Tesco banned me!

C_Ronaldo

I cant believe youve been banned from tesco, you only complained when neccessary, there must be a limit as to how mmany times you can complain

Little_John

Tesco up to their usual tricks, rather than sorting the problem out they just cover it up and ignore it.
R+R change the policy to people no longer look for over charges if they don't look then the over chargeing problem goes away.
Selling out of date stuff, ban those that point the problem out, not train the online shoppers in store to check products are in date and report any that are not. or train the shelf stackers to ensure stock is rotated and old stock removed before it is out of date.

RadoJo

I think there are plenty of people on here who are inferring an emotion from this banning. Tesco's (as a company) haven't decided they 'don't like' the OP; calling someone a 'serial complainer' means nothing other than that they have complained on a number of occasions - OP you have said that people assume you are a 'serial complainer' as though this description implies something about you as a person - it doesn't, all it does is mean that you have complained regularly, which you yourself wrote. There is no malice behind Tesco's banning of you, it is a simple calculation:

They tally up the amount of time and money they spend in resolving your complaints, and decide whether the profit they make from you shopping there is worth it. If it is, then no doubt they would have continued to serve you, and as it seems it isn't, they have decided not to. For all you know it may be that they only have their meat delivered on a Tuesday, and your deliveries tend to be booked for a Monday, so they have realised that they are in a long term position where they will be unable to fulfill your order to your satisfaction. It's not a personal attack, just a simple pros and cons excercise on their part, and in an industry where the profit margins are so low, just replacing one or two items a week could mean the difference between them making money from delivering to you, and losing money. You don't really expect them to completely re-arrange a system which must work well for the majority of customers in order to accommodate you?

Plus, you have benefitted from the problems you have had - they deliver meat with only one day to go on the best before date, you complain and get your money back, then freeze the meat/use it before the BB date. From what I can tell, you were happy to keep using them when their policy meant you were getting free items. I am not disputing that there were issues with them, but once they're free, you aren't forced to throw them away are you? And I am sure that there were occasions where the items weren't suitable, but were still useable? I also appreciate that they could have come and collected them, but for the extra time and money involved in that is yet another factor.

By all means, I think if you feel as though you have been unfairly treated, then make your complaint as you see fit, but acting as though this is a personal attack will not do you any favours, and trying to see it from their point of view will help.

Fidget

Tribulation wrote: »

I don't disagree with what you say, but age can have a great effect on someone's skills and ability to pick something up. I have seen a lot of youngsters in the workplace who make me shake my head in wonder (have also seen some outstanding ones, but sadly these are the few exceptions).

My wifes a hairdresser, has been all her life. She started off at the bottom, sweeping the floor and making the tea. Had a day release once a week to attend college and got top marks in her qualifications. Roll on 25 years to a couple of years ago, and the salon she worked at had a real struggle finding anyone new that would actually put in a bit of effort. The totally unqualified ones given a chance to work their way up and make something of their lives were bad enough, doing things like not returning from lunch breaks because it was raining and they didn't want to get wet, quitting because they weren't let loose on a customers head in their first week etc.

But the qualified ones were just as bad. Now, instead of working in the salon and a day release from college, they do 2 years at college and in their second year, start working in the salons for part of their week. My wifes salon had person after person that when asked to do something like sweep the floor (something my wife still does after 25 years), would get the response "I'm a hairdresser, I don't sweep floors"

Uni Grads can often be a LOT worse. They seem to think society owes them something. When I ran a computer room, grads were the worst people to employ. Again they didn't want to do certain jobs that everyone else did, as they felt it beneath them (I haven't spent xyz years at Uni to clean a tape drive). I found that experience was worth more than qualifications, employ someone who had no qualifications but wanted to make something with their lives, they were keen, willing, quick to learn and still with the company 3 years later. Employ a grad, they would resent the fact that someone who hadn't been to uni earned as much as them, would shirk off any of the menial day to day tasks, and 6 months later would have moved on to someone paying a few thousand more (bearing in mind that this was 10 years ago and a 18yr old trainee would start on £10000 plus 30% shift allowance, plus had the ability to easily double their salary with overtime, so it wasn't badly paid)

