Okay the title is a bit exaggerated, but honestly not far off. This post is very mundane and a bit long, but thought it fits the community.
I’m visiting my home country and went shopping for pants, there were “30% off everything!” signs with a tiny text underneath that said “member discount” (don’t have membership). Not a problem, did not notice and I don’t care for such marketing tricks to get you into the store but okay.
Picked up couple of pants, went to the cashier and they asked me “do you have our membership?” - I answered no and expected the follow up question whether I’d like to join, but, to my positive surprise the cashier just happily responded “okay, not a problem!” and continued to bag my stuff.
I stood ready to pay and then the cashier said “now I just need your phone number and you can pay”. Hold up. What. I did not expect that, I honestly had a burst of anger inside me (never gonna take it on a cashier, they are just doing their job). I asked nicely why do I need to give my phone number and I was told that to register me as a member so I can get the discount.
I declined and said I don’t want to join and would like to just pay.
The entire interaction after questioning why they need my phone number was awkward, as if I had been the first person to decline, the weirdo, aluminum foil hat wearing hermit.
This was just one of many interactions in the recent years that make me feel as if I was a weirdo for not sharing all my info around. The worst is when everyone keeps telling me “its just an app, just download it and use that why do you make things complicated” or “just sign up you don’t need to pay anything”.
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(Your Area Code) 867-5309. None of the younger store clerks know the song reference when I give them this number. But I get chuckles from older folks in line behind me
There’s usually already an account with that number, so just try it out. You probably don’t even need to actually open an account. BTW, if you do open an account, don’t expect that a fake phone number is going to keep you anonymous. Everything is linked these days. All of the big data brokers are buying and selling information to each other. The second you swipe a card, it’s going to match that card to real information from some random online purchase 95 years ago, and they’ll have all of your real information, including political preferences, address, phone number, all of your email addresses, ethnicity, height, weight, sexual preferences, everything. They have it all, and it’s all linked to every credit card you have ever used.
Grocery stores. Picking up prescriptions at the pharmacy (there have been a couple of months where I couldn’t have afforded the cost if there weren’t discount points on 510-867-5309). Stuff at the hardware store. Target, occasionally.
I’d use that number all the time and not take the rewards. Glad my stupid tech job was actually used for something good.
I don’t get it either. I would rather use 8-800-555-35-35 because of the catchy meme ad.
That doesn’t even look like a real phone number. Just use 0118 999 881 999 119 725 3
I had this experience once in an Ikea, of all places. I calmly told the clerk that according to local laws (which I cited), it was illegal for them to demand that information from me (phone number and post code) to sell me anything, and if the computer wouldn’t let them do it, then they should call a manager for an override.
When the manager came, the clerk said “this person refuses to give me their info” — to which I added, “your computer refuses to comply with the law; please override and then notify HQ that they are in contravention of the law and liable for significant fines.”
The next time I went in, they still asked me for the info, but the clerk was able to override. I suspect they just put in fake info for everyone who refused to supply it.
Well done for taking a stand. The problem, as ever, is that most people prefer to comply obediently even if it feels wrong. And then next thing we know, it becomes standard practice.
BTW I have been in your situation and responded similarly. Usually it ends in the clerk inputting dummy info, sometimes after I irritably tell them to do so.
Maybe just an awkward sales agent, or they thought you were mad at them for in their mind trying to help. I decline phone number and zip code all the time. Also been using someone else’s phone number at grocery stores for years – started by mistake. I don’t care about accumulated points or whatever but discounts at grocery store are pretty significant for me.
But I understand your frustration in general. Keep up the good fight :)
Any time a store asks for a phone number, I use the local area code followed by 867-5309, and 9/10 times it works
Yeah, I think this was just a hard sell, and it works. My friend and I were apartment shopping and had already checked out a few places. Then we arrived to look at another complex and after meeting with them, we said we’d let them know if we’d like to move forward. They were very friendly, but pushy, saying “no, you don’t have to do that”, “you’re moving in here!”, that kind of stuff. Being naive and lazy, we just said okay and took the path of least resistance. Oh well, gotta live somewhere!
Stores will never respect your privacy or data, so you have no obligation to respect a corporation’s expectation of truth.
Just have memorized fake data ready for bullshit like this, say it when asked. Then the retail person who cares even less than you about it (but is forced to pretend they do, in order to survive) can get to their break faster. Win win
Yeah in Australia I just use my home phone landline number converted to a mobile number, first 2 numbers are state code so like 02 1234 5678, mobile numbers are the same but 04 at the start. No idea if it is someone else’s number but I haven’t clashed yet.
Everyone’s approaching this from the privacy aspect, but the real reason isn’t that the cashier thought you were weird, they’re just underpaid and under a lot of pressure from management to try multiple times and in some cases they even get written up for not doing it because it’s deemed part of their job. They hate it just as much as you. Same when you try to cancel your cable subscription or whatever: the calls are recorded and their performance is monitored and they make damn sure they try at least 3 times to upsell you, even when it’s painfully obvious you’re done with them.
Just politely decline until they asked however many times they’re required to ask and move on.
I did politely decline and didn’t want to make a fuss about it - the title is bit exaggerated and from outside perspective it probably wasn’t that dramatic.
I know that the cashier is just doing their job and I didn’t want to make their day any harder than it probably already was. I smiled, thanked and left right after paying.
Hope I don’t sound like a karen, just wanted to share my mundane experience in this community since I really love the discussion that is going on in this thread. I do hope that all of us in this community still remember the human when interacting with people in the real world.
… they’re just underpaid and under a lot of pressure from management to try multiple times and in some cases they even get written up for not doing it because it’s deemed part of their job. They hate it just as much as you.
I’ve worked retail and call centre jobs and I can assure you this is many people (at least those who are not too exhausted to care). These workers are constantly pressured to enshitify their service at the expense of theirs and the customer’s experience.
I haven’t worked a counter in over a decade, so can only imagine it’s got worse.
