Okay, now they're actually running after people....

[Mr Hero]

Okay, I just got the obligatory form letter back, with the last sentence being:

"Make sure you're registered at Kmart.com for emails, so we can stay in touch!"

[/I]

Gotta love the irony.

I've gotten some of this at Best Buy. Most of the time it's asking me if I want to sign up for some cable deal. I watch my cable shows online, thanks. Why can't I just I pick up a DS game in peace?

[dalesys]

Okay, I just got the obligatory form letter back, with the last sentence being:

"Make sure you're registered at Kmart.com for emails, so we can stay in touch!"


So I sent back:

Um...yeah. I guess we can translate this retail-speak into "We completely missed the point of your letter".

Oooky dokie.


Kinkoid

There should be a 12-step program for these idiots...

I know!

Dumf**k-anon!


"Hi. I'm Pointy and I'm a dumbf**k."

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

My company gave up on its store credit card. We weren't getting any sign-ups for it anyway, and there wasn't any real pressure for us to get sign-ups anyway.

There's just the loyalty card and while we do mention it at the register, we don't send somebody around with a clipboard to harass people. We might set up a table for people to go sign up, but it's been a while since we even did that.

Actually, the loyalty card is kinda being diminished. It started Christmastime when all of a sudden corporate took a bunch of stuff off loyalty and made it regular sale-price merchandise. I don't see many signs for special loyalty prices for things any more.

[MoonCat]

If these stores want to force the majority of their customers to shop online instead (and not with them)...they're going about it the right way.

[MadMike]

By the time I actually checked out, I'd been asked about the fucking card by three different people. The pharmacist, the cashier, and the clipboards stalker.

That's the sort of thing that made me stop going to Media Play, about a year or so before they ended up going under. It was a shame too, because I used to love that place. If I was looking for a CD or DVD, chance are they'd have it.

I for one am shocked that K-Mart still exists.

There's one not far from my house, and it's really starting to suck. Their selection seems to be constantly shrinking. I don't know how many times I've gone there for a simple, basic item, and they don't carry it. Sometimes it's something that they used to carry recently.

They asked me once what was my zip. I said "No clue."

She said "You don't know your zip?"

I said "nope."

She said, "Well I can't ring you up without it."

I said "Well, I guess we got us a situation, then, eh?"

Guess what? Turned out, she didn't need my zip.

I know when you're paying with a credit card, sometimes they use it to cut down on fraud. They make sure the zip you enter matches the zip on the billing address. But if you were paying cash, then no, they don't need it.

What I really don't like is when they ask for a phone number. They claim they won't use it for telemarketing, but I don't trust them. If they're not using it for telemarketing, then they don't need it. If they are using it for telemarketing, then I don't want them to have it.

One them when they asked for it, I asked them what they needed it for. The answer I got was, "It's company policy."

OK, that's not what I asked, but I didn't want to hold up the line, especially over something the cashier had no control over. I still had my second phone line for the computer back then, so I gave them that. There was no phone attached to it, so if they called it they'd either get a busy or a no-answer depending on whether I was on the computer. Now that I don't have that line anymore, I politely refuse to give my number. So far, no one has had a problem with it. In fact, I've seen the question pop up on the registers at some places, and the cashier just bypassed it somehow.

[Bandit]

I love it in when shopping in the US when they ask for a zip code.

Being Canadian, I'll happily give them my postal code (in the format A1A 1A1) just to see them blue screen.

Double points if they had just checked my licence or passport because I bought beer or smokes.

B

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Well, here's the thing. I'm tired or off my game, I CAN'T remember my zip. On a good day, it takes some effort on my part to recall it. I frankly resent the hell out of being put on the spot to remember a string of numbers that they apparently really don't even need (as evidenced by the transaction going through without it.)

It's embarrassing and upsetting for me to have to stand there and have to stammer around and concentrate that hard while someone's waiting. And then get stared at like I'm stupid. I'm not going to carry around a crib note, either, it ain't me that supposedly needs the thing. It's them. Let them figure out the workaround.

As for the telephone numbers you SHOULDN'T trust that they won't use them for telemarketing. They are not that desperate to "send you a coupon", which is the laughable excuse I usually get when I ask whyt they need that. They want to put together a direct marketing database. something that is worth A LOT.

But I can't remember my phone number, either, so it's moot. Even on a good day. I don't have a land line anymore, and the cell is made up of sevens and twos and fives. Ironically, the worst numbers to have to deal with. They all look alike for some reason.

