Friday, October 29, 2010

Walgreens Followup

If you read yesterday's post about my Walgreens shop, you'll remember the cashier was telling me that their Manager told them that he'd been told in their District Meeting last week that "One per purchase" on the coupon means "One per visit".

So I called Walgreens Customer Service and made my complaint, and what do those knuckleheads do? Have the Manager call me. What a colossal waste of time.
"The coupons say "one per purchase" and that means one per visit".

He insists this comes from Corporate and their Vendors.  I told him Walgreens Corporate Coupon policy is online, and it doesn't say that:

When purchasing multiple items, Walgreens accepts multiple identical coupons for multiple qualifying items as long as there is sufficient stock to satisfy other customers, unless a limit is specified. Management reserves the right to limit the quantity of items purchased.
http://www.walgreens.com/topic/help/generalhelp/coupon_policy_main.jsp

I just told him I wasn't going to argue with him and asked for his District Manager's name and phone number. Guess I'll be calling her next week.

Also, I wasn't going to mention it, because I wouldn't want to possibly cost someone their job/livelihood just because they said something stupid (sticks and stones). But it's not the first time I've heard it, and if I just keep not saying something then they are just going to keep thinking it's okay.
It was right at first, when she explained this new coupon policy of them only accepting one coupon (on multiple identical items) per visit, she added on this little aside, "We did stop all them Indians from coming in here and buying up all the Dr. Peppers to sell twice at much at their stores."

If you've been reading here awhile, you already know I'm a backwoods, redneck southerner; so I'm not usually one to take automatic offense on behalf of others' age, race, religion, whatever, but that comment always just irks me to no end. 
First off, where do idiots that make this kind of statement think the stuff that they are selling comes from? Uh, yeah, they bought it from someone else, marked up the price and are selling it in their store, hello!

I don't have alot of financial smarts, but the way I see it, the Vendor sells stuff to the stores for the cost they need to get for the item to be able to pay for their operating costs, etc.  Then the stores mark up the price to cover their costs, etc. and sells the stuff to us. I buy it from the store, set the price to cover my costs/profits, and sell it in my garage sale or store.
Maybe my customer will go on to mark it up and sell it to someone else, but what the heck do I care, so long as I got my money??? What does Walgreens care, they got their money. The vendors certainly don't care that Walgreens is selling the stuff. They hope Walgreens sells the stuff, and buys more stuff to sell, too!

But, too, I mean, you could tell by her tone, she just seemed to particularly dislike that it was the Indian store owners doing it.
Probably, if we'd been having a different conversation and I told her that I sold some of the stuff I get free/cheap on Craigslist, she probably would have thought that was a good idea.

We have several Indian families here where I live, (Indian-American?) Anyway, the ones I know are very nice, and really hard working. Seven days a week, open to close, they are always there. They get to know you, and ask about your kids or spouse, and remember things about you that you don't even remember about yourself, haha.
Far as I can see, they're just trying to make a living like the rest of us.

Anyway, so I told the manager that the cashier had said that, and he ignored the "them Indians" remark and started giving me a spiel about them having the right to limit the number of items a customer can purchase...if one person comes in and buys 30 of something, then there's nothing left for other customers, blah blah blah.

I said, yeah I know about your "rights", but that wasn't the point. The point was, that was an offensive statement. 
He said, yes it was, and if it was said, it would be addressed.

If it was said. So she'll deny it, and I'll be the liar and trouble-making coupon lady.
Ask me if I give a care.
I don't care if people like me or talk about me behind my back or throw darts at my picture, so long as THEY follow proper coupon procedure and I get my deals.

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