AIBU to fed up to the back teeth with discount codes, special deals and loyalty cards?

[PacificDogwood]

Apologise, I've ranted about this before and some of you agreed, many didn't

I've just ordered Domino's pizza for our Satusday night treat.

'Buy one pizza, get 2nd (cheaper one, natch!) half price - so far, so usual.

A bit of googling gets me a discount code 'exclusive' to the Domino's blog.
FFS. 'Domino's blog' - who wants to read their fecking blog??
Anyhoo, gave me 25% off the whole order.

The admin of all that crap, the money that that costs - just charge me a realistic amount and I'll happily pay it. I am actually prepared to pay a decent price for a decent product (this is not about the relative merits of Domino's pizza btw ).

I know that these marketing gimmicks work, of course they do, companies would not spend lots of money on setting this crap up if it did not pay.
But to make us believe and us to actually believe, we are 'saving' anything?? Redunculous!!

Don't get me started on my Tesco receipt telling me smugly how much I 'saved today' - I just spent £££; saving is when you put some spare money away for a rainy day. Not being overcharged is NOT saving, you twats!!

One day, I will move to the country and weave all my own lentils and chew my own yoghurt and have nothing to do with the evils of modern living. Humph.

Oh my, you would not believe how much better I feel for that!
Thank you, MN, for giving loons like me a platform

YANBU. Just charge me your best price to start with and don't waste my time faffing about shuffling umpteen different deals.

Special offenders Pizza Express and Boots.

I forgive Sainsbury's because they give me nice simple vouchers, and GAP because you know the right price is simply always headline less 30%.

I'm not sure. Last week I bought a Groupon voucher for £10 discount off a takeaway from takeaway.com for £5,valid for new customers only. I also got cashback for the voucher by buying it through Quidco.
I rather like some deals.

Oh, yy, re Gap - anybody paying full ticket price has been had - bastards!
I braved the madness that was Black Friday before Christmas and went to a Gap store to get 50% off - DSs are in joggies forever, mwah, mwah, mwah
Why not charge those prices to start off with?
Or, shock horror, don't use sweat shops? Radical idea, I know.

Not sure marketing gimmicks do always work. How do they test that they aren't losing sales because of them? I used to regularly walk out of Boots because I couldn't find what I wanted because they were always moving things around - deliberate policy. They've stopped doing that now, presumably because they realised it wasn't as effective as they thought. Did it ever really work? Who knows?

I think 2-for-1 deals are under a fair bit of scrutiny.
I've begun to be more disciplined in only taking them up on them if I actually need a vast amount of whatever-it-is.

sooty, I love a 'deal' as much as the next person. I just don't like being suckered.
I'm signed up to Groupon too - I've had some nice meal out for little cash, but I've also bought a voucher for an expensive photography session which expired unused….

This is why I like shopping in Aldi - it's nice and simple. The big supermarkets always make me suspicious that I'm being ripped off and I just don't have the time or inclination to stand in the aisles doing all the calculations. I just want one cabbage dammit, not three and one half price.

Oooh, Lidl's is my favourite shop in the whole wide world!

I actually love being at the checkout at Lidl and being given my receipt. Just my receipt. No coupon saying how much I've saved or been overcharged. No coupon for money off things I don't want or double points next time. And every item I buy is the price it is. Not half off or 2 for £2 whatever.

Are you my OH, OP?!

How about those vouchers at morrisons for knives? How much do you spend to get a voucher? £10? And you need 20 for a knife?! So they are worth £200... My mil lives for shit like this

Leeds, do you have a beard?!
If yes, maybe

Completely agree! I'm so fed up with this at shops, restaurants etc. I don't mind a small loyalty discount but it's just ridiculous- pay full price at Gap or Pizza Express and you're a mug!

Also yy re Boots and their moving stuff around. Five minutes in there and I head to Superdrug!

