Comments on: Consumer Tip: Scanning Code of Practice

By: carol iwasaki

carol iwasaki — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 00:06:50 +0000

whole foods, cambie, vancouver does not subscribe to the code notwithstanding their statement of “core values”

By: Lc

Lc — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 22:27:43 +0000

to the people that think “it’s not worth the time and hassle…..” . This practice is to keep retailers in line. If more people would watch the prices as well as refuse to give in to convenience pricing (purchase the overpriced item just because they are too lazy to chose something else), retailers would have to be more competative.

By: Chris Frame

Chris Frame — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 01:49:02 +0000

Home Depot :Big Disappointment

I just left a Home Depot where one of the items I purchased rang up 3.99 instead of 3.84.I was buying 10 of them. I mentioned it to the cashier who said she would ring it in for the correct price, I mentioned SCOP and she said she did not know anything about that, I would have to go to the “Customer Service” desk. The clerk at customer service said she had never heard of SCOP and offered me the product for the self price, I asked to speak to the manager. The manager came over and said “The Home Depot no longer supports SCOP, we got a very large memo saying we were no longer to give the product for free”. I said what is to protect me the customer when your staff forget to change prices and I pay more than I should. THE MANAGER SAID ” you can’t expect us to change all the prices on the shelf when the prices change in the computer, can you” In disbelief, I asked for my money back and went next store to WalMart and bought the product for for $0.22 cheaper. No more Home Depot for me.

By: Ms Save Money

Ms Save Money — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 20:48:29 +0000

This is pretty cool. I live in Southern California and a few years back I was at Albertsons – bought a really big tray of strawberries for my class since we had a pot luck for the end of the semester. I don’t remember how much it cost but I think it was around $19. Anyhow, it was miss labeled and I got it for free. :)

By: Robert

Robert — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 19:21:13 +0000

As a follow up, I was in Canadian Tire on Thursday and purchased a $15 air filter than scanned at $16. The cashier on the self-checkout knew all about the SCOP and was very fast in giving me the item for $5. I was pleased to see that each checkout at my store has a statement of the SCOP on it. I am sure not many people read it, though…

Seems it depends on who you get. Be firm and polite and refuse to give in!

By: skip

skip — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 18:59:22 +0000

“CT’s policy is actually to give $10 off the DISPLAYED price (not the corrected price),”

ALL stores abiding by the SCOP must take the $10 ff the correct price, which is the incorrectly displayed lower price

By: Debbi W

Debbi W — Sun, 31 May 2009 15:41:33 +0000

I had this experience at Canadian Tire last week. An item displayed at $14.99 scanned at $17.99. The cashier didn’t know what to do, so I paid and then took the receipt and item to Customer Service. The cashier there had someone check the display price, and then told me she’d refund me and then ring up the item at $14.99. I refused and asked for a copy of their SCOP in writing, to confirm that this is the correct procedure. There is definitely some staff training required – it seemed she had no idea what the SCOP was! She ended up calling her manager (who also seemed clueless), and eventually found a sticker near the main cashiers – CT’s policy is actually to give $10 off the DISPLAYED price (not the corrected price), so in the end I paid $4.99.

By: Canadian Finance

Canadian Finance — Fri, 29 May 2009 15:42:44 +0000

I normally shop at Sobeys and most of my items are from the weekly flyer. I write down the things to get, plus the price in the flyer. So it’s easy to keep my eye on the price on the till display and on my grocery list.

By: Sampson

Sampson — Thu, 28 May 2009 21:29:07 +0000

I didn’t know it at the time, but one Sobey’s Manager actually invoked the SCOP for me. They had left the sale display out by accident so I just wanted clarification on the pricing, when the Manager came back after checking, he gave me the item for FREE!!!

Good man.

My wife and I are hawks when it comes to checking pricing, and do it as the cashier scans the item so we don’t have to wait in the customer service line and get them to fix it at the til.

By: Robert

Robert — Thu, 28 May 2009 20:11:25 +0000

Shopper’s Drug Mart most recently and Real Canadian Stupidstore all the time. Sobey’s too. At SDM I almost messed myself up as I was willing to settle for the correct price, and not a free frozen pizza. But they refused even that, so I wrote the manager a letter and during that process I remembered the SCOP. I even looked it up and quoted the section to him. I got my free pizza, eventually.

I am often tempted on a large shopping trip to take a pen or pencil and scribble the shelf price or displayed price on each item as I put it in the basket.

Many (most?) of the items I get on this deal are where sale prices were advertised on shelf, and never taken down after the sale. I got a couple of boxes of ceral at Sobey’s once, the “sale” sticker was over a week out of date … it was taken down when the manager checked the shelf price, but I got no argument.

