I’m used to companies targeting their advertising to my children but this week a large company has taken advantage of Miss Frugal and made her feel uncomfortable in one of their branches and that is unacceptable.
I’m not going to name the company as that’s not really my thing but I am going to share her experience because as a parent teaching a child about money management, this is something that I hadn’t expected or considered so we’d never discussed how to deal with situations like this.
I pay Miss Frugal’s pocket money into her debit card account each week and she has a debit card so she can access the money – either by spending it online or in a shop or by getting cash out of a cash machine. I get a notification every time she uses the card so I can see what she’s spending and where and she gets much more financial freedom than she had before which is teaching her some great lessons for later in life.
Last week, we were out shopping and she asked if she could nip to a shop nearby to buy something she wanted while I was trying a top on. I’ve got no problem with this as she’s quite independent and more than capable of walking two shops down to buy something specific that she wanted. (See how I’m being nice and vague here?)
She came back a couple of minutes later and was a bit quiet, clearly something was bothering her so I asked what it was. She explained that the person in the shop she’d just been in had taken her order and then suggested that she buy a loyalty card for £5. She says that she said no thank you but the person gave her a bit of a hard sell and she ended up buying this loyalty card for £5 which was double the cost of her purchase.
I was horrified and wanted to go back to the shop there and then to complain but she asked me not to so I respected her wishes and silently fumed about the situation until I got home where I stewed about it for a while longer and then tweeted the company. Twice.
Pretty sure this face doesn’t look 18!
No response came but I did discover that their own terms and conditions say the card is only for over 18s and she clearly does not look that age!!! I ended up emailing the CEO who ‘passed my email to a member of his team’ but they clearly didn’t get the issue and dedicated about two sentences to my complaint and about five paragraphs to how I could get a refund back for the money taken on the card. She also said that the Twitter team get so many tweets each day that they can’t reply to all. I’ve deleted my tweets now but they were very clear about how unhappy it was and how serious I thought it was so I’m not sure why they would ignore that and reply to jokey tweets and other complaints. She went on to ask for ID for Miss Frugal in order to get her money back – she’s 12!!!
I replied back to advise how unhappy I was and got a much more reassuring response and I now feel that the issue is going to be addressed both in the store itself and in other stores nationwide. All well and good but that doesn’t help Miss Frugal as she’s lost some of her confidence going in to shops on her own which is the reason I’m sharing this.
Big companies like the one we’ve had the issue with should know not to prey on children like this to make a sale and to be fair, most probably do but you can’t account for the individual employees and their need to hit a target.
To make sure your child is prepared for when (and if) this ever happens to them, please have a chat with them about how to deal with people who try to sell them something and make sure they know they can (and usually should) say no.
Here’s a couple of things that Miss Frugal and I have talked about this week:
- Things are rarely as good as they seem – the person made this sound amazing but when we’ve looked at it together, the chances of her ever buying enough to earn a reward are slim to none.
- I’ve explained that she may be offered things like this in future and she may or may not want them. If she doesn’t want it then she can always say no and like on this occasion, if no doesn’t seem to be good enough then she can just walk away.
- Even if she does like the sound of something, the chances are it will still be there later on so she can just explain that she wants to have a think about it.
- If all else fails, she can just say that she doesn’t have any money spare for it and if she’s paying with a note that will give her change she can just say that’s her bus fare or something.
- She is the customer and does not need to feel bad if she doesn’t want something.
It’s a shame we’ve had to learn this lesson but hopefully, you’ll be more prepared than we were!
Don’t miss out on future posts like this – receive updates directly to your inbox by email by adding your email address to the box on the top right of this page and hitting subscribe. You can also follow me on BlogLovin or Networked Blogs and I’d love to see you over on my Facebook page and on Instagram.
But that’s the wonderful thing about foreign travel, suddenly you are five years old again. You can’t read anything, you have only the most basic sense of how things work, you can’t even reliably cross the street without endangering your life. Your whole existence becomes a series of interesting guesses.
I kept staring into the blackness of the woods, drawn into the darkness as I always had been. I suddenly realized how alone I was. (But this is how you travel, the wind whispered back, this is how you've always lived.