Personally while I'm a firm believer in the minimum wage, I think it should be entirely up to an employer as to what he/she pays individual employees. You might run a company, advertise for a vacancy, ask the interviewee what they were earning in their previous job, they might say they were earning £15K and were looking to earn around the 20K mark. You offer them 19K they are happy. The fact that another member of staff might be earning only 15K for the same job or even £25k for the same job is totally irrelevant in my opinion. You sell yourself to the company at interview. 9 years ago I changed jobs. When at the interview I was asked what I expected, I gave a figure, I got slightly less than that. Turns out there were a lot of people earning a lot more than me and if I had said, I could have got a company car. Was I annoyed? No. I was earning what I wanted for what I negotiated for. I don't think everyone has a right to the same wage for doing the same job because like it or not, we rarely do do the same job, whether if it's filling shelves in the local supermarket or programming a supercomputer. Monitor 2 people closely and there will be differences. One might take that extra bit of care lining up the tins on the shelves etc.

At the end of the day, if your a good employee, whether you start at the bottom or get a lucky break, you will end up with a good wage because good employees are few and far between. I haven't got a qualification to my name, was expelled from school at 15, yet every place I've ever worked, I've flown up the ladder. This is for only one simple reason, if I'm given any job to do, I'll do it to the best possible standard I can (putting in the extra effort, such as finding something to do if works slack etc). One of my first jobs was cutting and vacuum packing cheese. It was monotonous and boring but I still put in the best effort I could and was determined to do the best I could possibly do. It wasn't hard, yet I managed to do in 1 hour what others were doing in 4. My day flew by because I kept myself busy, their days dragged by because they put so little effort into working and so much effort into moaning. Guess what, the managers liked me working on their shift and when a vacancy opened for a trainee manager, guess who got it.

Yes, and life would be great if this was still the case.

I've got years of administration experience and a degree, I get very enthusiastic and involved with any job I do, I'm a perfectionist and I would never take so much as a paperclip home from work. After I had my child I worked as a cleaner, which involved cleaning toilets then I worked on a checkout which I worked to the very best of my ability. I have no delusions of grandeur when it comes to menial jobs. Eventually, when I was ready I went back to working in admin. I stayed above and beyond the hours I was required to work, took work home with me, never had a day off sick and had a genuine interest in the job then a year later I (and a couple of other good workers) were bumped off in favour of somebody who could not work out 10% of an amount and somebody who turned up when they felt like it, and when they did, spent the day texting and surfing the net.

My partner has just been passed for promotion in similar circumstances.

I have never got further than earning £6 per hour because now it appears that your ability to get on in work depends on how much of a laugh you are to have around the workplace and how good-looking you are. Old-fashioned work ethic just doesn't seem to cut it these days.

I also believe that no matter what your age you should get the wage you deserve, there are quite a lot of older shirkers around as well you know.

uktim29

Little_John wrote: »

Selling out of date stuff, ban those that point the problem out, not train the online shoppers in store to check products are in date and report any that are not. or train the shelf stackers to ensure stock is rotated and old stock removed before it is out of date.

You've just completely made this up! Stock before it's sell by date in the last 24 hours has now apparently became selling out of date stock!

You've now imagined that the people who pick the stock are picking it up out of date! As well as now imagining out of date stock is left on the shelves!

How come there is nothing in your post that has taken any information from the original post where it clearly said the stock was not out of date but just not as long as the op thought it would have?

Terrylw1

Well, I don't know about the old fashioned work ethic.

I've managed people aged 18-60ish and there have been really good young, middle aged or older works. Then again, there have also been really bad ones of all ages and some right older jobworths with a "I'm older and more experienced so deserve more pay despite having low quality work" ethic.

Certainly, I have come across the "I do my job and thats it" ethic more amongst older people - although I know thats not everybody, it's the individuals.

I think it depends on your personal experience since some have clearly had a one sided one with certain social groups. Mine is, don't make the assumption and judge people based on their individual merits.

There's no such thing as older is more responsible and younger means less capable. That certainly is, an old fashioned way of thinking because it doesn't stack up thesedays.

Tribulation

Terrylw1 wrote: »

Certainly, I have come across the "I do my job and thats it" ethic more amongst older people - although I know thats not everybody, it's the individuals.

