Great 'supermarket staff tell us your reduction policies' hunt

ellybelly89

full-time-mum wrote: »

Morrisions reduced some pots of daffodils when I asked - they were yellowish...

lmao yellow daffodils! whatever next? orange oranges?

i'm only joking full time mum. it sounded funny!

ellybelly89

theluckiswithme wrote: »

Hi, I work in M&S (although in Womenswear not Food). M&S don't reduce going out of date food for the customers. Instead the staff get the chance to buy any that hasn't sold at the end of the day at 50% off (most items) or 75% off (bakery and meat products and possibly some other things I'm not sure) and sometimes there are offers for the staff such as pay for one sandwich, take 4 depending on how many going out of date items of a particular kind there are! One of the perks of working at M&S !

my mate works for M&S and their old manager gave them £1 bags at the end of the day. It was a lucky dip what you got. She got expensive lobster once with loads of other stuff all for £1!

Sami_Bee

I grabbed some great bargains at my local Tesco on Saturday as they were closed sun and mon for easter I got lots of stuff that had 3 days left the best being some Camembert cheese for 20p and BB date of Wednesday because the display until date was 2 days before the BB date! It was about 2pm and they were adding to the reduced shelf while I was browsing/avoiding fellow bargain hunters that were a bit too eager to get them!
something to consider as may bank holiday approaches

madmurphy3

i currently work at tesco in york final reductions are carried out at 7pm each day for pre-packaged goods which are going out of date that day. counters (deli, fish & meat) have their own policy and will reduce stuff when it needs to be. saturadays at 7 they again reduce all damaged stock to silly prices to sell it before stock control counts on a sunday

Gordon_the_Moron

I work part time on Morrisons produce (fruit and veg) for a bit of extra money.

- Refridgerated lines (prepared salads and prepared vegetables) are supposed to be reduced by 25% at closing time the night before they are on their use by date. This doesn't always happen but it usually gets done in the morning. If the goods are not sold by early evening time we usually reduce further.

- Every evening someone does an audit of the department looking for stuff with best before/use by/display until the next days date. Throughout the next day these items are either reduced on the fixture (not supposed to but we do) removed and placed on the selected seconds (reduction) table at a reduced price or repackaged and place on the seconds table at a reduced price. Therefore if you find something on the fixture not reduced that has display until todays date on it, by all means ask for it to be reduced and we usually do (unless the customer is rude/unfriendly) we are supposed to reduce by 25% and no more but if the condition is a bit ropey or it is something that is a silly price to start with like organic and 'The Best' lines we usually reduce more. Look out on the selected seconds table for anything that is in a 'selected seconds' bag or re-wrapped in either a plastic clear tray or a green flat carboard tray. These have been repackaged by us in store and because we repackage and re-label them the seconds label can say less than the original price, then when we reduce the 25% limit kind of doesn't apply. We can't reduce more than 25% or the HHT (reduction handset) says value below user limit, however if we bag up £3 worth of stock and put a selected seconds 20p label on it (extreme example but I've seen it done to get rid of stuff) we can then reduce it by scanning the seconds label and reducing to 15p.

- Official reductions (doing it by the book and not the seconds procedure above) are limited to 25% for staff (including department managers and supervisors) if you want a bigger reduction you need to go to an ADM (assistant deputy manager) DM (deputy manager) or GM (store general manager)

- If you find any loose fruit and vegetables that do not look in perfect condition (that you wouldn't pay full price for) they don't need to look inedible just imperfect, ask for them to be reduced. If the member of staff says no as they will sell look if it says class 1 on the product then point out it is actually illegal to leave it on sale and trading standards would have them for it, go to a senior over that if necessary, they are more likely to care about legalities, that goes for prepack as well if the condition isn't perfect but it is in date.

*** LINES TO BEWARE OF ***

Garlic - it is put on a stand in stupid baskets, very badly designed as the staff nearly always lob the new stock over the top of the stand and it drops into each basket burying the old, it also often gets overlooked on the audit as it comes in with a month or so date. Check the date on any you pick up to make sure it is in date. If you have a dig in the bottom of each basket you might find some out of date (the dates are stupid, it is fine unless it is sprouting and splitting, go by condition) if you find any ask for it to be reduced.

Coconuts - kept in a dump bin (metal bin used to display stuff) again stock rotation is poor since it has a long life. Dig to the bottom and see if any are out of date. If they are there is nothing wrong with them unless they are split/cracked or weeping milk. Ask for reductions.

