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‘The tyranny of apps’: those without smartphones are unfairly penalised, say campaigners
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 22 Feb 2025
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I'm in California where we have a grocery chain, Safeway. They've had a loyalty card for decades, which works great, gets you good deals, can be scanned by the checkout clerk or at self checkout. It also racks up points which can be used for discounts.
About 2 years ago I started seeing signs in the store offering even greater savings through the app. There will sometimes be 2 signs side by side for the loyalty card vs the app. The app is always a better deal.
So I downloaded the app and learned
It's the dumbest thing ever. Why not just offer the better savings to the loyalty card? Isn't that the whole point behind loyalty? I literally shop at Safeway less often now.
it's not a flaw. it's a feature.
Loyalty cards werent a great thing either.
They werent to reward your loyalty, they were to tie your purchase history to an individual, So that information can be used and sold for marketing purposes.
It was basically the prototype for the invasive, information stealing apps we have today.
Can't your purchases be tied to you via credit/debit card number? I mean obviously you can use cash, but I don't see a lot of people using cash
yes, that still doesnt give the store your home address, phone number, etc etc like signing up for a rewards card does.
Food Lion (East coast, not sure if they're national) has a fairly good loyalty program. Your loyalty card number on the physical card or in the app are the same, you can load coupons to it so they're applied at checkout if they're relevant, you can use their ordinary website if you don't have/want to use a smart phone app...it's non-cancerous.
My GF laughs because I have no loyalty cards or apps and I laugh that she has one for everything.
Loyalty rewards are bullshit.
In the US, if you don't have the loyalty card, you're paying more for groceries. For the stores we use, any sale prices are contingent upon using the loyalty card. This can add up to $5-$10 per order.
I use a loyalty card pretty often. It's just that it is almost always another customer's card) And in case this is not available - a barcode of some rando's loyalty card I found online, the valid ones are often easy to find.
We used to be free from such bullshit, but some companies have started trying to bring similar systems here in Brazil, especially drugstore brands that would ask for our id number in every order to give "discounts". Fortunately, this practice is now being investigated, and I hope the companies lose the case.
Oh the same bullshit is done here with Loblaws. I don't care. They have my info every time I use my credit card at their store that's all they need and it's all they get.
If I have to pay more because they're greedy little fuckpigs so be it.