Great 'supermarket staff tell us your reduction policies' hunt

kizzers

ok this is what we have up in our store:

Cooperative (CWS)

8am or night before:25%

12pm: 50%

7pm: 75%

most stores have moved on to handheld pdas to reduce items, all staff on the system can use it, which are usually supervisors, but our store allows everyone.

TIP when you get to the tills, ask for a bit more off if its damaged or near the end of the day, because all staff have a little button called "mark down", which allows us to reduce it to anything down to 1p!

and bogofs do work at the till, lowest priced item free.

however 2 for £x do not work

A_little_stressed!!

Just beem loitering around Tesco bread & cakes waiting 4 some 10p stuff, but nothing was being reduced, I asked what time they reduce them (it was 20mins B4 closing) & he said they don't reduce the bakery stuff anymore!! I'm gutted I love 10p cakes!
Is this all Tesco's or just mine??!
also they had stuff out on the shelf out of date yesterday!

JoeyEmma

Is there a certain day of the week when bargains are best? I have no issues with buying reduced meat as it goes straight in the freezer. If I go on a Monday will there be as much on offer as on say a Thursday. I was wondering if days of the week and delivery and shopping patterns make a difference in trying to find bargains!

calleyw

JoeyEmma wrote: »

Is there a certain day of the week when bargains are best? I have no issues with buying reduced meat as it goes straight in the freezer. If I go on a Monday will there be as much on offer as on say a Thursday. I was wondering if days of the week and delivery and shopping patterns make a difference in trying to find bargains!

It is trail and error. My local sainsburys drop the price down to between 10p and 20p on most reduced items after 6pm.

What you get depends. The other night I got pack of 4 taste the best apples for 10p each bought 3 packs so 12 apples for 30p as well as an organic lettuce same price. Retail for each was £1.69 each :eek:

I have also had 12 slices of nice ham from the deli again for 10p. Bunches of carnations for 30p each retail £2.99.

You need to suss out your own local supermarket. You never know what you will get.

Yours


Calley

Jakejakejake

It often depends on the person reducing items too. In my sainsburys, they have different people on different days, one takes like 20-30p off when another half prices it all!

In the evenings, if they have enough staff, the prices will go down to 5p, 10p, 20p etc.

MoneyGypsy

Hi,

I had been doing well at my local Sainsburys after reading that article about reduced items and the times on here. However, it seems that they have recently changed their system and the reduced food is no longer in the place in store that it used to be. Also I think the times might have changed, or perhaps they have stopped doing this altogether. (The other sneaky thing they did prior to this was set the self-checkouts so that they wouldn't scan reduced items, grr)

(I suspect that changes were made following a horrific incident where a poor teenage boy who worked in the store was mobbed by crazed women filling their trolleys to the brim and not considering others)

If anyone has any advice on how to find out what the new policy is please let me know (although am I right in thinking that I shouldn't mention what store it is?).

Thanks

rob_nilli

hi
i'm an ex-trading standards officer and i thought it would be useful to clarify the law in relation to the above.

if something has been reduced but is still displaying the BOGOF sticker the shop must apply that offer even if the items have been reduced otherwise they will be committing a criminal offence under Part III of the Consumer Protection Act 1987 by giving a MIsleading Price Indication (MIP). The only way they could avoid this is by applying a disclaimer which must be as bold, precise and compelling as the original offer.

therefore if you get to the till and they refuse to honour the offer be polite and point out that there would be an MIP offence and that you will have to report it to your local trading standards dept if they insist on not selling.

appy72

was in my local asda last night,i was shocked to see there was nobody hanging around the reduced fridge,but as i was going round the shop i noticed all the reduced item was on the normal item shelves,i was talking to the girl on the till when i was leaving she said its because its the same people every night just go in the shop for reduced items ...well they have to look in every fridge now,,,plus it gives others a chance to get a bargain

ShelfStacker_3

This thread is long since dead I spose, but my twopenneth...

