked at a Radio Shack for a couple of winters, and sold many, many scanners, I can tell you right now, most of the returned scanners were from people dropping them and screwed up antenna jacks. These went right back into stock if they still looked OK, although I always knew which were new & which were returned, and tried to sell the good ones first.
There is a HUGE difference between returned & refurbished, buyer beware!
Added Note - Most of these scanners, in any condition are coming from the stores RS closed in the last few years!