Tesco misprice policy discussion area

MrSmartprice

The situation on Tesco overcharging is actually quite straightforward. They clearly do not deliberately overprice goods. The problems are due to their recklessness rather than fraudulent intent.

It works like this. The statutory defences require that they need to show "Reasonable precautions" and "Due Diligence" when they are found to have made errors, so that they can try and get away with it. Consequently in the 1970's, when the relevant case law was created, they found that they could show these if they had a decent system of checks and procedures. Then when they fouled up, they claimed that it was because the staff were at fault. They let the staff take the rap and get fined.

What seems to have happened is that the systems have become so complicated that it is almost impossible for anyone to unravel them, making prosecution difficult. It means that they have to bite the bullet by refunding us all, but it generally keeps TS off their backs. They save money by doing this.

The flaw is that the systems are rubbish. They rely on £5-an-hour shop workers to run a system so complicated that not even the managers understand them. So we find loads of errors. But hey, Tesco don't get huge fines and costs. And they save a fortune by not paying or training the staff properly.

I bet no-one in Tesco management can deny any of this!

--Tony--

Interesting in Winchester today.

Went in as I passed, found finest cheese with apricots (not had this one before) went and paid and went to CS as you do.

She said "were you not in last weekend with cheese too", I said yep she said "can't belive thay have not sorted it out yet".

But then she pointed to a sign on the wall and said I can only let you have 2 as Tesco bulk Buy policy is 2!!!!!

I said "so I can only buy 1x bogof then" and she said yes!!!!

She told me is was Tesco policy, we know thats not true and the sign was clearly made on a pc and not a propper sign but it just shows you how far the stores are going.

Email tomorrow to HQ aking why bulk buy and BULK being the word here is 2!!!!!

wallace_3

Whirly wrote:

"If a store has the same amount of staff, same levels of pay, and same quality of training (pretty much none) as it's competitors and yet it manages to make grossly more errors that are almost entirely in it's favour, is it time to question *why* this should be the case?"

But you are not taking workload into account. For example, lets assume that Asda have 50 special offers a week, and Tesco have 250. When the offer is over, and the tickets need to be replaced, Asda staff would need to swap 50 tickets but Tesco staff would have more work to do in swapping 250. So even though staff levels may be comparable, the workload would be greater.

Whirly wrote:

Reading between the lines, Tesco don't claim to be cheaper or even the same....just that there is no "official" body so Asda can't claim it officially. Brilliant marketing move...don't lower prices, just take the others to court on a technicality. Hehe.

I agree with Tesco on this. Asda are using the word 'official' to imply that they have been endorsed by someone, or that there is evidence to show they are the overall cheapest. The ASA accepted Tescos complaint, that customers were being misled.

wallace_3

--Tony-- wrote:

Interesting in Winchester today.

Went in as I passed, found finest cheese with apricots (not had this one before) went and paid and went to CS as you do.

She said "were you not in last weekend with cheese too", I said yep she said "can't belive thay have not sorted it out yet".

But then she pointed to a sign on the wall and said I can only let you have 2 as Tesco bulk Buy policy is 2!!!!!

I said "so I can only buy 1x bogof then" and she said yes!!!!

She told me is was Tesco policy, we know thats not true and the sign was clearly made on a pc and not a propper sign but it just shows you how far the stores are going.

Email tomorrow to HQ aking why bulk buy and BULK being the word here is 2!!!!!

I can't find the exact thread now, but another MSE'r has posted an email they received from Tesco head office which confirmed that stores are free to introduce their own policies (including bulk-buy) and head office allow this.

bylromarha

cpjackso- any chance of making sure items aren't duplicated on your list? There are a few duplicates.

I think you said items will start dropping off after 50 are listed on there, and repeated items will make the genuine misprices drop off quicker.

For those who don't know what I'm talking about, look here

http://www.cpjackson.co.uk/cgi-bin/misprices/index.pl?orderby=&startat=0

Whirly

*grins* Sorry Wallace, please don't take offence - I just can't resist an argument....

But you are not taking workload into account. For example, lets assume that Asda have 50 special offers a week, and Tesco have 250. When the offer is over, and the tickets need to be replaced, Asda staff would need to swap 50 tickets but Tesco staff would have more work to do in swapping 250. So even though staff levels may be comparable, the workload would be greater.

That's a very big assumption. There was a time around 8-10 years ago when Tesco's certainly did have far more special offers than the other big supermarkets but that is far from true nowadays.

From personal experience Tesco's have pretty much the same number of special offers on a weekly basis as either Asda or Sainsbury's. In fact sainsbury's generally have more.

As for other arguments about workload I can say from my personal experience that my local Asda is probably busier than my local Tesco's despite them being a similar size. (Probably because you need a car to get to the Tesco's while the Asda is just off a large housing area.)

Jumping back on your point about special offers being the root of the problem I can also say that my personal experience of their incompetence belies that too. Overall (in my experience) Tesco's are no more likely to overcharge on special offer items as thay are on normal items. Remember, I'm not talking about the items in the recent MSE free-for-all but my personal experience of being overcharged on every substantial visit.

I'm not sure where you get your information Wallace and I suspect it may be from a better position than mine - I'd like to re-iterate that my information is purely from personal experience over a (large) number of years.

I'm not one to boycott shops but Tesco's behaviour made me stop using them regularly many years ago despite the Tesco's being far easier for me to get to (at the time). So for anyone thinking this is a new thing, think again. It was 1997 when I got so sick of constant (and I do mean constant) overcharging that I changed my supermarket.