Whole melons - apart from honeydews they all have a display until date, if they say 'display until' and there is no date they have been cowboyed, we get replacement labels sent in as they don't stick to the melons skin very well. They get used on out of date melons as well. Whole honeydews are dated using the flower code system (look at a bunch of flowers and you will see a code like 09/2) the first number (09) is the number of weeks since the annual stock take that the item was delivered and the second number (02) is the day of the week so 02 is Tuesday. You can work out what this week's week number is by looking at flowers (beginning of the week you will see the end of the week before and the beginning of this week, end of the week you will see all this week as they are reduced after they have been in store 4 days, at first by 25% and more depending on condition) that will tell you the age of your honeydew, if there is an old one there (there may well be as it is not a display until date but there to tell us how old the product is) ask for a reduction.

Loose mushrooms - if you are in at the start of the day and any loose mushrooms are there that don't look as though they are that days THEY SHOULDN'T BE THERE the brief is they are all removed and selected seconds procedure used at night on all loose mushrooms, ask for a reduction and you will get it, they don't tend to be that bad just a bit dry/wrinkled, cooked they are fine.

If you find any split prepack stuff (don't do it yourself, that is fraud, plus we get enough of it anyway that you don't need to) or with 1 item damaged/bad condition in it ask for it reduced, we can rewrap stuff with the bad taken out and we can repackage split stuff. Potato bins (brown bunkers of potatoes at the back end of the department near bakery) nearly always have split bags in if you look for them.

Loose tomatoes - look for very ripe ones there usually are some and we will reduce them.

Loose apples - look for imperfect condition, again point out the legal issue with trading standards as they advertised as class one when asking for a reduction if you are refused.

black-saturn

I've found that tescos seem to reduce stuff at about 4ish. I went there on saturday at about 4 and because it was going to be closed on easter sunday I got loads of bargains. So I would figure that going the evening before a bank holiday would be a good idea if you were looking for reduced stuff.

Plushchris

Constantine wrote: »

I don't normally do fresh cakes at more than 15%...seems as soon as you slap a yellow label on, they are no longer bad for you and fly out

LOL

I remember trying to convince my OH that a reduced large carrot cake makes up at least one of my five a day.


She wasnt having any of it though! :rolleyes:

Constantine

Plushchris wrote: »

LOL

I remember trying to convince my OH that a reduced large carrot cake makes up at least one of my five a day.


She wasnt having any of it though! :rolleyes:

I always have a bottle of wine as one of mine :cool:

chris1982

Which supermarket do you work for/did you work for? sainsburys

What times of day do you reduce prices? after 5pm this was when things are normally handed over to students in the smaller to mid size stores who shut the bakery and fresh goods departments down for the night

How big are the discounts? (If the computer does it automatically, do a rough estimate) 25% to start then down to as cheap as a hour/hour and a half before the store closes. We use to get in trouble from the morning shift if stuff was still there in the morning

What time is the final, final reduction (to 10p-ish)? 7:30-8:30

Who has the authority to reduce prices?the employee charged with closing the section down for the night or the duty managed could on his discrection
If a customer asked you to reduce something because it’s on it’s sell-by date are you allowed to? we'd normally refer it to the duty manager

Does it vary if it’s a 24-hour store? never worked in one so dont know
And any other useful tips …

never go and ask them to reduce it they probably wont or say that the duty manager has to or they dont have any reduction labels

dont hoover around like a vulture ready to pick a carcass clean when you see someone with a ream of reduction labels

also dont ask to reduce it further they'll think your being tight!

The_Don_9

Baby_J wrote: »

Which supermarket do you work for/did you work for?
I used to work for ICELAND.
What times of day do you reduce prices?
Itmes which will be going out of date the next day will start to be reduced the evening before but only by about 20p. Items that are going out of date on that date will be reduced throughout the day. For example, if an item was reduced in the morning, it will be reduced again at lunchtime and again in the afternoon. The final reduction will be done half an hour before closing.
How big are the discounts?
Depends on the member of staff. It is usually 10% the day before, then a further 20% the next day and then silly prices before the last half an hour of the day.
What time is the final, final reduction (to 10p-ish)? Around 5:30pm.
Who has the authority to reduce prices? Members of staff, usually with reducing stickers.
If a customer asked you to reduce something because it’s on it’s sell-by date are you allowed to? Yes but not by too much.
Does it vary if it’s a 24-hour store? NA
And any other useful tips …
Get there quick as staff tend to grab stuff or ask each other to reduce things down even lower.

ICELAND
I work for iceland and they have just rolled out a new reducing policy where only fresh meat and poulty and damage stock is reduced which is to half the original price, anything else is kept on sale until the end of the day that it goes out of date then put in shrinkage (waste). This is meant to save money, making more profits for iceland. dont see how though, we've wasted lots of stock since this change in policy.