AIBU to push back when shops ask for my details when I just want to pay?

[ISimplyDontBelieveIT]

I popped into The White Company today to buy one small item and use the 20 percent off. I normally order online, but this was a cheap item and I didn’t want to pay delivery.

At the till the assistant asked if I was on their mailing list. I said yes (I am). She then asked for my postcode, which I gave, and then she asked me for my surname. My surname is foreign and long and I couldn't be bothered to spell it. I just wanted to pay for my item and leave. I asked why she needed my surname and she said it was to check if I was on their mailing list. That annoyed me as I had literally just confirmed that I was. Why should I go through this whole nonsense especially for such a tiny purchase?? I felt irritated but I know she was just following protocol so I stayed polite and gave her a short version of my surname. She obviously couldn’t find me and then asked if I wanted her to enter my details again. I said no, I just wanted to pay, which I did.

I left the shop feeling oddly irritated by the whole thing. I know a lot of shops do this and it's not a new thing, but it felt like far too much admin for a quick purchase. Would this have grated on anyone else? What’s the best way to shut this down right at the start?

Do the big bosses of these companies genuinely prefer people to dump purchases at the counter and not return again, rather than accepting that they just didn't manage to grab another avenue for marketing spam on this occasion?

My concern is that these new practices of shops demanding email addresses at the counter are not really done with those of us over a certain age, who will resist it, in mind. Do shops that traditionally appeal to a considerably older demographic do this as insistently?

I wonder if they're playing the long game and hoping that, eventually, it will just become a completely standard and accepted part of making an in-store purchase to younger generations; and they will never have known any different and thus never think to query or object to it. Any of us oldies who are left who still complain about it or refuse will be pitied and patronised as out of touch and 'not very shopping savvy'.

Yep. Bricks and mortar stores can't afford to be lackadaisical about sales, each and every sale counts. Every sale is an opportunity to add on extras. When I used to work at currys and PC World we wouldn't be allowed to check out a purchase unless it had everything added on (like with a laptop: laptop case, burnable CDs, 'tech friend' support line, a mouse, insurance etc.), we'd have to get permission from a manager who'd come over and lay the pressure on hoping a second round of pressure would do the trick in forcing the customer to acquiesce. Honestly some of these stores have only themselves to blame frankly.

They do it because it works, it's been happening for a while now and if profits went down they'd have pulled it. Getting your business into the minds of a past customer every day via email converts to more sales. I find it funny personally as I end up harangued by so many businesses on a daily basis it ends up irritating me, I unsubscribe and avoid shopping there for a while. But it must work for the majority. Or they'd no longer be doing it.

One sale: one chunk of profit.
Marketing: the potential for numerous future chunks of profit.

Yep, it's killing the golden goose. Personally, I used to see Curry's as a handy place where you could go to view and buy all kinds of electrical items in one place; but now, I see them as a place waiting to lie to me and rip me off, so - surprise surprise - it isn't a place I go to.

In fact, considering that the pressure only tends to ramp up once you're at the till, they've re-established themselves perfectly as a non-sale showroom for people to be able to spend time checking out all of the products 'in the flesh' and then go and buy them on Amazon, where they will ask you once if you want any other associated stuff or a warranty and, if you ignore or say No, they just let you buy the item with no drama, gaslighting or pressure whatsoever. How is this sustainable?

They remind me of the companies that sign people up for marketing info - quite legitimately and openly - but then they can't help themselves from abusing your email address and spamming you every day or two. One or two emails a month would have kept a potentially lucrative sales avenue open to them for years; but the instant they start bombarding you with spam every day, surely the majority of people simply unsubscribe and then they completely lose all of those potential sales avenues for good.

I remember being harangued at a furniture showroom by a salesman after I'd agreed to spend a lot of money of a leather suite. Did I want this insurance - no thanks. What is somebody spilt red wine on it - nobody will be drinking red wine on my couch. What if a dog ripped it - no dogs will be in my house and so it went on and on and on.
If I hadn't already been round loads of shops and finally found the suite I really liked, I'd have walked out.

We cross-posted, but I had the same thought!

I'm still not 100% convinced that it works for them, though. It's far from uncommon for big bosses to have their great new ideas that turn out to be a complete failure, but they won't listen to any counter-arguments or reason.

For all we know, they could be ascribing falling sales to 'more people shopping online instead' and so desperately trying to reverse the trend by grabbing email addresses for marketing saturation - all the while never understanding or acknowledging that their aggressive demands for email addresses are a very big direct factor in customers abandoning them!