in suggesting that the Marks and Spencer Sparks card is the worst loyalty scheme ever

[JackandDiane]

1. YOu have to activate offers - requires WAY too much thought and planning
2. I just want money off things I buy fgs
3. that fucking ' have you swiped your sparks card' is surely mitigation for murder?

I use the Sparks food rewards sometimes. Last week it was 20% off bread rolls and another time it was 20% off ice cream but I don't bother with the discounts off their clothes which are all naff.
Agree the Tesco one is much better!

Completely agree, it is rubbish. They just want your personal information - I know that's the point of all loyalty cards but this doesn't offer a reasonable reward in return for that info - An M&S employee even agreed with me the other day when she asked if I had a Sparks card as she served me and I told her I don't bother with it any more.

Hope you're reading this M&S, you're really p'ing your customers off by treating us like idiots, do you really think wewe're that gullible?

www.businessinsider.com/the-incredible-story-of-how-target-exposed-a-teen-girls-pregnancy-2012-2?IR=T
There are loyalty card schemes that are good ^^^^^^
But Sparks is just annoying
HAVE YOU SWIPED YOUR FUCKING SPARKS CARD?

Completely crap and a waste of time. Ditto the John Lewis card.

I have used a couple of the offers - £5 off beachwear and I used 20% off beauty plus I did get free Countryfile live tickets for DH and myself

I've messaged M&S today highlighting this post. I completely agree. I've got 20,330 points that are pointless! You get offers like 20% off Percy pig sweets and 10% off a bouquet of flowers or 20% of cake making kits...wooooowwww!! The scheme is pants. The offers are not individual to you as a customer, it's not a loyalty scheme. The offers could more easily be normal in store offers without having to faff on your iPhone adding 20% off women's bras! How about a few freebies instead like 5000 points and you get a £20 voucher or 10000 points and £100 voucher! Something decent we can use and make us feel appreciated as customers. There are no vouchers, no free tea or coffee, no personal choice in tailor making own own offers apart from where we get to choose 4 out of 5 offers given to us! Its just a damp squibb! On the website it says competitions for 17000 points and so I was excited when I reached that target but so far nothing!! M&S you really need to pull your cashmere socks up because it's really not good enough!

I suspect my mother is the only person in Britain who uses her offers regularly and thinks the scheme is great

The only thing I've ever used my card for is scraping ice of my windscreen when I lost my scraper!

Card makes a good windscreen scraper tho

I was so pleased to read this and actually joined mumsnet so that I can join in the conversation! I hate the sparks scheme and every time I buy something in M&S and they ask for my card it really irritates me. I actually wrote to them last year to express my dislike of the scheme and whilst they did respond they weren't really interested. I can not be bothered picking my offers every week so when I do go to buy something they have to look for the reader to check if any of the offers match what I am buying (which unsprisingly they never do). They don't have a card reader at every till so this involves them wandering around the shop floor trying to track down a spare card reader while the queue builds up behind me. Utter waste of time - I am going to destroy mine. As I said in my email to them last year, a scheme dreamt up by men in suits who think we have nothing better to do with our time than log in on a weekly basis and 'pick our offers'. Get real M&S and look at Boots, Waitrose etc for loyalty schemes that work.

It's rubbish I agree.

I never eat any of those stupid loyalty cards as they just encourage you to spend more than you need anyway.

Only exception is Waitrose. I love he free coffee and paper. That's an incredible deal and I hope they never get rid of it!

Awful. They were also bombarding me with editorial type emails with no offers or promotions - just lots of product and lifestyle stuff. Wouldn't let me unsubscribe from those emails and just hear about offers unless I closed my Sparks card account. So I did. So stupid

I always use mine because of the charity donation

YANBU it is utter shite. The worst loyalty card around, over complicated crap.
Agree the M&S cafe card was good although the queues in their cafe are so huge at the moment I don't go and the one they did for greetings cards was ok. At least it was clear and you knew what you were getting.

Agree, it's just annoying. I've not used even one offer and have now given up looking at the emails.

I thought it was just me. For some time now I have been saying to the people on the till that I do have a card but don't bother with it anymore. My local M and S has a crap 4g signal I can't even do some last minute offer downloading when I'm in the store. The last time I tried to get 20% off a Per Una jumper the supervisor claimed the long sleeved woolly Per Una garment I had WASNT a jumper . Even the lady on the till looked confused.

Now - JL and Waitress cards; I actually go out of my way to shop there so I can pick up my free newspaper, coffee and cakes. Small pleasures but they appeal to me

And you can't subscribe from their twenty times a day email without giving up the card. Fine by me it's absolutely bloody useless.

*unsubscribe

The one time I tried to use it they told me "Oh no, you can't use it for tights, the offer is for womenswear!"

I love a loyalty card but HATE my Sparks card (although I do keep it for the charity donation). Mine doesn't even work online so if I ever do want 13.5% of multipacks of men's XL undies (or such random shite) then I actually have to go into a store. LOVE the Boots scheme (currently have £25 of points to spend) and Waitrose - my last emails from them showing my latest 3 months saving was nearly £400 and £98 of that was free coffee!

Sparks is the absolute worst. They are always offering me discounts on things they must know I never buy, like per una clothes, and never on things I do buy, like children's items. I'm just supposed to buy more stuff there, with no discount, in the hopes that one day I'll reach a reward level that will allow me to have a discount on something I actually want. Who would do that? It's like their beauty boxes that were only offered to select sparks members. I probably would have spent some money to get one, but I was not chosen. It didn't motivate me to buy more things for months in the hopes that there will be another beauty box I might be allowed to buy.

To be fair I did get £5 on my birthday. I forgot about that.

I have lost mine. It is truly liberating.

As a result of this thread I've cancelled my card. Yay!

It's my birthday on Friday - did you hear that, M&S?

£5 on my Sparks card might be the first offer I'll actually be able to use.

The last lot of "deals" I was offered were so rubbish I couldn't even be bothered to sign up to them.