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So much for the customer always being right.

Some retailers are deciding that the customer can be very, very wrong -- as in unprofitable. And some, including Best Buy Co. Inc., are discriminating between profitable customers and shoppers they lose money on.

Like a customer who ties up a salesworker but never buys anything, or who buys only during big sales. Or one who files for a rebate, then returns the item.

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I was all 'yeah, fire bad customers' while I was reading that article until it got to the part about banks 'prioritising' customers with large accounts...

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Originally posted by Anchoress:
I was all 'yeah, fire bad customers' while I was reading that article until it got to the part about banks 'prioritising' customers with large accounts...

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Originally posted by lagatta:
There are customers who do things like buying outfits, wearing them to a party, and returning them (Eatons used to have a very liberal return policy and some nasty folks like that took advantage of it)

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there was a funny smell eminating from the dress. They sent it to a lab to be tested and found formaldehyde all over the dress.

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Though I do buy Canadian, and am willing to pay a bit more for that.

I'd like to buy domestically-made goods as well, but in "ladies' wear", at least, it is getting almost impossible to do so...

[ 06 July 2004: Message edited by: abnormal ]

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...buy a CD you like, tape it, return it became common. I suspect that companies like HMV simply add up the cost of doing business this way and decide whether it's worth it.

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Most store's return policies have changed. However, even if they haven't the store has made an estimate of the percentage of people that do this and simply grossed up everyone else's prices to compensate.

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...with less than $40,000 in their accounts was to be dealt with as quickly as possible, not be given any special treatment, and then gotten rid of. Those with more than $40,000 or more were to be served graciously and all steps were to be taken to ensure they were happy with the service.

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The way banks deal with poorer clients is downright criminal, and measures to rectify such discrimination and ensure basic savings and cheque account services (not talking about credit) should be a condition of renewing their charters.

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Retail banking is generally a money loser. I suspect the real condition re the charter should simply be that they continue to offer retail banking services period.

Even if you're a "high net worth individual", whatever that may mean, banks generally treat you like shit. That's their job. By the way, I do exempt private banking from this but that's a different world that I can only aspire to enter. "Would you like an coffee Sir? How about expresso? ..."

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One thing consumers could use is a Canadian-based catalogue retailer similar to Eddie Bauer, LL Bean, Lands' End etc.

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I have no problems with those, since you have to provide almost no personal information to get one (and you can lie if you want to). All the stores care about is whether or not customer 123456 is likely to buy chips or pretzels with their beer - they don't really care about anything else.

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Although with certain smaller local businesses I cut them some slack...I want to keep them in the neighbourhood. Its nice being able to walk to certain stores

As for the banks...once I became a mortgage slave I found that I was treated much better...they start throwing money at you because they know their going to make oodles of dough from interest charges for a decade or two.

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Yeah, I do tend to be a "bottom feeder" when it comes to buying stuff...especially at large chains.

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One thing I didn't mention about "bottom feeders": we're a very necessary part of the retail "food chain". Stores need bottom feeders to clean out the last of their inventory. If they have 1000 pair of jeans to get rid of, and they aren't moving, even at $39.99, then they cut the price in half again, wait for the bottom feeder frenzy to subside, and voila! Room for the new season's inventory.

The tough problem comes in restraining gung-ho sales types. They will promise the world and give away the shop at the boss's expense. All companies have limited abilities and they should be honest about that. If you deliver pizza, then include your 25 km limit in your ad. Those big posters in front of car dealerships that say "0 % financing" should also explain the catch. I guess I like truth in advertising.

I certainly don't blame a company for trying to control expenses, so long as they are up-front honest about it, and fair about it. If I live way out in the toolies, then the company should tell me ahead of time that extra delivery charges are my problem. Don't surprise me. (I think it's UPS that has a $50 bonding charge to bring things to Canada from the US. A lot of Canadians have been burnt by that one.) If they can't provide the product or service to me, for whatever reason, then they should stop advertising to me. I understand that they might not want my business; that's fair enough. Quite simply, they should stop trying to lure me in.

In my world the sign, by law, would have to say "As High as $49.99", and if you're still interested enough to see about the blue rugbys you can go ahead, but at least you know what's really on that rack.

One of my more amusing run-ins with absurd policy happened when I went to Winners, to buy some underwear for Mrs. Magoo. I found a package of the kind she wanted, and it was $5.99. Then I found another one, and this one was only $3! I brought them both to the cash, fully expecting to pay $3 for each, but the sales clerk rang them up as-is, and the total was over $10. I pointed out to her that one was on sale, and that presumably the other simply hadn't been marked down yet, but wasn't the sale price in the computer?

The clerk insisted that they were different prices because they were "different", but I pointed out to her that the packages were identical, and the manufacturer's product number was identical too.

An assistant manager came over and basically insisted that this was normal store policy, that occassionally identical items in the same department will have different prices and there was nothing she could do about it. I quite loudly reiterated everything she said, and did my best to emphasize the absurdity of this policy to any other shoppers nearby. I took the on-sale pair and left the full price behind.

When I got back to my office, I phoned Winners head office and spoke to a customer relations employee. She informed me that Winners marks products down by date, and in fact the date a product enters their store is on the price tag. Apparently one pair had been in the store longer and had been automatically marked down by the system, the other hadn't. I pointed out that this is entirely counterintuitive to a shopper, and that we really don't care if one product has been in the store for 3 weeks longer than another identical product, but I was polite (since there was nobody around to hear me anyway ) and thanked her for her time.

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One thing I didn't mention about "bottom feeders": we're a very necessary part of the retail "food chain"....

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He is also an inveterate 'bottom feeder'and clothing buyer.

Last summer he told me, with some delight, about a field trip on which he took the 20 or so special needs kids to the downtown area. On arrival, he looked around at all the stores, and asked himself 'Now, which one of these stores was the most haughty and rude to me this year?"