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AIBU

To think that there is an underlying motive by businesses to ask if I want a receipt?

(47 Posts)
Bakingmad0203 Fri 20-May-22 14:46:16

I have noticed since Lockdown that all business I go to, ask if I want a receipt. Is this their contribution to saving on waste or is there another reason?

In the past week I have saved £9 by checking my receipts.
Once after my weekly shop at the supermarket, ( the price on the till was different from the shelf price for one item and the other was scanned twice), and yesterday after having lunch at a cafe, ( the cashier charged me twice for one item) .
If I hadn’t kept my receipts I would have had no way of checking the prices, and of course the businesses would have made more money.
Does anyone else check theirs or am I being over suspicious?

AGAA4 Fri 20-May-22 14:51:40

I have wondered why I am always asked now if I want a receipt. I have just thought it was to save paper.
Thanks for pointing this out. I don't always check my receipt.

welbeck Fri 20-May-22 14:54:33

i sometimes check mine as i buy items for another.
occasionally i have seen what is an obvious error.
once a tub of ice-cream was scanned twice.
but i travel far to shop so not worth going back. this was during pandemic and i only went every 3+ weeks. also i reasoned that the prices at lidl were still saving me money overall.
i mentioned it to the cashier next time, but just as conversation, it was not the same cashier.
she asked me if it was the same ice cream i had bought that day. i said no,it was a different flavour.
she picked the ice cream from my basket and put it through without scanning.
which i was v impressed with. had not expected.
big up to lidl, finsbury park.

AreWeThereYet Fri 20-May-22 14:57:46

You have to give them your email so they can then send you lots of emails about products and offers. We always refuse but get them anyway from places where we have a store card, like B&Q.

grandtanteJE65 Fri 20-May-22 15:03:12

Since supermarkets started using scanners and bar codes it is only too easy for the cash-desk operator to make a genuine mistake and scan something twice. And anything that has been reduced in price frequently has to be scanned twice, once to record the original price and once to record the lowered one and subtract accordingly.

So always check your receipt. On the rare occasions I don't, I usually discover when I get home that I have been had!

welbeck Fri 20-May-22 15:04:30

if you go right to the end of those marketing emails, there is usually a link to unsubscribe.
you have to look in the very small print.
but it is your right to decide how your data is used.

Kim19 Fri 20-May-22 15:24:40

Yesterday in Asda, I asked the girl at the checkout to remove one of the items from my shopping as it was not the price I had thought it was. She asked me what price I thought it was and adjusted it to that. Amazing and not at all what I had expected.

Mogsmaw Fri 20-May-22 15:41:34

I work in a shop, I ask if you want a receipt because, if you don’t, I don’t. Print it. Saves paper , saves rubbish. Nothing sinister just “reduce” like we are all encouraged to do.

Blossoming Fri 20-May-22 16:11:53

I’ve never been asked for my email address in the supermarket and I always take my receipt.

BlueBelle Fri 20-May-22 16:14:49

Paper saving, tree saving, time saving, ink saving, money saving nothing more than that as far as I know

AreWeThereYet Fri 20-May-22 16:15:35

Sorry, misread the op - I thought you were asking about an e-receipt being sent. My apologies.

Georgesgran Fri 20-May-22 16:17:32

Now that we take our own bags or just carry stuff out of the shop (me in John Lewis today with a baby outfit) I presumed that was why we are asked if we want the receipt - to be able to prove that we’ve paid for an item and not stolen it?

welbeck Fri 20-May-22 16:22:18

no, because previously we were always handed the receipt or it was put in the bag.
now it is an option. apparently young people throw them away or leave them at the till anyway.
they seem to have an aversion to actual documents but they quite happily give their email address.

GagaJo Fri 20-May-22 16:29:57

There is a worker (a manager) at my local Aldi who without fail, always over charges. Either sale stuff scanned at normal price, or things scanned twice. I always ask for the receipt and have held up his queue in the past, asking for my refund.

Nannee49 Fri 20-May-22 19:43:48

I always use the self scan when I can as I can then fully check if the prices are correct. There's been countless times, especially with the supermarket beginning with M, I've been overcharged, either the specific offer hasn't been applied or the shelf has been re-stacked with a more expensive product and the price label hasn't been changed. It may not be done deliberately but it has happened so often I've mainly stopped shopping there.

MawtheMerrier Fri 20-May-22 19:57:58

Are you serious?
A conspiracy to defraud the nation by millions by overcharging them and discourage the from seeing their receipt?
Shakes head in disbelief.

Vintagejazz Fri 20-May-22 20:50:46

My pet hate is unclear signage with qualifiers in tiny print under the large price sign. A row of chickens with a big £5 sign, but in teeny print it's actually £5 per lb, so the chicken is actually £10.

Or two almost identical items side by side with a big £4 sign. Then you're charged £6 at the checkout because the sign referred, again in tiny print, to the wholemeal bread, not the wholegrain bread.

The supermarkets must trick people out of a significant amount of money every year. There really should be regulations about that kind of behaviour

notgran Fri 20-May-22 20:56:50

My decision on whether or not I want my receipt has no logic. Sometimes I say yes sometimes no. I don 't think in my entire life I have ever checked a receipt. I wonder if that is why I am not a millionaire?

CanadianGran Fri 20-May-22 21:10:11

I am amazed at how well some of you know your prices. I think on average when I am shopping my weekly shop, I would have maybe 40 items (guessing). There is no way that I remember all those prices when I reach the till. Some of the more specific items that were reduces prices, maybe.

I think a lot of shoppers just toss the receipt, so they are saving waste.

Teacheranne Fri 20-May-22 22:01:15

I think many people who use contactless payments do not want receipts particularly if they have just bought a small item - I certainly don’t bother, it seems to defeat the object of making a quick transaction if I have to wait for the receipt!

With my Tesco food deliveries, the receipt is emailed to be before the delivery so I can check any substitutions or short shelf life items and hand them back to the driver. Excellent idea.

Witzend Fri 20-May-22 22:10:30

A bit different, but I now invariably take my receipt after using a self-checkout. I was once stopped at the exit because one item had a small security tag on the back, and there had been no alert to summon staff to remove it.

It was utterly mortifying to have to wait there, a suspected shoplifter, flanked by security guards, while they went through the bin to find my receipt.
Never again!

Jane43 Fri 20-May-22 22:31:26

Kim19

Yesterday in Asda, I asked the girl at the checkout to remove one of the items from my shopping as it was not the price I had thought it was. She asked me what price I thought it was and adjusted it to that. Amazing and not at all what I had expected.

A similar thing happened to us in Wilko. We picked up two bottles of Radox hand wash which we thought were on special offer. When we scanned them the price was more than we expected so we asked one of the staff. She checked and said the offer didn’t include the bottles we picked up but let us have them for the offer price even though it was our error.

Granny23 Fri 20-May-22 22:36:22

As far as I understand, the question was first asked because of Covid i.e. one less thing to change hands

ElaineI Fri 20-May-22 22:47:49

I don't ask for receipt unless it is an item I may have problems with. I thought it was to save waste. I was once charged £9 for 5 mushrooms in Tesco and glad I had the receipt to get that sorted.

Mollygo Fri 20-May-22 23:47:28

I always ask for a receipt-and check it.
Buy a meal deal and find you’ve paid for separate items and saved nothing is a favourite mistake-and that’s the till not the checkout assistant’s fault.