I needed some pricing labels in a hurry for a craft show I was about to do so I went to The Range to buy some.

In and out quickly so I thought.  Walk in, grab goods from small rail, pay cash at checkout and back home to get on with pricing items.

As you have probably guessed it didn't happen like that.

I walked in, went straight to the place I knew the pricing labels were, grabbed a handful.  (I didn't care how many I got as long it was a fair few) and wnet to checkout.

Checkout lady checks items individually and notices that two of them are a different size to the ones I really wanted.  (Not all same product on same rail) So I said no problem I won't have those two, I'll just take the other five. She says she will have to get a supervisor to cancel them on the till.  So we wait and as no supervisor is coming I say it doesn't matter I'll pay for them and use them on something else.  She tells me that she has to get supervisor anyway as she is a trainee and isn't allowed to put bulk purchases through without supervision.  I tell her I'm in a hurry and to scan them individually.  She can't do that cos I would have a long receipt and she would be in trouble for wasting paper. 

I keep tellimg her that is isn''t her fault as by this time a large queue is building up and she is getting very flustered.  Supervisor now turns up and cancels the two erroneous items ands authorises here to transact a bulk purchase.  The bulk purchase is 5 packs of pricing labels, 49 pence each. 

She does the scan and bulk transaction details and asks me for £2.94.Those of us on this side of 50 know that 5 times 49p equals £2.45.  I tell her this and she insists that £2.94 is correct as that is what the till is telling her.  I point out the correct answer and ask if she agrees.  She can't tell me because she doesn't have a calculator handy.  I point out that she must have put in six and she checks this and is surprised when it shows she had.  She points out that I must be very clever to have noticed the total price was wrong.

I try to pay the £2.49 but am told the supervisor has to come back to cancel one of the items.  There was an audible sigh from people in the queue behind me.

I eventually get out of the store after 20 minutes.  I am frustrated, the young trainee is practically in tears and the supervisor's ears are ringing because I pointed out that if a trainee is being trained in the early stages she should have someone helping her.

Not the trainee's fault but the stores fault.  How much bad will was generated by that incident because people behind me in the queue were unable to pay for their goods for 20 minutes.  Or would I need a calculator to work that out?

Lessons to be learnt.  Make sure stock items are in correct places.  Make sure trainees are sufficiently supported in the early stages.  Ensure supervisor is not overloaded and is available to help at short notice.   £2.49 of goods is not a bulk buy by any stretch of the imagination.  Change schooling system so young people can once again do basic arithemetic without a calculator.

That's the world put to rights so I can go back to my craft work now.  Happy shopping everyone.

Steve

Have you ever despaired of some of the unnecessary questions you get asked whilst buying something?  Normally I ignore them for what they are but one particular day when I stopped for a coffee at a motorway services I questioned why I had been asked something.  This is what happened.

I had been driving for a couple of hours and decided I would stop for a coffee.  It was about 11am and the services were relatively quiet.

I went to the counter and asked for a Latte.

The conversation went like this.

“Good morning.  Can I help you?”  Pleasant young girl and a nice greeting.

“I’ll have a large Latte please

“Do you want anything to eat?” 

“No Thank you” I reply politely

Latte is poured and I get to checkout till

“Do you want anything to eat?”   This is the unnecessary question that got to me

“Sorry, I just asked for a coffee”

“Yes, I asked if you wanted anything to eat.” Says assistant with a forced smile.

“Hang on a minute and let me think, I was driving on the motorway and decided to stop for a coffee, I came in here and asked for a coffee, was given a coffee and was asked if I wanted anything to eat and replied in the negative and now I want to pay for the coffee, I can’t remember wanting anything to eat and if I had I would have asked for it when I ordered the coffee,  Why have you asked me if I wanted anything to eat as if I am senile and may have forgotten between ordering the coffee and walking the 5 yards to this checkout till?”

“Sorry sir we have to ask, it is our policy”

Maybe I was being very pedantic here but I asked to speak to the manager who I could see lurking in the background. He came over.

“Is there a problem I can help you with sir”

“I would like to know why I have been asked twice if I want anything to eat.  Once when  I ordered the coffee which is fair enough but then a second time when I came to pay.” The bit I have left out up to now is that it is the same girl who took my order and had already asked me once.

“It is our policy sir.  We are given instructions to do it on our training course and it increases sales by 60%”

“And you take that at face value do you? I presume that on your training course they gave you the figures from a café that didn’t ask and one that did in a controlled experiment, so a true comparison could be made.

“No they just told us and you would be surprised at how many people change their minds when they are asked the question at the checkout till.  The customer should always be given the opportunity to change their minds”

I turned to the girl at the checkout till and asked her how long she had worked there.

“12 months” she said

“And how many people have changed their minds at the checkout till and gone back to get something to eat when you have asked them the question in that time”

Manager told the girl she could answer.

“None” she said

You should have seen the manager’s face. 

“I rest my case. None, doesn’t equal a 60% increase in my experience.  Have you ever asked your staff that same question?“ From the look on his face I assume he never had, “And by the way, I’ve changed my mind, I don’t want the coffee”

Pedantic and childish maybe but the satisfaction I got from this exchange, as I walked away, was worth it.