That's probably because they've been let down so many times by past employers. I'm just stating as I found it. I always found it very very hard to get my foot in the door (due to no qualifications), but if I managed to, I always managed to prove myself, and never found it very hard to do so.

That said, almost without exception, I have left all my workplaces due to a total lack of appreciation, each time 6 months to 2 years after a new big boss. It's never been the case of not wanting change etc far from it, I've always believed in giving change a chance. Best way I can explain it is by giving you 2 employment examples.

17 years old, promoted to trainee manager with a supermarket. Put loads of effort in, worked loads of extra hrs here and there, my effort was very appreciated by management. However, my pay was the same as before I was promoted, just much bigger prospects down the road (this was the standard rate for a 17year old). No worries, if ever there was something major going on where I was expected to work loads of overtime, the manager always paid me as he appreciated that I was on a pittance compared to everyone else.

Roll on 6 months and a new manager takes over. Constantly expecting me to work many many hours overtime unpaid. Might have worked all day and they were moving stuff around overnight and he wanted me to stay and do it. I politely asked if I was getting paid overtime and his response was along the lined of "managers don't get overtime, so why should you"

There comes a point when your simply being taken advantage of, and I decided that was then.

Roll on many years, had been a computer operator for many years and had worked my way up to shiftleader. I took a job in a newly established company, only about 20 staff, 1 shiftleader per shift which was one person working for themselves (so no one to lead). I would turn up for my 12 hr shift to find my companions asleep (or gone home with a note left) and loads of work not done. When I worked nights, I liked to keep busy and it wasn't long before it became obvious that I was turning out twice as much work as the others. I got promoted to operations manager and systems manager.

Over the course of the next few years the company moved site and grew to over 300 staff. I put my all into that company, cancelled two family holidays so we could reach deadlines etc but was appreciated by my bosses, staff turnover in the comp room had dropped to virtually zero and everyone was happy. Then we got a new boss. One that liked to use sentences like "I hear what your saying".

We'd have a company meeting, I'd (politely) warn them of what was going to happen in 3 months time if xyz didn't happen, then in 3 months time I was expected to give up my family life and try to fix the mess (again unpaid). It got to the point where I was forever chasing fires. I had a boss that new nothing about computers, but liked to think he did (read too many magazines). On top of that, he brought in all his friends from his old company, not that there was anything exactly wrong with that, just that a load of people that had put their all into the company, were simply sidestepped for his friends.

It got to the point where I had hardly seen my son for the first 2 years of his life due to the hours I was having to work. basically they had so much work, everyone was doing 2 peoples jobs but the boss wanted to look good to his foreign even bigger bosses by keeping the number of employees as low as possible (and most people had a contract saying words to the effect that unpaid overtime was expected). In the end I said enough was enough, Yes I was earning good money but I was working 7 days a week, often 12+ hrs a day. I started to (politely) complain that the situation couldn't continue. The response I got was along the lines of "Your lucky your only working 12 hrs a day, some are working much longer.

It got to the point where I said enough was enough and said that I wasn't going to continue working those hours as it was unfair on my wife and kids. I didn't exactly work to rule, but would only stay late if it was a real emergency and refused to come in every bank holiday when they were forseen problems that I had warned them about etc. I want to stress that I still put a lot of unpaid hrs in, stayed late doing installations etc, just refused to do it permanently.

So we're in a company wide meeting (all the staff are there) and a new computer operations manager is announced, and everyone's told to report all systems problems to xyz. I'd had no prior warning of this whatsoever. When he asked if there was any questions, I said "Does that mean I'm no longer systems manager?" To which he responded by screaming at me across the full room that he wasn't prepared to discuss it in a public meeting.

I worked more unpaid hrs for that company than paid ones. I was one of the ones that helped the company reach the size it got to. I'd given up seeing my son (something that I totally regret doing) for the first 2 years of his life in order to help the company out. I'm rewarded by them not even having the courtesy to take me into the managers office before the public meeting and letting me know that my position had been given to someone else.

There's two true stories of my employment life. Please don't pick the scenarios to pieces, they're typed quickly and I've probably not worded everything right/given totally the right impression.

