Money Moral Dilemma: Should I report cashier who used loyalty card on my shopping?

Idiophreak

hogger84 wrote: »

So if you saw the cashier pocketing a bit of extra change out the till on each transaction would you report them? (not your change but the supermarkets money) I know this is not quite the same as they WILL get caught if their till is under, but it is the same thing stealing from thir employer just this time "real" money.

So if a checkout girl offers you your 2p change and you say "keep the change", you'd consider the girl a thief if she didn't return it to the till?

hannerrbabes

I work for a company who use the Nectar card and we view this as fraud. Though, I wouldn't report her as if this is the only time she'd done it, I think you'd feel guilty if she lost her job over it. However, if this isn't the only time she'd done it, then I'm sure her employers or the loyalty card scheme will notice irregular activity and investigate the matter.

judywoody

please don't get me wrong - of course it's wrong to steal. the point is that i feel that many people here are a bit "holier than thou" and just want to report because it gives them a feeling of power ... not because they really care about 50p. and sometimes giving someone a second chance by DISCREETLY telling them what you saw is enough to scare them into changing their ways. i am sure that in the long run she will be found out anyway if she carries on without you playing the loyalty card police!

a lot of people who are "brave" enough to report incidents like that to HO wouldn't have the guts to stand up for bigger injustices in the world just so not to leave their comfort zone...save your time and care for more important things instead ..the ladies whole life probably depends on this job.. for that reason i would speak to her and give her a second chance..het employer probably wouldn't.. it's also a good opportunity to see her reaction and find out what kind of person she really is (if you can't remember what she looks like it cant have been that important to you..surely if you saw someone stealing your car you would try to remember their face)..


so no, it's not right what she is doing..but can i ask you, how many tiny dishonest things have you done in the past? exceeding your speed limit? report a tiny bit less to hmrc? being lazy at work and chat an hour to your colleague instead of concentrating on your job or browsing facebook? depending on your hourly wage this could be more costly to your employer than it is to hers...and no, it's not different just because you are not literally stealing someones money...

jockosjungle

I wouldn't report the person, would hate to be responsible for someone losing their job, especially when I'm in no way out of pocket.

I would imagine when Nectar (or whoever) sees that one person has made about 1000 transactions in the shop, alarm bells would start ringing.

Aside from wasting a lot of my own time reporting her, submitting evidence, etc. what do you get out of it?

The satisfaction that I've got someone sacked, seems scant reward

markiev

Are you absolutely sure this is what happened? If you have a store credit card which you used to pay, this is often linked to your loyalty card so the loyalty card details can be taken from the credit card. Check whether any of the loyalty card digits displayed on your receipt match yours (usually the receipt will show some of your loyalty card number with the rest starred out). Did you use any personalised special offer / money off / prize draw tokens? Maybe your card number can be picked up automatically from these?

Surely you would have noticed the checkout person swiping their own card at the time?

7oakslady

Catch her out on a future trip. It's blatant fraud. And why does she have her loyalty card on her anyway? It should be in her locker along with her cash and other cards.

kiwi84

I think when people are in low paid jobs and may be really struggling for money they can sometimes behave in ways that they would normally be ashamed of- lines become a little greyer. When I was a student there were a few months when I was really REALLY short of money- to the point where the only thing I was eating all day was the left over sandwiches at the bar I worked in part time. One week I was accidently over paid, the manager had put through my hours as 40 instead of 20, no one else had noticed the mistake. I'm normally scrupulously honest with money, but for about an hour I considered just keeping it- something I normally never would have hesitated to correct. It was the look on my friend's face when I asked them what to do about it (disbelief that I was considering keeping it) that brought me back to myself. I'm so glad now I didn't keep it as it would have eaten away at me all these years.

I think the kindest thing to do would be to try to catch a quick word with the cashier involved and just say to her that if you noticed her points scam it won't be long before the company does, then she'll lose everything. Sometimes a little nudge is all that's needed to remind you of what's right and wrong, which is a much nicer way to behave to each other than getting people fired for minor transgressions.

Hoppypoppy

I think it depends, if the card is for a well known Chemist, I would maybe try and speak to the person if you don't want them sacked. It is treated as theft with this company and she would be investigated if you did report it. However not all loyalty cards give you personal gain, for example a large pet retailer has a loyalty card where all the points you earn go to animal charities and you get sent money off coupons for registering a card.
It's a hard one, you don't know if it was her card or if she just scanned a new card to give to the next customer who signed up!

happyinflorida

The cashier should have asked if you minded her swiping her own loyalty card before she did it.

I would not report it before trying to talk to her about it - is she swiping a relative's card who's struggling? There are many who are in a dire situation in our country at present.

I would not like this person to lose their job either - that would be unfair and put them in a terrible situation over something trivial. She's not stealing from you nor is she stealing from the shop.

Shops are making £billions in profit - Tesco is one of these. They only pay minimum wage - it is not enough to live on, not with the cost of mortgage's and rent today and everything else.

This isn't worth making a big fuss about IMO - maybe have a word with her when you next go shopping, that way you get to find out what is happening.

If she's unrepentent and unapologetic, I would say "Well I'm considering reporting this to the store manager" to hopefully make her see she's in the wrong! Maybe the store manager has given permission though - who knows?! Or she may have misunderstood when given instructions, if they were given any or someone may have told her it's ok to do this - speak to her please and don't make her lose her job, even if she is a bolshie madam!!

CATS

wow petty!