Which supermarket do you work for/did you work for?
Waitrose.

What times of day do you reduce prices?
Generally if it's a Monday or Tuesday, basically a slow day, we reduce quite early, usually a few hours after store opening in order to get rid of stock that's going out of date. On other days we might leave it a bit later so we can get it sold for full price.

How big are the discounts? (If the computer does it automatically, do a rough estimate)
Generally it's at the discretion of the partner assigned to reductions. It has to be a more than 12% discount (so that staff, who receive a 12% discount themselves, can't claim a larger reduction than customers), but progressively lower throughout the day, bottoming out around 10p.

What time is the final, final reduction (to 10p-ish)?
Usually about an hour or two before closing.

Who has the authority to reduce prices?
The sticker-printing guns are available to all partners trained on how to do reductions, really. Cashiers have the final final final authority but really asking them for further reductions will not win you any favours.

If a customer asked you to reduce something because it’s on it’s sell-by date are you allowed to?
We are allowed, but we're not supposed to. We get a large flood of people coming in every evening with the specific intent of getting the cheapest stuff possible and then hounding down partners, especially young looking or inexperienced ones who are easy to intimidate. I was once explicitly told not to reduce on demand for these people, if at all. On the other hand, if someone pointed out something was on its sell by date to me and was polite about it, I would be more than happy as a cashier to take a bit off the price.

Does it vary if it’s a 24-hour store?
Doesn't apply, we don't have them.

And any other useful tips …
* If you ask for and are given a reduction do not complain about its size. I had one woman get a reduction off me and then harrumph about how small it was; I promptly told her that I shouldn't have reduced that item at all, let alone give her less off!
* Waitrose is a partnership, run for the benefit of its staff, who share in the profits, which are cut into by reductions. Consequently, we won't give you stupid reductions on demand. Ever. Be reasonable.
* Do not ask for reductions on large amounts of goods. It's never come up before, but seriously, don't think of trying it. I'd probably refuse or call store management.
* I'm going to state this clearly because this HAS come up: DO NOT switch tickets on products. We can tell if you've swapped a reduced sticker because it comes up as a different product when scanned. One man tried this on a quite expensive range of ready meals and was denied his precious reduction. Oh yeah, and it's theft. Duh.
* We shouldn't have damaged tins on sale. It's up to the cashier's discretion whether they give you a reduction on one, as they technically should call a supervisor to exchange it; don't bother asking.

willowthecat

Re: BOGOFS and the law

How does the law apply to items which are say for instance 2 for £2? If singularly the items cost £1.50 each ,then obviously if you buy 2 then the till automatically deducts £1. But I'm willing to hazard a guess that if items are reduced to say 90p each, then if you buy 2 because the combined price is less than £2, that the supermarkets don't have to deduct the £1 as if you were buying at full-price?

I'm asking because I've noticed before (particularly in Sainsburys) that these "linksave" items are reduced from their original price i.e £1.50 to say £1, so in effect if you buy 2 at £1 you aren't saving any money, and you're buying stuff that's nearly out of date! Seems a bit sneaky to me and I suspect isn't against the law unless the items have been reduced to say £1.10 so if you buy 2, you'll be paying £2.20 instead of £2.

Sometimes I've noticed that the linksave deduction kicks in if you buy 2 reduced items (I've found these mainly at Tesco) and sometimes it doesn't.

"if something has been reduced but is still displaying the BOGOF sticker the shop must apply that offer even if the items have been reduced otherwise they will be committing a criminal offence under Part III of the Consumer Protection Act 1987 by giving a MIsleading Price Indication (MIP). The only way they could avoid this is by applying a disclaimer which must be as bold, precise and compelling as the original offer."

I've noticed that Asda has started putting a little statement on their whoops stickers saying that not part of any linksave or BOGOF promotion, but you need a magnifying glass to read it, so I'm guessing they're still not strictly being legal?