A New Low

[RecoveringKinkoid]

So I walk into UHaul today to price out trailer hitches. Their "policy" is that they will having nothing to do with me unless I complete a marketing research poll for them.

Me :Hi, am getting quotes on trailer hitches for a 2009 Grand Caravan SE.
Clerk: (pulling up what I thought was a price list on her screen) Okay. What's your name?
Me: RecoveringKinkoid.
Clerk: Okay, what is your phone number?
Me: Uh...why would you need my phone number to tell me how much a piece of merchandise in your store costs?
Clerk: It's policy
Me: My policy is that I don't give out my phone number.
Clerk: Well, I can't give you price without it.
Me: Okay. Thanks anyway.

And I leave.

Seriously? We have not even determined if we will be doing business together or not at this point, and they need my personal info?

Evidently they think that phone number is far more valuable to them than what I might pay them on the hitch. I wouldn't think anyone would be in a position to turn away two hunnert bucks a this point, but hey, what do I know?

Before we get into "failing to see the suck" because the clerk was just doing her job, let me say I am not faulting her. I am faulting the policy, if that is indeed what corporate told her to do.

[Whiskey]

Maybe she was checking for previous thefts? I cant imagine they'd throw away business just to complete a survey. When I rented a dolly from uhaul, they told me the price first. But its a 7$ dolly..

[LillFilly]

Wow. I never heard of that. Just asked for info and got it. Wow.

[ditchdj]

People seem to say it's no big deal to divulge your personal info with the cashier on demand. But the problem I have with it is that this info goes into the company's database. And it seems like I can't go more than three month without hearing a news story about yet another company's database full of customer data getting hacked. Just the thought of hackers getting my personal info so easily and then selling it on the black market for a profit nauseates me.

[fireheart]

Seriously WTF? A postcode could've sufficed just as well (ZIP code for all you US folk) for that purpose.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

I would submit to you that a postal code would have been just as irrelevant to the question. They don't need any of that to tell me what price their hitches are. I havent even decided I am going to be their customer yet and here they are asking this.

Of course, even if I was in the act of buying the hitch outright, I still wouldn't give them any of that info, but all I did was ask for a price to SEE if I WAS going to buy.

[MadonnaC]

tell them 202 456 1414

Let them speak to the whitehouse if they should ever decide to use it

[mikoyan29]

867-5309.....Tell them to talk to Jenny...

[blas]

A big reason I hate the personal info thing is I HATE making a one time purchase or just going about my business, and all of a sudden my mailbox is packed with their crap or they have the gall to start making stupid calls to me about their stuff. Uh. No.

[kzc]

"I don't have a phone" is my standard response. I only occasionally have to break out "I don't have an address" or, more rarely still, "I don't have a last name".

The policy is only half the problem. The other half is all the zombies out there who encourage such policies by just blithely giving over whatever information is asked of them.

Marketdroid tactics work because people are in general some combination of stupid and/or lazy and/or gullible. And since this is unlikely to change any time soon, those of us in the complement of the union of those sets can expect to find RK's situation increasingly common.

[fireheart]

I would submit to you that a postal code would have been just as irrelevant to the question. They don't need any of that to tell me what price their hitches are. I havent even decided I am going to be their customer yet and here they are asking this.

Of course, even if I was in the act of buying the hitch outright, I still wouldn't give them any of that info, but all I did was ask for a price to SEE if I WAS going to buy.

At that point I'd agree with you. There's a Rite Price near home who will ask me what my postcode is. As I live in the same area the store's located, I just give it to them since it doesn't affect me otherwise But they also ask me at the end, not at the beginning.

[paxillated]

Oh, yeah. I hate calling some place to get a ballpark guesstimate on something. They always want to send someone to do an estimate. I'm just trying to figure out if I can afford it in the first place! It's a waste of my time and their money to send someone out. Surely someone in your office can give me the basic price!

I got an over-the-phone guesstimate, finally, from a fence company. Guess who will get my business - if we can afford it?

[Jay 2K Winger]

I figure you could try having fun with it.

Giving the old 867-5309 number or any other famous phone number, perhaps.

Or give them the classic 555-xxxx number. If they call you on it, just insist that it is your number.

Of course, I might pull something like--

J2K: You don't need my phone number.
Them: I have to ask for it.
J2K: And so you have, and I've told you I'm not giving it to you. Now, what's the price?

It could backfire, I suppose.

[Whiskey]

Of course, I might pull something like--

J2K: You don't need my phone number.
Them: I have to ask for it.
J2K: And so you have, and I've told you I'm not giving it to you. Now, what's the price?

It could backfire, I suppose.

That sounds like something that would be posted in SC. A lot of programs won't let you advance if you dont have a phone number. Just give an obvious fake one and let it drop. The $8/hr desk clerk doesnt care

[PepperElf]

at the pizza place i use to work for (little ceasers, like 20 years ago) we had to ask for numbers so we could ID the correct pizza when they came for pickup.


but if a customer insisted on not giving the number, i accepted. and if they wanted to use some other madeup number (like 123) i didn't really care.


i dont think we kept the numbers... this was back when they used handwritten slips - but i could be wrong.



but yeah i like the idea of the jenny number or the whitehouse number lol