[Snaptwitch]

I am an employee that has to push these cards. I am sick of being harrassed about pushing them on to people. We have meeting almost every day about it. So far I have been avoiding doing it because I know how much people hate being asked a million times if they want something. I know I do. Now they are threatening write ups, so now I feel like I have to try, because I don't want to get written up. They want to keep a tally of how many cards you get a day. Although I probably will anyways, because I suck at getting cards. People either have them already or don't want them, and I am not just not pushy enough. I ask once, and only once. I just want to go to work, do my job, be friendly, help customers and go home. Now I have to stress over this stuff.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

What REALLY offends me is the idea that management likes to act like you all have some control over it. It's just beyond stupid to penalize someone for something they have absolutely no control over.

Unless they are allowing you all to stick a pistol in my face and give me an ultimatum, there's not much you can do to influence my decision.

It's almost like they are using you guys as hostages or something. "Get a store card with us or we'll fire our own employee!" So damn stupid.

I actually chewed out a manager in a Belks once for this, although it probably wasn't even the manager's fault. She just had to poor judgement to step into a conversation where I was actually saying to the clerk "Yeah, I know it's so stupid how they make you guys do this. " And the manager didn't like what I was saying and agreed that they punish their clerks for failing to adequately badger me. As if that would make me do a sign up out of pity.

Yeah. Right. I told her to her face, in front of two clerks and a bunch of customers, that was stupid, self destructive, and appalling.

[Chromatix]

Standard practice here is to simply ask if the customer has the store's (or co-op group's) loyalty card, during checkout. If not, no problem.

Anything else is advertised in the usual way, with big signs up pointing out the main bonuses of the loyalty card, and usually smaller ones advertisng the co-op group's banking services (in which the bank/credit card incorporates the loyalty card's features).

Pestering customers about it is simply Not Done.

[Shpepper]

I like being semi deaf in those instances. I just keep walking like I can't hear the person talking to me. Sometimes I really can't hear them and that's even better. If companies want me to shop in their stores, they will leave me to it, or I won't go back. I've done it before. I have actually walked away from a full cart of items because I was asked for a telephone number and a physical address on a check. I only use a PO Box on my checks and that wasn't good enough for the store. Just more info to put into their database. No thank you.

[Racket_Man]

all that pushing of cards is like what my pizza place does with phone orders.

we have a very very specific script we HAVE to follow and each store is surveyed at least 3 or 4 times a week (all different times of the day). IF we do not read EVERYTHING on the script word FOR word and upsell/upgrade several different kind of items during the conversation we get written up for non suggestive selling. 3 write-ups and you are fired.

OK some of the things I can see but that much upsell/upgrade is outrageous

[MadMike]

As for the telephone numbers you SHOULDN'T trust that they won't use them for telemarketing. They are not that desperate to "send you a coupon", which is the laughable excuse I usually get when I ask whyt they need that. They want to put together a direct marketing database. something that is worth A LOT.

If anyone ever told me they needed my phone number for that reason, I'd ask them how they send a coupon to a phone number.

As for not trusting them, I agree. These companies can be some sneaky bastards. I applied for a credit card back in the early 90s, and when it arrived, my name was mispelled. My first name was spelled "Micheal" instead of "Michael", and my middle initial was listed as a "K", instead of an "R."

Not even a week after I got the card, I started getting all sorts of junk mail with my name spelled the same way. But I'm sure if I would have called them on it, they'd say it was a coincidence.

[GiggityGiggityGoo]

Meh. I usually give a random phone number or zip code that I pull out of my ass.


Thankfully the only smelly, dank, useless K-Mart within 25 miles of where I live closed last year.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Oh, yeah, Mike. Ask them why they need a number sometime and see if someone doesn't pull out the "coupon" excuse.

I actually got into an argument with someone over that. I was offended that the thought I was so stupid that that lame ass excuse was sufficient. I asked them a series of questions they couldn't answer:

1. Does your company hire a bunch of people who do nothing but do reverse lookups on phone numbers to get addresses?

2. Why not just ask for an address?

3. If I put a phone number on a piece of mail instead of an address, would it get where it was going?

4. If the ultimate goal is to give me a coupon, why not just hand me one right here and right now?

You get the idea.

I actually used to deliberately misspell part of my name, or give a bogus first name when I had to apply for something. I would do this after "making sure" my info would not be sold or otherwise shared. You'd be surprised at how many "coincidental" misspellings happened shortly following.

They lie.