I honestly believe that this so called customer service has never been researched but just passed on in training courses by inept trainers.

If more of us wasted their time like this maybe they would stop doing it.

I got my coffee from another vendor in the same services without being asked any unnecessary questions.

This happened earlier in the year and is another instance of a large store imposing something on to customers and expecting them to accept it without question. I'm afraid that doesn't work with me.

Most people probably know that Tesco's allow people to buy their lottery entries at the checkout till and the numbers get added to their till receipt. I don’t like this as I lose till receipts whereas I don’t lose pink lottery tickets. So I always go to the actual lottery desk to buy my tickets. On this particular day (sometime in March) I duly went to purchase my lottery tickets in the normal way and was presented with a till receipt bearing the numbers. I told them I didn’t want a till receipt, I wanted a pink lottery ticket. I was told that it was now company policy to give till receipts with the numbers on for lucky dips.

“I don’t want a till receipt with numbers, I want a pink lottery ticket please” I said. “Sounds a bit petulant but when I ask for a lottery ticket I expect to get a pink lottery ticket not a till receipt” Person serving now told me it was the same thing. I pointed out that white and pink are two different colours and a lottery ticket looks distinctly different to a till receipt. I told them I wasn’t paying for a till receipt and could I please have a pink lottery ticket. Manager now appeared.

Manager was very nice and she told the checkout lady to give me a pink lottery ticket. Now I added an extra complication and asked for the same numbers that had been originally produced on the till receipt. Got the reply “You asked for a lucky dip”. I replied, “I did and I got one at the time of asking but not on a pink lottery ticket. I don’t want a different lucky dip, I want the same lucky dip I would have got 10 minutes ago if it had been on a pink ticket”. There is quite a queue building up now so the manager takes the old numbers off the original till receipt, keys them in and gives me the pink ticket which I duly pay for.

I assumed this was the end of the situation but as I paid I was told that in Tesco’s in the near future they wouldn’t be issuing any pink tickets and all lottery numbers would be on till receipts. I asked who had told them this and they told me Camelot. I thanked them and left.

I went home and relayed the tale to my wife. My wife and I never accept things on face value so she then sent off an email to Camelot asking if this was a policy they were imposing on large stores such as Tesco’s and if so why were they doing it.

Camelot were very quick to respond and sent a mail back saying that it was not their policy and it was the first time they had heard of it. Now my wife sends this reply from Camelot to Tesco’s head office asking why this policy was in place in our local Tesco store, when Camelot had never heard of it before.

Reply comes back from local Tesco manager telling is that the Camelot rep had told them this was going to be policy so the local Tesco had been briefing their staff to issue lottery tickets on till receipts. The letter also said that I could have my lottery numbers on pink tickets in the future.

I keep the letter on me because I have to use it from time to time when a new checkout person appears on the lottery till. They are still being briefed to not give pink tickets for lucky dips. Which prompts me to ask the question, “If it is not policy why are they still doing it?” The only thing I can think of is that it is some local cost saving exercise because till receipts are cheaper than lottery tickets.

How many people accept things because it is too much trouble to argue.

I think I am getting addicted to complaining. I enjoy the challenge of arguing about something that is always taken for granted and actually winning the argument. One lesson to learn if you may be thinking of doing it as well, is never lose your temper and always be polite.

Make a New Year’s resolution to fight officialdom. If it doesn’t sound right then try arguing. You may be surprised at what you actually don't have to accept.

I have recently taken to saying NO when asked for my address when I buy something. The latest one was buying a drill bit from Screwfix. It cost £4.95 and they wanted my postcode. You should have seen the face when I asked why. The answer "Because we need it" I told them they weren't getting it. I told them how buying things worked. "I ask for something, they give it to me, I pay, I get a receipt end of transaction, no need for anything else".

Now I got "We need it because we are a mail order company" My reply "I'm in your shop and not buying by mail order" ; "But you might want to in the future" "If I do then you will get my address then.

Slight pause now and the Supervisor/Manager now got interested. "We need your address so that if you ask for a refund we can give it to you" I now told them how refunds worked "I buy something, I get a receipt, what I have bought breaks and I bring it back with the receipt, you give me a refund."

I was told that I would have to look after the receipt carefully as they wouldn't give me a refund if I didn't have it. I told them I would guard it with my life as it was the most precious thing I would have.

It then took a few minutes while the till operator and supervisor huddled together over the Till screen. I'm presuming they were trying to get past the page where it was asking for my address. Eventually they managed because my money was taken and the goods and receipt given to me. I would have loved to have thrown the receipt away but prudence dictated I actually kept it in case the drill bit was defective when I got it home

My parting words were "Easy wasn't it, you didn't need my address, you just wanted it"

As I left the store I heard somebody at the checkout say "NO, why do you want my address?"

This last bit I made up but wouldn't that be a nice postscript if we could get a campaign going that would say NO more often to these types of unnecessary intrusive questions.