Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think Boots shouldn't charge me.

251 replies

Lagoonablue · 13/07/2015 22:20

Shopping after school and my 5 yr old falls heavily on his knees. He is crying and knees are bleeding and dirty. We are 15 min walk from home. I am next to Boots. I go in with my hysterical 5 yr old and ask if they can help. A pharmacist hands me a pack of antiseptic wipes and some wound dressing. I clean him up and then she says £4.99 please.

I pay for the wipes but not the dressing as I haven't used it. Left feeling a bit miffed. Surely they had the odd wipe knocking about and do wouldn't use the opportunity to sell me a product! I went there as it was the nearest place and kind of made . sense. However I bet if I went in any other shop they might have helped out by using their own first aid kit or something,

It's not about the money but feel it wasn't very sympathetic

OP posts:
Hellionsitem2 · 13/07/2015 23:36

They would have had a first aid kit and should have used it.

Evabeaversprotege · 13/07/2015 23:39

I remember when ds fell in Tesco. He hit his mouth & a member of staff rushed over with blue paper towels. She reached into the freezer & opened a box of ice lollies, held it to ds's mouth until the bleeding eased. I was covered in blood & trying to stop dd from being sick at the sight of her bleeding brother.

The staff member gave dd a lolly too, we signed an accident book & thanked them for their help. I don't know what they did with the remaining lollies, it's not like they could sell a box with two missing Smile

nancy75 · 13/07/2015 23:40

An accident on the premises is different, that is the shop's problem

Iggi999 · 13/07/2015 23:41

Should coffee shops give out a free cookie to any diabetics that come in with low blood sugar?
Yes.

WanderWomble · 13/07/2015 23:41

My friend was sacked for giving out plasters/wipes from the store she worked in. A Mum had come in with her bleeding DD.

I think you're being unreasonable OP.

Justmuddlingalong · 13/07/2015 23:42

I think first aid kits in shops and other businesses, are for use on staff and members of the public who are injured on the shop premises.

ShadowFire · 13/07/2015 23:45

I think that if they weren't allowed, or didn't want to, give OP the first aid stuff for free, then they should have said so right away, before they gave them to the OP.

Then OP could have decided whether she wanted to pay for a packet of wipes or not. It sounds like it was clear to the shop assistant that OP was after immediate first aid treatment rather than just shopping.

MrsJorahMormont · 13/07/2015 23:45

Your mistake was going into a pharmacy where they can legitimately sell stuff. If you'd gone into any other shop they probably would have handed you some loo roll.

bostonkremekrazy · 13/07/2015 23:46

i asked in Boots recently for a first aid kit as dd had rolled a clarks ticket up (shop next door) and put it in her ear!
they sent me next door.....and Boots didnt have tweezers in the kit so grabbed them off the shelf - no cost to me....the first aider was very helpful :) so well done Boots on my end of the world!

nancy75 · 13/07/2015 23:47

The op might have been after immediate first aid treatment - the trouble is boots is a shop and the person was a shop assistant not a nurse

FunnyNameHere · 13/07/2015 23:48

You need to time his accidents so you're outside John Lewis.

When DS2 was in nappies, the vending machine in the John Lewis mother/baby loo jammed and I couldn't buy one. DS2 had diarrhoea and had gone through all 5 nappies I'd brought with us, and I got SO upset.

The lady who had the misfortune of dealing with me:

  1. sent a colleague diwn to Waitrose to buy me a pack of nappies;
  2. got DS2 a drink and a snack from the Cafe;
  3. got me a bottle of water and tissues (I'd got really tearful!);
  4. got DS2 a £££ train from the toy department to play with

She was like a guardian angel!

So I say yes, the Boots staff were being pretty mean-spirited.

FunnyNameHere · 13/07/2015 23:50

Oh, and we got to keep the nappies and the toy train, and not spend a single penny. It was astonishingly generous and kind.

MrsRyanGosling15 · 14/07/2015 00:06

They were a pharmacist, in a pharmacy. I think they could of came up with a tissue.