It's also things like kitchens, windows etc. One of the reasons we went with our kitchen supplier (apart from the awesome quality Leicht kitchen) was the take it or leave it pricing, no haggling etc so you have a nagging feeling you could have got it cheaper. The owners used to work for Magnet and hated the constant 'sales' and 'free' items, so when they started their own company they decided on straightforward pricing.

As an aside, I always smile when I see your posts PacificDogwood. You were the poster that got me on to Lush Henna. I haven't used a regular dye since, though I now mix my own blend of Henna, indigo and cassia. So I feel really grateful to you as I can cover my greys without the burning scalp and worries about a bad reaction.

Oh, and thinking like this about all these 'deals' is proof-positive as well that I am morphing in to my dad btw…

Aw, EarSlaps, that's nice to hear
It goes without saying, it was MN that got me on to Lush Henna in the first place

More than happy with my tesco clubcard, that's fine. Although the vouchers can do one. The rest of their deals are a massive pita.

At least they just shove it through the till if you don't take the free one. Co-op always stop and point out it's on special offer and ask if I want to go and get the free one. No I don't. If I'd wanted it I'd have taken it when I was standing near the great big 'buy one get one free' sign.

The paper tickets in sainsburys give me the rage. Why give me a massive handful of paper that's going to get lost in my bag and then expire?
I only ever find a relevant offer the week after it's expired. And half the time the tickets are for stuff I never buy.
And it's such a waste of fecking paper. Grrrrr.

I love my Costa club card. I'd be going to Costa anyway so the fact that I can get freebies is great ð???

YANBU.

Am 100% with you on this one, OP.

I long for the days when you wanted something, you turned up at the shop and you bought it. Or you wanted a holiday, walked into a travel agency and booked it.

Now it's an endless debacle of price comparison websites and Google.

And don't get me started on insurance. I remember the days when your insurance company automatically reduced your premium when it was time for renewal for being a loyal customer.

Now we have a ridiculous charade where insurance company sends me a renewal quote for £stupid. I then am forced to fart arse around getting more reasonable quotes from price comparison websites. I then have to ring my insurance company and tell them that such and such company is offering me the same insurance for a lower price. They then reduce their original quote for something more realistic.

JUST GIVE ME THE LOWER QUOTE IN THE FIRST PLACE YOU CUNTS.

I always order the buy one get one dominos pizza free when you get a side order. Works out the cheapest for us unless it's Tuesday where you get Bogof without the side order.
But I hate it all to. Loce Lidl and Aldi prices and no faff or vouchers

The last car we bought was from a no-haggle place. The bloke said we wouldn't get it cheaper anywhere else, and the prices were as listed, no haggling. And he was right.
So utterly refreshing not to have to go through that ridiculous process of "I'll see what I can do, but I'll have to talk to my manager", and leaving your purchase feeling slightly tarnished.

Do car salespeople ever actually think that customers can't see what they are doing?

YANBU. That's the reason I now shop at Aldi and Lidl (as well as saving ££'s).

I love that I don't have to stand for ages calculating whether it's cheaper to get the bogof or the 3 for 2 or whether to just go for the own brand.

My cupboards now contain the items we need and not a load of stuff that will go past it's sell by before we can eat it.. oh but it was a BARGAIN

I have a tesco clubcard which is used to fill two cars with petrol and that gets us a couple of days out a year

Yanbu. I stopped shopping at Boots due to the products being over priced and then after you've paid they give you a coupon that would've made the price more reasonable, but you don't need it after you've purchased, they just want to lure you back...

I buy all my toiletries in sainsbury or Waitrose now with my shop - fair and honest prices.

Finally a forum to vent my spleen about the Sainsburys bastards.

They tell me my shop was about £10 cheaper than asda. No it was not. I just buy the deals because I am a sucker for deals

If I was at asda I would be buying their deals. I always want to discuss this with the checkout assistant but I bite my tongue.

The only reason I go is because they send me random vouchers for £10 off when I spend £60. Again, the bastards!