Why wouldn't I want my receipt?

[Lorrymum]

I've recently noticed that every time I buy something Im asked if I want the receipt. I always feel a bit awkward when I say "yes please" and it feels as though Im being a bit of a pain.
Why wouldn't I want it? How would I return something if I don't have one? Is it to save paper or ink?

Like others here I don't say yes if it's in a cafe etc. But if I'm not going to ask for a receipt I will ALWAYS ask to see the total on the machine before tapping my card. We're all human, I don't want to be paying £100 instead of £10 for my coffee & cake!

I never get a receipt for day to day things like food shopping 🤷‍♀️ I would only do it for more expensive items / gifts / clothes etc.

Wilko self serve tills give you the option of a receipt whilst clearly stating they won't accept any returns without one. So I'd always have one unless it's a really quick purchase.

I always take them at Aldi as there's a competition at the bottom. My colleague has won twice! It'll be my turn one day.

Showing my age here but years ago a load of cars were knackered because the petrol station had filled their diesel with unleaded or vice versa.
So irs habit now for me to take a paper reciept as they could only prove it by this . (Though you'd have thought CCTV would show the pump you used ?)
And though I've never actually had a wrong fuel fill, I double check - yes unleaded before I drive off .

It depends how many other shops you are going to go onto. I bought certain bits from poundland today and the went to Sainsbury, of course i took the receipt in Poundland. Sainsbury sell the 3 things that i bought in Poundland, if i had been stopped coming out i could prove they had been bought elsewhere.

Same, it would just go straight in the bin so pointless.

The receipt scanning apps are market research. The 3 I use are:
Shoppix & Storewards- this pays out £2-£5 every 3 months for me, paypal or amazon vouchers.
Zipzero - this pays directly to your bills like council tax / utilities.

Free money 💰 IMO.

Same. If the self service doesn't give me a choice then I leave the receipt where it is.

I often pay with cash at Tesco and walk out leaving the receipt, often without a bag. Never been stopped but if I was then they can check the till.

I sign up for e receipts where possible. Eg in M&S I never get a paper receipt but it's automatically emailed to me and then I have access to it if I ever need it.

Exactly this. CLothes or bedding you aren't 100% sure will go with your colour scheme or your teenage daughter might not approve of, definitely get a receipt.

A sandwich and bottle of orange juice from M&S for lunch - no thank you.

@Jolenetookmyman don’t suppose you have a referral code for Shoppix please? I would like to register

It's a bit like nearly 12 years down the line still being asked "do you want a bag?" How long are we going to be asked "do you want a receipt?" And if in WH Smiths "do you want a bag, a receipt and chocolate?". If we want we should ask.

I like a receipt even grocery shopping, mistakes happen

Yes I want mine. And I'm fed up with the huffing and eye rolling when I say yes. A few weeks ago the self scan checkout had run out of till roll so I called for help and the staff member was very rude about it.

As it happened I was getting things for someone else so needed the receipt for them, but I shouldn't have to justify it to anyone.

I always ask if I'm serving in the shop, and most people who are paying on their phone don't want one, as they receipt is automatically sent to their phone.

But elderly people quite often like to have one, to keep track of their spending. I have one customer who still ticks it all off on his statement every month.

It really annoys me being give a receipt, for most items I buy (unless it’s clothing etc I might return) then it goes straight in the bin.

It’s like being giving an empty crisp wrapper, annoying and takes up space.

Yes I want mine. And I'm fed up with the huffing and eye rolling when I say yes.

I have to admit I get fed up with this as well - while I've seen some phone paying for good here it's not common yet though card paying is by far the most common cash is still around as well and not just "old" people - my teens frequently pay in cash.

If you want a receipt, just say yes and no need to feel bad - it's not like the cashier has to write out the receipt in blood with an arthritic hand!

It's literally a button-push. So if you want it, say yes, and if you don't, say no.

It's to save paper of course, now there are other ways to verify purchases. But planty of people need or want receipts, so they are available. E.g. I always take a receipt for work purchases.

I find it worse when they don't ask you so you have to ask for it, but they've already pressed no on their screen!

Receipts can be useful for tracking spending (especially if you pay by cash) and also tracking price changes.

I've told my DSs that they are to ALWAYS take receipts. They're teenagers and I'm not going to have them accused of shoplifting because they didn't take a receipt.

Yes, this. I’m very far from a teenager, but this is always a possibility that you want to guard against. If you bought a Mars Bar that later turned out to be out of date/off/faulty in some way, you might just harumph and not care; but if you bought it, stuck it in your handbag and then were stopped on suspicion of theft before you left the shop (or in another shop), you would have left yourself in a difficult situation for no reason at all. This is even more a potential issue now that shops don’t give out free carrier bags; in the past, it would have looked well dodgy to be walking out with unbagged goods, but now, if people don’t have a bag but haven’t bought too many items, they just carry them out loose in their arms.

I’ve also found a lot of places will print the receipt before asking whether you want it or not. Asda robot tills sometimes ask if you want it, but then if you press ‘Yes’, it comes out instantly, so it must already have been printed.
WH Smiths is a weird case, as they frequently don’t even offer you a receipt, even if you’ve spent quite a bit, and you have to ask; but they do automatically give you a sheaf of random offer coupons – printed on the same till roll – and never ask if you want those or not, so it’s clearly nothing to do with saving waste.

Call me a cynic, but I wonder if some stores factor in that it’s much harder to ask for a refund if you don’t take a receipt and so deliberately don’t give you a receipt automatically, so as to catch you out and leave you to obtain your full rights only if you remember to ask. At least Wilkos are honest about what rights you’re giving up by pressing ‘No’, but I think they’re the only ones.

Why do people get receipts for fuel out of interest? Worried I’m missing something now

A great many people are not in the privileged position where they don't need to budget and keep track of where their money goes – and receipts can help with this. A card statement will only say that you spent £X at BP on this date, but it won’t tell you the price per litre or how many litres you bought – which enables you to compare different fuel stations, work out fuel efficiency of your vehicle (which may differ with different brands of petrol), and even to make sure that you weren’t charged in error for somebody else’s pump (or the user of yours before you used it).

Claiming mileage for business use of a personal vehicle

I keep receipts to check items on my bank statement but DH doesn't and it's a joint account so he gets asked lots of questions if I can't work out what the purchase was. But I am trying to break the habit for things like meals in pubs or restaurants where I'm hardly going to forget the event within a few weeks.

I only take the receipt if I am likely to want to return something. Otherwise I don't bother. I never get around to checking them against bank statements anyway - who has time for that!