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| My haul at Vons for $57.54 |
After spending an hour+ getting your coupons ready, begging
your husband to watch the kids, and brushing your hair for the first time in a
week the very last thing you want to deal with when grocery store shopping is a
problem with your coupons. Sadly, some
stores make it very hard to follow every single coupon rule because they are
NOT consistent!
I’ve learned as a parent it is hard to have high
expectations for your children to succeed if you don’t have your expectations
clearly stated and if you don’t stay consistent with your follow through and
your discipline. It becomes extremely
frustrating when a child gets punished for a rule they didn’t even know about;
which is exactly how I felt last Saturday evening.
After filling my cart full of groceries and triple checking
to make sure my coupons were in order and all correct (items match the coupons,
etc) I decided to stand in line at Vons.
I was out of the area shopping for other deals, so I was not at my
regular Vons; which was a red flag right there.
After the cashier rang up my order and I handed her my
coupons she started to deny them immediately.
She said that it was their policy to only accept 3 identical manufacture
coupons. That was news to me, there is
no policy about this on their website nor has my regular Vons ever mentioned
it. Her next denial had to do with
having 2 coupons (different) for the same manufacture. So she allowed me 3 coupons for Cheerios but
she wouldn’t accept any coupons for Cinnamon Toast Crunch because they were
both GM products. The manager then
approached and confirmed her coupon rules.
I was in shock and highly disappointed. So how should you react when you are being
denied your coupons for reasons not listed on their website? Remain calm & Coupon on.
Now this is much harder to do at the moment when neither the
cashier nor the manager will listen to you, they won’t look at the copy of their
own coupon policy that you so perfectly packed in your bag, and the line is
starting to get very long with some pretty ticked off people. Take a deep breath, explain your reasons for
disagreeing, take down their names, and do not buy the items that were denied
coupons. You will most likely feel the
heat radiate off the people in line who are fuming mad. But this is not your problem; they can either
find a new line or wait their turn.
Do not feel pressure to purchase full price items because a
manager has decided to make up a policy.
If you were only buying the item because of the sale price, then hand it
back and ask for it to be removed off of your receipt. Then, make sure you get back the coupons that
were denied.
The last thing I want to stress is that you must CALL
CORPORATE. If you feel like
you were treated unfair or if you are disappointed that their coupon policy states
“Safeway
reserves the right to refuse any coupons at its discretion” which allows
individual stores to create their own rules then complain. Change will not occur unless people speak up.
As
for me, I contacted corporate and received phone calls immediately from local
management. I appreciated their immediate
attention to the situation; however, policies need to change. Coupon shoppers are not criminals and shouldn’t
be made to feel that way in front of the other shoppers, especially when they
have followed every rule listed on the corporate website.
Now, I’m going to jump off this pedestal, stop
preaching, and go back to enjoying this hot afternoon with my kids. How are you keeping cool? We are watching movies. While eating my coupon purchased popcorn! J