I have *never* come across another supermarket (or any shop for that matter) that overcharges anywhere near as regularly....and I've been looking for at least 10 years.

One good thing...Tesco's taught me a very important lesson. ALWAYS check your receipt before you leave the store.

I agree with Tesco on this. Asda are using the word 'official' to imply that they have been endorsed by someone, or that there is evidence to show they are the overall cheapest. The ASA accepted Tescos complaint, that customers were being misled.

In one sense, I completely agree with you - Asda should not have used the word official. The customer was indeed being misled when it comes to the semantics...there is no official body.

However, I'd strongly disagree that the customer was being misled when it came to the meaning. My personal experience shows Tesco to be exactly equal to Asda on pretty much all comparable products (shelf vs packet price aside, of course) but I have also noticed a tendancy on Tesco's part to up the price on items which are not quite so comparable.

I'll use an example that annoyed me for years:

5% fat minced beef. Often labelled in varos ways - from "Super Lean" to "Healthy Eating". The name is unimportant though as the fat content defines the product.

For years in Asda this was sold in packs of 454g (1lb) for £1.86.

In Sainsbury's it was sold in 500g packs (46g or around 10% more meat) for £3.99

In Tesco's it was sold for....you guessed it: £3.99.

They matched Sainsbury's and because Asda didn't have a directly comparable product, they did not match them.

But let's look at it from a price/Kg point of view.

Asda £4.10/Kg
Sainsbury's/Tesco: £7.98/Kg

As far as Sainsbury's are concerned they have never claimed t be the cheapestr supermarket. But Tesco's always have.

I personally found it disgusting behaviour that they should charge around twice the price for the same product - especially when it is one that attempts to reduce the fat intake of their customers.

So, cut to around 1 year ago. Asda finally realise they live in the 21st Century and change their mince packet sizes to 500g.Do they take the opportunity to hike the price to Tesco's levels? Nope. Do they keep the same price? Nope. They actually reduce the price per kilo to £3.86 (the pack cost is £1.93).

Now all of a sudden Tesco's mince drops to exactly the same price - despite the fact that up until now they have been charging £3.99. Now either they have been taking an indecent profit from that item for years or they are suddenly accepting a massive loss on it.

Incidentally, Sainsbury's changed their packet size to 454g so they could not be directly compared...however their price is not significantly higher than either of the other 2.

So it begs the question: Where else are Tesco using "not quite directly comparable" products to up their profit?

Or more importantly: Can you trust a company that uses small differences in weight to profiteer off you for years when they say "We are the cheapest"?

Oh, and you mentioned that Asda used 33 products in their "official" test. Tesco claimed 33 products were not enough to make a comparison. I agree with Tesco's, 33 products are *not* enough.

But then the other side of the coin is this.

Tesco's claim they constantly check their prices against other supermarkets to guarantee they are the cheapest - it's even part of their national campaign "Where do you find Asda's preice...our website!".

So if Tesco constantly check, how did Asda manage to come up with a believable "weekly" shop where 33 products were cheaper than Tesco's? In order to be believable they must choose best selling items, remember. Oh, and I did see the "trolly" they put outside Asda stores with the comparison shopping in and nothing struck me as out of the ordinary about the contents they were comparing.

Tesco's advertising leads the customer to believe that they check all of Asda's/Sainsbury's/etc prices and match or beat them and yet they missed 33 everyday items where they charged more...could that be construed as misleading the customer just as much as misusing the word "official"?

LilacLillie

Went in to Tesco today, with 6 vouchers total £6.50. The girl on the till said she was only allowed to take 1 off the total bill. Called a supervisor, who said it was company policy. Pulled out all my emails from HO, and a letter from the manager of the store I was in. 'Oh just put them through' says she and waltzes off, like I'm hard work!!!!!
Then went to CS, got my first mispriced..........WO-HO! Harris bacon at last!
There she tried to give me the difference as a refund. I said the policy is keep the goods and give me my money back and she looked like I was a crazy woman. She said 'Its the first i've ever heard of it and I've worked here 6yrs', then grinning said 'If they done that they'd be out of business, 'cos everyone would want their money back on stuff'. Called another manager to the desk and got refunded 2X£4.24 and kept the bacon.
Happy shopper today. I Love MSE
LL

chardonnay_2

got our first misprice the other day, we got two of the butter basted chickens. customer services gave our money back & product with no hesitation. she mentioned that this had been going on for weeks and she was fed up telling them. i said it was a shame for all the customers who didn't notice and would be overcharged. her retort was that, "oh, they know our policy, they won't be overcharged".

what annoys me is there are probably loads of mistakes, but if you do a big shop, unless you write down every price you are very likely to be overcharged.

we never even used to check our receipts !!!

perhaps we should all note every price of the stuff we pick up to make sure tesco don't rip us off anymore.

Kenny4315

bylromarha wrote:

Are you telling me your misprices only fill a basket?

You need a lorry in most stores if you were really looking hard !!! :rotfl:

Kenny4315

wallace wrote:

But you are not taking workload into account. For example, lets assume that Asda have 50 special offers a week, and Tesco have 250. When the offer is over, and the tickets need to be replaced, Asda staff would need to swap 50 tickets but Tesco staff would have more work to do in swapping 250. So even though staff levels may be comparable, the workload would be greater.

I can't believe what I am hearing here.

If they need more staff to do the job properly, hire some more ! :mad:

And get the process sorted it is not rocket science !! :rolleyes:

They are not short of cash !!