Supermarket lying

[Mycatisalwaysangry]

I used two packs of mince beef yesterday and they both had less beef than what stated on the packaging. I thought it was because I froze it.

Today I was weighing my food and it’s absolutely clear that what’s written on the
package is not what’s inside it.

Has it ever happened to you? I feel very betrayed as a customer.

I have weighed a block of cheese purportedly 400g (I do this regularly and also pick up two packs in assess in the supermarket to see if there is a difference)

It was 430. I did not chop off the extra and send it back

Well, here’s the reply. I actually wasn’t asking for a refund, which is great, but for an explanation, and I don’t feel that I got it.

Thank you for contacting…

I'm sorry to learn that the quantity of your Mild Scottish Oak Smoked Salmon is not up to your expectations when you received it. I understand how important and disappointing this was for you. We are aiming to provide you the best product and we apologise for the inconvenience this matter may have caused on your part.

The details you've provided have been passed to our technical team to investigate. We’re keen to achieve the very highest standards of quality in the products we sell, and work hard to make sure these are maintained. Any complaint about a product is recorded and the findings of our team are passed to the Head Office. This ensure that it will not be repeated on your future shopping with us.

Our buyers and technologists work closely with our producers and suppliers to alert them to any concerns. These close and honest relationships are a vital part of us making sure that we are selling you the product you expect and deserve. We hope you’ll be reassured to know the information you've given us will help us stop this from happening again.

I appreciate your patience and understanding with this matter. I hope that I've been able to reassure you of the steps we take to ensure quality in our products.

In view what happened, I've gone ahead and actioned a refund of £3.75 onto your payment card. Please be aware that this will take 7 days to appear on your account and please accept my apologies for the inconvenience caused.

Funnily enough, she hasn’t mentioned the ‘E’ at all. I guess I got the standard reply. I will start weighing things more though.

This has absolutely never happened to me

What's your basis for saying the scaled are accurate? Are they calibrated? Do you have a 100g weight you can use as a control?

PP have stated product weights usually based on an average. I can't imagine when they grow the salmon they specify they be grown to a size to produce a fillet exactly 90g In mass....

YABU. meat products are always going to vary, it's not like weighing out rice or flour.

Would you rather they added a slither of salmon to make it up to 100g which would invariably be wasted anyway?

That's not how verifying the accuracy and precision of scales works...

I can't believe this is a serious thread.

You contacted them about a 10g difference 🤦🏻‍♀️

If the supermarket just randomly charged you 10%. More you would complain?

10g short is 10% of expected if I read the thread correctly, and outside acceptable margins

If the scales seem to agree with packaged weights most of the time it's a strong indication that they are right

Because mostly shops won't be giving you extra for free

That’s a lot of waffle as a response. That said, once you get past the waffle, that’s pretty much all they can do. I used to work in the Exec office of a well known company (not selling physical products though) dealing with complaints and when we said that we would feed it back, it did actually get done via the way we processed the complaints. All the data was looked at. It’s likely this was a one off but if not, they’ll probably have a way of flagging it. These things are generally well regulated and it’s not often these things are wrong, nor will they be intentionally wrong. IF this was something that happened a lot then there would be repercussions for the business. And the refund was fair. I’m not sure what more that they could do.

And as a PP has said, unless your scales are properly calibrated, then it’s impossible to say really.

Dying to know - which supermarket?!

Freezing does this with meat and fish - because some meat is soaked or injected with additional water to increase the weight - and therefore - profit.

Some fish too, but more likely the fish meat has a slightly higher water content, this freezes, and then more of it drains out upon defrosting than was contained within the meat before.

Illegal to add too much tho - https://www.gov.uk/guidance/meat-products-sell-them-legally-in-england

Again, I don’t need to verify the scales because the scales work. Here’s is something that was packaged as 50gr (choc covered orange peel. I had to open the packaging because of you so now I’ll have to eat them! 🤣) Guess how much my scale says they are?

Thank you, this is very helpful

Calm down. It's salmon, not drugs

Love this 🤣🤣 frankly I care more about my salmon than possible drugs, especially when I’m hungry, but you have a point 🤣🤣

@Mycatisalwaysangry you can also weigh water to check 1l = 1kg

But I suspect your scales are fine.

It's probably because you froze it.

Freezing expands and so bursts cells within the food, so when defrosted that fluid is released (hence strawberries being so mushy when defrosted and losing their structure) - so you possibly just lost the naturally occurring fluid in the cells of the salmon.

It'd be interesting to know if it is still underweight if you weigh another one that is fresh and you've not previously frozen and defrosted?

Again, this is not how verifying the accuracy of scales works...

You cannot take something of unknown mass and use it as a means to verify the accuracy of a piece of measuring equipment.

That’s not how checking scales works. Those could weigh more than 50g and your scales are under reporting. You don’t know. Just because the scales match the packaging doesn’t mean the scales are accurate as packages weights as estimates, so a lot of the time you will get more in the packet. Your scales, if wrong, would be reading that as the right amount rather than accurately reporting the weight as higher.

If your scales are not trading standard approved then they’re not counted as accurate, and if it is well used then it very well may not be accurate.

If you froze them, defrosted them, unpacked them and moved them on to a plate, you probably lost some water somewhere. 1 tsp water = 5ml = 5 g. Only 1 teaspoon would put you back to an acceptable weight for "100g e".

The way things are going and the way corners are being cut, I'd imagine manufacturers and suppliers are going to do this deliberately and it will become more common, if it isn't already. Giving the bare minimum.

Slightly off topic but chocolate covered orange peel? How very unusual. Presumably it’s white chocolate too? And this is some sort of a sweet snack, perhaps a leftover unwanted Christmas gift?

@Mycatisalwaysangry are you sure that is orange peel and not frozen chunky chips 😆

The e is estimate and meat or frozen foods gain and lose weight as the water content changes. That is why there is an allowable
margin. Imagine the preservatives they would need to keep the weight a constant.

YABU to freeze smoked salmon, it degrades the flavour and if it gets even half a degree too warm is a risk for botulism. But yeah, complain about your lost 10g, I guess.

Any scales in a food packaging environment are calibrated several times daily, properly with a control weight by the QCs. Products passing down the line are weighed by an also calibrated checkweigher. This is the job of QCs. The checkweigher is set to remove the weight of the packaging from the total, packaging is NOT included. At the end of the job the checkweigher tells you the average weight of all the units that have passed it which must be at or above that specified on the label, again checked by the QCs. It won't leave for the depot otherwise. But obviously an average means some units will be a few grams underweight, some over. That's what the e represents. Food suppliers for British supermarkets are so heavily inspected and audited, regularly by the supermarkets themselves and the BRC for example. They are not going to send out products that are all underweight, deliberately, because they'd very soon be out of business.

@Mycatisalwaysangry i admire your diligence on this. It isn't just a question of "but it's only 10g", it's that we need to hold the supermarkets and product supply chain's feet to the fire. They need to know the customer expects to be buying what it says on the pack, and according to the permissible tolerances.

I have had a longstanding issue with the current scourge of shrinkflation because the food industry is constantly playing "smoke and mirrors" with the consumer over different pack sizes, prices and conflated with special offers given at supermarkets. We've all seen (eg) a sachet or 2 being sneakily removed from a box of Nescafé cappuccino or 350g of Philly cheese magically shrink to 280g with a special offer at Tesco or Sainsbury masking that difference until the price then goes to the full price again and you realise you, and millions of consumers in UK are collectively being ripped off.

thank you for helping to force them into having to stay honest, because they wouldn't by choice only by pressure!