No changing of place at a hundred miles an hour will make us one whit stronger, or happier, or wiser. There was always more in the world than man could see, walked they ever so slowly; they will see it no better for going fast. The really precious things are thought and sight, not pace. It does a bullet no good to go fast; and a man, if he be truly a man, no harm to go slow; for his glory is not at all in going, but in being.
I think I know what the company is as I know know of one with a £5 loyalty card and if it is I am really surprised that they would do that to a young girl. I avoid going into their stores as an adult because they put the pressure on so for a child it must be horrid.
That is awful, the company should be ashamed of themselves. Well done you for letting them know how unhappy you are.
That would make me cross too. I think I will have to have this talk with my son as well, he's quite innocent of things like this.
Ooh – this makes me SO cross. You're amazing not to have named and shamed. Taking advantage of kids is beyond wrong. Taking advantage of anyone is wrong. Don't let it lie. You deserve answers and they need to change their system x
I understand why you are upset! I hate how one ill trained shop person can do something lie this to a child. I wish I knew wjhoh shop it was. But the lesson from this…although learned too early is something she will remember in future.
This is outrageous! But name and shame, I say…..
This makes me so mad! Good on you for taking it up with them. That's absolutely disgraceful and I really hope their company policy gets altered as a result. I hope it hasn't knocked her confidence too much x
Goodness that is awful! I suspect I know which shop you mean as I have had a similar conversation recently. It is bad that this happened in the first place but even worse the way it was handled afterwards. I think you have a very positive way of handling money with your daughter though and I hope she isn't put off by this experience
It's disgraceful that a company is even ripping of children. They should be ashamed of themselves. I feel so sorry for Miss Frugal, but I also hope that this has thought her some important lessons about people…
Crikey, that's not good at all.
So many issues here. The first Miss Frugal has been ripped off. £5 for a loyalty card?! That sounds like a scam to me if the purchase she was making was only half that, I can't see how the £5 loyalty card would ever be worth anything. Secondly the repsonse on Twitter. They get too many to reply? Well employ more people then or outsource it! You can't use that as an excuse, I don't suppose the likes of Tesco only get a couple of tweets a day yet they seem to cope. And if this company are getting so many tweets, maybe they need to address why so many people are contacting them, are they all complaints? If so they really need to look at their business a bit more closely.
Thirdly the response from the CEO is shocking.
It all adds up to one holy cock up and I am so sorry that MIss Frugal got caught up in this. But at least she has learned that she can tell her mum things and her mum will get it sorted. And b that this is not right and that if she wants to say no, she can say no in future and not be afraid to stick to it.
I would be furious too! Just reading that, made me get my dander up. And you know, I think there;s probably more reasons than one, as to why the sales person (man or woman~matters not) was trying to get her to sign up for the card. Not only did they probably pocket the $5 and never turn the form in for her rewards, they probably were attempting to find out personal information to sabotage someones account for further scheming gain to benefit themselves in a deceptive way or even to know when you or your kids live. How do you know hope many times the same scam was played out on other minors. I'd do just as you did and take it to the top. That sales persons name should be on the recite so you can do just that and make sure it stops there with such a deceitful person. I'm sure it was a store that your daughter enjoys shopping in and thats one reason she said to let it ride, so she could shop again. But that's just wrong to target a child knowing they are not the proper age to try to solicit them.
This is really awful, I'm horrified to read it and can't believe it happened. I really hope that it's not dented her confidence too much. Thanks for the warning!
ah bless hjer. Glad you wrote this post Cass important to prepare them for horrid companies like this!
I'm not surprised you are fuming. It was taking advantage, pure and simple.
J x
Hmm I wonder if I know what shop this is! I think I have a loyalty card I purchased for £5 too. I’m 34 and I still have trouble saying no. I’m glad that you were able to get the situation resolved to your satisfaction. I hope Miss Frugal gets her confidence back soon.
Thank you for sharing your experience – my 11 year old daughter is just starting to be more independent in shops and I hadn't thought about this aspect. I shall be talking to her about it. I hope Miss Frugal sees the injustice and doesn't feel like she did anything wrong, because she didn't. She will be better prepared than others next time.
Thats awful! shows that lots of larger companies are just focused on sales rather than customers!
Miss Frugal has learned a very valuable lesson, which will help her in the future. It is not easy to say no and stick to it, it will help her stay out of debt in future.