[RANT] May I see your receipt please?

No, you may not.

 

You better have a receipt for that dinner you thief.

 

Luckily the Italians are loading the truck up in the back of the store where receipt policy was blocked by the union.

 

Is it really THAT much of an inconvenience to stop for 2 seconds to show your receipt?

Stopping crime helps to keep prices down, thus savings are passed on to YOU, the consumer?

When did our society become so obsessed with ranting and raving about every little minute detail of everyday life?

I call it the "Seinfeldization of America."

Gimme a break.

 

You of all people should realize that we live in an age of speed and convenience. I don't shop at these places, since I do most of my shopping online. However, there has to be a better way than manually checking receipts at the door.

Bottom line is that it's an annoyance and a waste of our time. Also, I doubt any savings is being passed to the consumer.

 

Sorry, my post was tongue-in-cheek, seeing as how "Seinfeldian rants" are an everyday part of my life.

I guess I should have put a winking smiley in my post.

 

You realize of course that they don't trust customers or employees because customers and employees have stolen from those store enough times that they felt they had to impliment those procedures.

If no one stole, you wouldn't have to show your receipt. So, don't blame the store, blame the thiefs.

 

Here, let me give you a real reason to hate on WalMart.

 

Amen!

WalMart is teh devil. You couldn't PAY me to step one foot into their ghetto stores.

Ok, maybe if you offered me like ten dollars I'd put a foot in, BUT I WOULDN'T SPEND THE 10 DOLLARS THERE!

I swear it.

 

Stop for a second and think. First, since "everybody" is doing it now, you might think about altering your normal behavior in the future, so that you can accomidate these people. Would it really be that difficult?

Now, you do understand why they do it, don't you? It's because people walk into these stores with a plastic bag in their pockets and a tool for removing the security tags, and they just walk out of the door with merchandice.

Now, imagine that you are running a store. It is only at the big places that this happens, because of the multiple people running registers, and the confusion this generates with people mixing together between exits, so if you have a really big store with multiple registers the reason for this behavior will always be there.

At one point these people introduced the Sensormatic type of tags, where there is an elaborate fastening mechanism, and a magnetic strip that would activate detectors at the doors. These worked for a while, but criminals have come up with makeshift removal devices or pocket demagnatizers (for the tape-on type) and these things are useless, except against the occasional first-timer.

Now, for an understanding of how severely shoplifting can affect profitability, read this article. Or, if you don't want to do so, at least understand that for stores that operate with limited margins (Fry's and other electronics stores are perfect examples) you can have a situation in which the theft of a relatively small number of items can have a major impact on profitability. In the example they use, 4 units of an article with a 5% markup were stolen. In order to recover the loss of principal, 100 units would have to be sold. This is just to get back to the breakeven point!

So, understanding the impact that theft can have, even when it would seem to be a relatively small theft, and understanding that other, less intrusive measures have been tried, but have been circumvented, what would you do if you were in their position?

My point is this: I understand that the practice is an anoyance to you, but I suggest that were these companies to eliminate the practice, they would either have to go out of business, raise their prices rediculously, or downsize to store with only 1 or 2 registers. I would imagine that each of these solutions would be at least equally unpaletable to you.

Also, if you think you can come up with a more efficient solution for these stores, you might want to consider marketing it, because the stores don't like anoying their customers, or for having to pay for a team of people to just stand there and check your reciepts. If you could come up with a better method, it'd probably make you rich, but I doubt you can. I say this not as an insult to you, but because I think you are underestimating the scope of the problem as well as the amount of effort that has gone into solving it.

In any case, I hope that you can learn to accept the situation after thinking about the situation that the large retailers are in, becuase I don't think it's going away any time soon.

Here's another article, written for the store managers, that discusses some of the details of shoplifting and prevention

 

I think is mite be design to prevent this :


One day my friend went into a "store" brought something .... put the item into his car then gives the receipt to his friend.
Who goes back in the store and grab the same item and walked around the store with it like he just paid for it, and actually walked out with it.

 

You must be proud to have friends that are so clever.

 

Been going to walmart for 3+ years now and they have always asked for a reciept especially high crime areas.

 

I went to target the other day to buy a cd for my dad's birthday ~ I grabbed the cd and started to walk around the store to look for a few more things. I quickly noticed a secret shopper following my every move around the store - I had a little fun messing with the secret shopper...

 

I've been showing my receipt to the people at Sam's for ever so I'm use to it. I've even found myself getting ready to show the receipt to someone at Kroger.

 

Esse and Ottomaton,
Consider this... retailers are doing this due to theft.... but they are not doing it with the concerns of going out of business or having to raise prices on customers. You can't seriously consider Walmart might go out of business, can you? You need to realize that in a free market competitive society, retailers can not raise prices on customers just because of losses. That would ensure their failure. Their competitors may not have the losses they have and to raise their prices would put them at a competitive disadvantage! Not good business.
They are doing this only to improve their profitibility!! They want to make more money! Shoplifting is not a new thing. It has been going on as long as there has been retail. This is just a new idea to thwart shoplifting. They will continue to do this to make more money, as long as the paying customers put up with it. They will stop doing it when enough paying customers say they will no longer deal with it. It is that simple.
If you don't like it shop somewhere else. The wierd thing to me, is individuals seem cosumed with greed. Isn't it a type of greed to put up with bull crap such as this, just to save a couple of dollars. Go somewhere else, pay the extra amount and get treated better. Isn't it worth it? Greed can exist an any income level, I believe.
Just in case you are wondering, I work at a retailer that uses this technique. And as you might have guessed, I don't like it. I fight against it in our company all the time. It is truly anti customer service. It is not your problem that people steal from us. It is ours. We should not make you have to deal with it. In addition, get this.... we actually measure how many times a customer walks out our exit door, gets checked and we actually catch something. Under five percent of the time, we need to fix something. 4 1/2 percent of the time it is our fault. About 1/2 percent of the time the person is trying to leave with something that wasn't paid for. And that amounts to very few dollars overall. Is that worth it to you? About half a percent of the time we catch a potential thief? While the other 99.5% of people have to put up with the hassle of receipt checking?
Not to me......

 

1) I hate the "show your receipt at the door" thing. It's annoying, and it serves no real purpose. Anyone stealing something will put it in their friggin' pocket.. not their bag. Isn't this what anti-thief tags are for?

2) Wal-Mart is a cult. A Bonafied CULT. I swear to god, nothing is creepier than watching a Wal-Mart share holders meeting.. or even the opening of a Wal-Mart in the morning.