Hellionsitem2 · 14/07/2015 00:14

The assistant should have called for the first aid trained staff member in the store, then used the stores special first aid box which is intended for staff/the public

SmillasSenseOfSnow · 14/07/2015 00:17

Iggi999

Hmm

Perhaps I should qualify my question with an addition: should coffee shops give a free cookie to diabetics that come in with low blood sugar and sufficient cash on them to purchase food?

AndNowItsSeven · 14/07/2015 00:34

Op I get your point. I took dd4 to a school open day. After she had walked out the door she fell on the path and cut her knee. I took her back inside and was given a wipe and a plaster.

Iggi999 · 14/07/2015 00:37

Why the face? That is my opinion. I feel the person in the scenario you present should certainly offer to pay, but I'd expect it to be waved away. We aren't talking I assume about someone thinking "I'll need something to eat soon", but someone having a hypo - in the same way this wasn't a child whose plaster was about to fall off, but one with current bleeding and tears!

CalmYoBadSelf · 14/07/2015 00:46

I have worked for Boots and suspect using company stock without somebody paying would be a sackable offence unless the accident happened instore and their authorised first aider was dealing with it. They would definitely not allow their staff to "write off" stock as they would see this as some form of fraud or theft

magentastardust · 14/07/2015 01:17

You are certainly not bonkers OP!

I think people are just being confused at the fact it is Boots that you went into. If you had gone into any other high street shop and asked for help I am sure most people would have got the staff first aid kit out and given you a plaster and a tissue. As I have done in the past when a little boy had an accident outside a shop I was working in.

Of course Boots shouldn't have given away their stock for free -you weren't looking for any stock you were looking for a help with cleaning up a small child. No one in boots would get sacked for giving you a wipe/plaster from a first aid kit.

I used to work as a Saturday girl in an independent chemist years ago-people came in to speak to the chemist all the time for advice -If a child had come in with a cut and was upset and a parent was asking for help we would have obliged and had the chemist look at them/clean them up.
If someone with a upset/injured child came in and said -my child has fallen could you please give me a box of plasters and some wipes then we would have sold them to you like boots did, but if you wandered in and it was an obvious , can I get a bit of help for my child -surely you would help?

I personally probably would have chosen the pharmacist to head into too as the ideal place for help -makes more sense than walking into the bank/bookmakers whatever!

magentastardust · 14/07/2015 01:18

*I mean from Boots own first aid kit-not one in the shop.

magentastardust · 14/07/2015 01:21

Nancy-It wasn't just a shop though , and no they are not a trained nurse but there is indeed a trained Pharmacist. It is common place for the pharmacists to give out medical advice.

nancy75 · 14/07/2015 01:29

The pharmacist probably had something better to do, let's not forget this is a child with a scraped knee not emergency leg amputation. The normal response to a child falling over is to go in the shop, buy a packet of plasters & a bar of chocolate to chear the child up and that's it, no need for emergency first aid or such a fuss

WaggleBee · 14/07/2015 01:52

Pharmacists are trained in first aid to a high level and there will be at least one other member of staff who are first aid trained. They're dealing with some very ill people everyday and it's not unusual for a patient/customer to be taken ill, sometimes very seriously. They're not "just shop assistants." Hmm

So that can't be used as a reason for not helping as a couple of pp suggested. However they are also a business and have to account for each item. Had they not charged for the wipes, they would've had to pay for them themselves which is fine once but if everyone started doing it...

YABU to tar an entire company with the same brush based on one experience of one store.

SilverBirchWithout · 14/07/2015 02:07

YANBU. I hope you choose to shop somewhere else in future. A shop that considers profits above the emergency needs of the people in the community they operate in, needs to act with more compassion.

Florrieboo · 14/07/2015 05:14

It's a scraped knee though, as a mum of two boys you just get on with scraped knees. I don't think I have seen either of their knees without scabs in about 4 years!

The way you worded it it sounded like you wanted to buy the items. I think YABU. Tissues don't stop the bleeding they just mop up what is coming out, did you really have nothing at all on you that could have done that?

Swipe left for the next trending thread