I could list other scenarios both at these companies and at others. Especially the "things will change, just give it 6 months" type of talk. When your younger your more likely to believe that sort of thing. It does happen but sadly it's rare. Usually someone's got rid of, someone else has got their position, we're all told things will be different, but they're tied to the same incompetence further up the ladder and nothing ever changes.

On top of this sort of thing, you have people that have worked their asses off helping shareholders line their pockets etc, only to be thrown on the scrap heap as it's decided to ignore all the people that helped build the company, instead, let's move the company abroad and lay them all off. One company I know of moved their premises from the south east to up north due to the house price difference and how much they could sell their land for.

So as people get older, a lot of them reach the stage where they're no longer interested in the rat race. They know that by taking their lunch break if a promotion becomes available, it will be given to someone younger who still hasn't had all these let downs and is willing to sacrifice their lunches for the company etc.

After years of giving that extra mile for other companies, if I had to work for someone else now, I too would do what I'm paid for and nothing else.

The thing is, when your young, (certainly applied to me anyway, but maybe I was naive), your more likely to believe the company bullcrap. When your told about your prospects, when your told how well the companies doing, when your told that changes are in place and things will change on a few months time etc.

That may sound hypocritical compared to how easy I found it to climb the ladder, but it's not. I never had a problem getting promoted, just always ended up getting pooped on (and almost every company I worked at, there was always at least one person 40+ that would work to rule. If you asked them why, you would get similar stories to mine.

There's no such thing as older is more responsible and younger means less capable. That certainly is, an old fashioned way of thinking because it doesn't stack up thesedays.

I agree. A 20 year old that's been working since they were 16 will be just as much as an asset to any company as a 30yr old. However I bet if you asked that 20 year old if they thought they'd learnt a lot during the last 4 years they'd say yes (or were in a dead end job), and I'm not talking about the skills needed for that particular job, I'm talking about their general practises towards the work place, how they manage their time etc.

You will get a fair few 16yr olds that pick up things really quickly and yes do deserve the full whack regardless of their age. But this is why I believe everyone's wages should be an individual thing so the company can pay more to those putting in that extra bit of effort (not talking about working through lunch breaks etc, I'm talking about finding things to do when it's quite etc). Why should two 16yr olds (or any age come to that) get paid the same just because it's the going rate when one does the minimum they can get away with and the other puts in loads of extra effort.

unhappycustomer_4

uktim29 wrote: »

You've just completely made this up! Stock before it's sell by date in the last 24 hours has now apparently became selling out of date stock!

You've now imagined that the people who pick the stock are picking it up out of date! As well as now imagining out of date stock is left on the shelves!

How come there is nothing in your post that has taken any information from the original post where it clearly said the stock was not out of date but just not as long as the op thought it would have?

If your going to have a go at people for mis-quoting, please dont do so yourself. The goods were not yet out of date but the issue wasnt that they were "not as long as the op thought it would have" but actually much shorter than tesco's own policy as stated before. Twisting the facts either way to support your argument just defeats the purpose of the forum.

RadoJo

I think the point is that selling out of date stock is illegal, whereas failing to meet the conditions of their own policy is unfortunate, but certainly not against the law. To accuse Tesco of the first is potentially libellous and shows that this poster is offering advice based on assumptions. To accuse them of the second seems to be simply a case of ukTim29 trying to enlighten the misinformed and over-zealous poster of their mistake.

However, it is nice of you to come back to post snide comments towards another poster, and fail to mention all the helpful posts on here which people have clearly spent plenty of time constructing all to help you out, or give their perspective. I won't bother adding any more advice on your issue as that is clearly of secondary importance to your crusade against 'defeating the purpose of this forum'.

uktim29

unhappycustomer wrote: »

If your going to have a go at people for mis-quoting, please dont do so yourself. The goods were not yet out of date but the issue wasnt that they were "not as long as the op thought it would have" but actually much shorter than tesco's own policy as stated before. Twisting the facts either way to support your argument just defeats the purpose of the forum.

It's not twisting the argument, it's a fact they were not out of date, but not as long as you were expecting (from Tescos policy, it's the same thing as not as long as you were expecting)! He wasn't mis-quoting, he took what he'd read then completely exaggerated it.