UK consumers lose £1.6bn a year in unwanted subscriptions

[ebikeerwidnes]

That's my point, if the shopkeeper is an employee and therefore an ambassador of the business, they shouldn't be trying to "get away" with anything. For the sake of this point I am ruling out dishonesty from individuals. But this is exactly what some businesses are doing, trying to get away with taking money where the contract isn't explicitly explained. So in other words, the onus should be on the seller/provider to make the terms clear so no "checking" should be required by the customer.

It has always been like this

My Mum was famous (?) in the supermarket 2 doors down from our house in the 1960s/70s

She found out from an old employee that when they trained till staff they were told to always sneak a few extra charges onto bills - especially if people were buying a lot or had kids to distract them
Of course, in those days your "bill" was just a list of prices
the till staff had to know the price of every item the shop sold
so it was difficult to work out what was what unless you were alert and knew the price

Except for Mum - she knew exactly what is should cost and how much everything should be
so the till staff were trained - then when they started they were sat next to an experienced worked who main job was to point out
"That is Mrs Price - NEVER try to slip any extras onto her bill EVER"

It still happened from time to time and she would just very politely and nicely say they must have made a mistake
if necessary she would make them put everything through again
even at Christmas


Must have saved us a fortune over the years


but it has been going on for many decades - the way they do it has changed - but the attitude to customer has always been the same

 

[Electric_Andy]

the way they do it has changed - but the attitude to customer has always been the same

Oh I agree, but a big company website is far easier to audit than an individual on the checkout. We can't make everyone charge people honestly, but when it's web-based it should not be trying to trick people into additional services they might not have wanted. It all depends on how you define "tricked" though. I've had this with Amazon where my Dad bought something and unknowingly left the "subsribe and save" button checked. It's not actually conning or stealing, as my Dad should have checked, but I don't see any harm in enforcing a standard where extras are laid out explicitly so you can't opt-in through negligence.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Of course, in those days your "bill" was just a list of prices
the till staff had to know the price of every item the shop sold

Must have been a dodgy convenience store. In the major supermarkets in those days, every item had to have the price on it from the labelling guns. There was no game of guess the price.

 

[cyberknight]

mini ck 1 had some online CV made up , they charged £9 i think for a one off but it somehow snuck a direct debit in which i didn’t authorise so when mrs ck saw it on the statement i rang the bank up and i got over £100 back .

 

[Beebo]

. And of course those Red-letter style vouchers which are bought as presents are very often not redeemed.

My wife spent a few hundred on a gift experience for a friend which was never used.
I has cast a bit of a shadow over their relationship.

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

Must have been a dodgy convenience store. In the major supermarkets in those days, every item had to have the price on it from the labelling guns. There was no game of guess the price.

No - a bigish brand around where we lived - and the biggest supermarket in the area

They did have price stickers on every item - but they could come off - or be swapped
so the staff had to know the right price for everything

AND they were tested every morning by the manager

Same in the slightly smaller shop up the road

 

[Electric_Andy]

My Gran worked on the local co-op at 15, probably mid 1940s. She got so good at arithmetic that she could add up someone's shopping faster than using the till, so she never used the till!

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

When my friend wanted s holiday job when he was at University he got a job at M&S on the tills in the food section

at the time they had a "thing" which delivered the change from some hoppers at the end of the packing area

regulars loved his till and looked for him as he was always far faster than anyone else

but he got a lot of complaints as well because he tended to keep things moving because he had worked out that the slowest part of the process was typing in the price of the products
so he mentally added up 3 or 4 at once and just typed in the price of all 4 in one go

speeded things up no end

but confused the Hell out of some people

 

[Pblakeney]

My Gran worked on the local co-op at 15, probably mid 1940s. She got so good at arithmetic that she could add up someone's shopping faster than using the till, so she never used the till!

I remember doing a shift behind the bar at a local working men's club in the early 80s. It was always busy so 4 behind the bar and only one till. This meant to keep things moving you had to add up the order in your head as you went, and this was for entire table orders (8-16?) of mixed drinks not just a couple of pints. Not only that but they knew how much the order would be to the penny and god forbid you got it wrong.

 

[PaulSB]

I've always understood a long established practice was to keep a bag of sugar, or other daily staple, by the till. It would be rung through for every customer. If challenged the response was "oh, sorry, I thought that was yours" or similar.

Many on here are of an age whereby mental arithmetic was taught as part of the maths or "sums" syllabus. A very valuable daily skill.

Throughout my working life I could calculate an answer faster than anyone using a calculator. I know the total, or at least a ball park number, for my purchases etc before being told by the sales person. Whether I can still beat a calculator or not I don't know. I no longer need to.

With the today's reliance on spreadsheets mental arithmetic is extremely valuable. I see when a spreadsheet is inaccurate because I know at least approximately the answer to expect. I would often contact customers to tell them of errors, often major ones, in their orders. The buyers being perhaps 20 - 25 years younger than me and reliant on what the computer told them. I once told the Treasurer of an organisation his accounts were wrong, spotted in less than a minute - a negative plus a positive cannot give a positive number!!!!! The accounts proved to be wildly inaccurate.

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

I've always understood a long established practice was to keep a bag of sugar, or other daily staple, by the till. It would be rung through for every customer. If challenged the response was "oh, sorry, I thought that was yours" or similar.

Many on here are of an age whereby mental arithmetic was taught as part of the maths or "sums" syllabus. A very valuable daily skill.

Throughout my working life I could calculate an answer faster than anyone using a calculator. I know the total, or at least a ball park number, for my purchases etc before being told by the sales person. Whether I can still beat a calculator or not I don't know. I no longer need to.

With the today's reliance on spreadsheets mental arithmetic is extremely valuable. I see when a spreadsheet is inaccurate because I know at least approximately the answer to expect. I would often contact customers to tell them of errors, often major ones, in their orders. The buyers being perhaps 20 - 25 years younger than me and reliant on what the computer told them. I once told the Treasurer of an organisation his accounts were wrong, spotted in less than a minute - a negative plus a positive cannot give a positive number!!!!! The accounts proved to be wildly inaccurate.

Mental maths was always a nightmare for me - I was rubbish at it

but I am far better at getting close but not exact

there have been a lot of times when I have got to a till and the cashier has gone though it all and I have commented "err - that can;t be right"
and been met with a look of "how in the name of all the Gods can you know that????"
well - I added it up - and it is about £xx and not £yy

sometime higher sometimes lower

 

[presta]

I check my bank statements and both my credit cards every month. Until relatively recently I never paid anything by DD either, which has the advantage of turning every bill payment into a check as well as a cheque. This story is a good example of why my father told me never to pay by DD in the first place: don't give someone else the key to your piggy bank.

Amazon checkout is an example of trying to trip you up: the buttons they want you to click are big and yellow, the ones you need are ordinary typeface.

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

Most of my bills are by DD
but I check the accounts every month or so

I have had "unexpected" ones from time to time but the companies have always been good are stopping them - and normally refunding the previous one (which is normally just one!)

I did have one that I just could not trace and I had to contact the bank
Turned out that it was genuine - it was just the way it appeared in the statements that was wrong
The next month it had changed

 

[presta]

I got my first DD 13 years ago when I went online: I don't think Plusnet had any option for quarterly bills by cheque. Several years later I got gas/elec by DD because of the discount. I didn't switch to online banking until lockdown in 2020. Now I've given in and have almost all by DD. I didn't use ATMs until about 2000, because of the phantom withdrawal scandal back in the 1980s.