By: laketown

laketown — Thu, 28 May 2009 02:24:18 +0000

I have used at Superstore a few times with no problem. Walmart with some explaining. Note, Zellers does not honour SCOP :(

By: CD Rates Guy

CD Rates Guy — Wed, 27 May 2009 22:18:32 +0000

Wow, first time I’ve ever heard of this! In America, it’s hard enough to get people to price match even when they advertise it let alone get an item for free.

By: Alex.

Alex. — Wed, 27 May 2009 14:33:28 +0000

Home Depot is a shop I really love the “Scanning Code of Practice” and where it really works well.

Most of the time the employees don’t know about it, but they listen! :)

My wife spotted blinds, which were reduced to 18$ from 69$. Well, the cashier did not have the right price in the system and I showed her a picture I took with my cell and we got it for 8$.

By: Stephen

Stephen — Tue, 26 May 2009 14:59:28 +0000

Remember everyone, the SCOP only applies if the item rings up at a higher price at the cash register. If the item actually rings up for cheaper then you aren’t supposed to get any discount because you are making out better than your originally thought. At least one poster seemed to indicate that they asked for a discount even if the price error was already in their favour.

It used to be that it was only applicable to “non price ticketed items” as well in that if the item had a price actually stuck on it (instead of just on the shelf) then you would get the lower of the ticketed price or the scanned price but no further discount. Don’t know if this is still the case or not. It isn’t mentioned in the block quoted text above but I’m pretty sure I’ve read it on the SCOP site before and on various signs found in store.

I’ve used SCOP at Superstore and Shoppers Drug Mart … possibly Walmart as well (can’t remember).

By: FrugalTrader

FrugalTrader — Tue, 26 May 2009 03:18:34 +0000

If the cashier makes the scanning mistake, we simply complete the checkout with the wrong price, and bring the receipt to customer service. They’re the ones who usually take care of the refund.

By: Audree

Audree — Tue, 26 May 2009 00:17:23 +0000

i know someone in QC who switched prices to make sure she would get her lasagna for free. Seriously.

By: cannon_fodder

cannon_fodder — Mon, 25 May 2009 18:37:06 +0000

I’d agree that you have to mention SCOP as no one from the store is going to volunteer on your behalf. I’m not sure how, but I can remember pretty much every price of every item I put in the shopping cart when I grocery shop and I always watch the monitor. Thank goodness most of the grocery stores are modern and they have PC-like displays where you can see the last several items.

On a bit of a side note – I was at Real Canadian Super Store on Friday and they ran out of the 400g box of cereal I wanted. The young woman who was putting product away checked with her manager and confirmed none in the back. I noticed that they had an 800g box of the same cereal so I asked if it would be possible to pay 2x the sale price on the 400g and she said sure.

I love it when a plan comes together.

By: Sampson

Sampson — Mon, 25 May 2009 18:11:40 +0000

Hey FT,

You’re streaming online!! congrats on the interview!

http://events.insinc.com/questrade/20090525/player.php?test=1#

By: Caitlin

Caitlin — Mon, 25 May 2009 17:38:31 +0000

I’ve found what happens more often than not is when you mention to the cashier that an item rang up incorrectly, 9 times out of 10 their first instinct is to just refund the original price and re-ring it at the proper price. The Scanning Code gets used so infrequently (because your Average Joe either doesn’t know it exists or just forgets about it) that even if the cashier had been trained on it when they were hired (it was probably only touched on briefly), if they have never actually done it before they are not likely to remember what they are supposed to do.
If this happens, just keep calm. They are not trying to rip you off or “punish” you by making you wait while someone checks the sign on the shelf. Keep in mind that, to be honest, people try to rip them off every day, and a good cashier learns to be wary of customers complaining about being charged incorrectly. I was a cashier for 5 years, and over 70% of “incorrect scanning” cases were due to a customer misreading a price sign (eg the Brand X was on sale but the customer grabbed Brand Y instead, or the sale sign said it was for the 750g box but the customer grabbed the 1.5kg box). The other 30% were brought to the attention of the store manager and properly dealt with.
If you come across a cashier who doesn’t know what to do for the Scanning Code, talk to the manager even if you get it corrected properly with the cashier. It’s possible they will have do some re-training on the Code to make sure all their cashiers are aware of the practise. If you don’t speak up, the manager might not know that the cashiers do not know the proper procedure.
In the case of the argumentative WalMart cashier above… well, she was either poorly trained or just plain ignored the training, and needed that wake-up call! Hopefully she’ll remember (and be much more polite) in the future.

By: Four Pillars

Four Pillars — Mon, 25 May 2009 17:27:11 +0000

I honestly can’t see this being worth the time and hassle. I don’t mind telling the cashier that the can of beans should be $1.59 instead of $1.99 but am I going go through a lot of hassle to get that free $1.59 can of beans?

Not a chance.