Gif certificates and flyers

[6809er]

As you'll probably guess from reading this, it's been a long time since I worked retail. Processes change, especially in how gift certificates are done. I suspect that the lady in my story may be a large part of why this happened...

As usual, I was working by myself at the Shack when a Vulcan* woman walked in. She was clutching our latest flyer and was trying to communicate something to me. Since she couldn't speak English very well, and I couldn't speak Vulcan at all, we had some initial difficulty. Then I took a close look at the front page of the flyer and realized what she wanted.

Back in those days, we did hand-written gift certificates. It wasn't a big deal in that we hardly ever wrote any. It just wasn't the industry it is today. Anyway, the flyer she was showing me had a picture of a woman who was holding a few blank gift certificates. It was intended to show that the Shack did indeed sell them.

But my Vulcan friend had actually filled out each of these teeny tiny certificate pictures with her own name and was attempting to redeem them. Fortunately I was able to convey that these weren't real certificates. I'll even give her credit - I would have never thought to try that.

She wasn't nasty or rude at all. It made me laugh more than anything else.

*No, she wasn't really Vulcan. But she was a different nationality, so I wanted to mention it in a way that wouldn't result in this topic devolving to Fratching. And if you are a Vulcan, I apologize if you are offended in any way.

[Emrld]

I remember the hand written certificates . . . also known as rain checks.
The item would go on sale . . .the store would sell out . . .you would go to Customer Service Desk and they would fill out a form to use within so many days. It allowed you to get the item the next time you were in the store for the advertized price.

I think the electronic tracking of things has helped to cut back on the need. (allows for better supply, quicker delivery when necessary)

[wagegoth]

The independent book store I shop at still does hand written gift certificates. If you buy a holiday or birthday card, they'll actually create it as part of the card, if you want.

[Boochan]

Thats sad.

Though I guess when its not explained terribly well, especially when their are language barriers its understandable if she didn't understand that theyre not real :P Haven't come across that problem.

We Proudly shredded all our paper gift certificates last year. The group that my chain belongs to does a Gift Card instead these days, which works across the other chains in their group, thats satisfactory enough. Of course, not many people buy them, and thats okay (we don't get any commission on them, and they are not a technical sale), we use them as a replacement for a credit voucher for returns out of our 14 day policy. The good thing about them is that it brings more people in who have just gone to the supermarket, or discount store part of the group and got the card, and then decide to spend it at our store

[friendofjimmyk]

Wow! If it weren't for the language barrier, I would be mor shocked, but maybe she thought that she could pull such a stunt because - well, who knows why.

[Andara Bledin]

Gift cards are fantastic.

Until the stripe gets corrupted. Then you're out however much was on the gift card with no way to recover it.

We had to argue with a clerk once because we had an old gift card that had become unreadable at some point and was old enough that their POS system no longer recognized the number on the card. It was a pre-order card that came with the goody box when you pre-ordered City of Heroes.

I wonder how many scammers get ahold of old gift cards and ruin the stripe just to weasel money out of places.

^-.-^