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O, To Be In England...

Here's something that some US citizens might not realise about the UK.
When we buy something in a shop, the item will have a price on the shelf, and that is the price you pay.
You don't take it to the checkout or cashier and then find that they have added on a tax of some sort.
Equally, if the pack is marked at a lower price than that displayed on the shelf edge, they are legally required to sell that item to you at the price marked on the pack.
If you use a self-service barcode scanner type of thing, carefully check your receipt as sometimes 'in store offers' like a BOGOF or 2-4-1 type thing might not be programmed into their system so if you were expecting to only pay half the full price because of a displayed offer, and it gets charged at full price, again the store is legally required to refund you to the correct amount.
 
Trevp666 said:
Equally, if the pack is marked at a lower price than that displayed on the shelf edge, they are legally required to sell that item to you at the price marked on the pack.
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Nope, a retailer has no obligation to sell you the product at the price on the label BUT it's illegal to display the wrong price.

I have kicked off about this in the past; saw a special offer, too my items to the till, been charged full price:
then gone back to the shelf/A-board, photographed it for proof, taken the photo, items and receipt back to the till and pointed out the mistake. :chuckle:
 
escargot said:
Nope, a retailer has no obligation to sell you the product at the price on the label BUT it's illegal to display the wrong price.

I have kicked off about this in the past; saw a special offer, too my items to the till, been charged full price:
then gone back to the shelf/A-board, photographed it for proof, taken the photo, items and receipt back to the till and pointed out the mistake. :chuckle:
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Sometimes it happens in our shop - offers change weekly, and sometimes the shelf edge tickets don't get replaced when the offer runs out. Usually we will just check if you say that you saw something advertised as, say £2.50 instead of £4.00 then we will sell it to you for the £2.50 you expected to pay. But if you are unpleasant about it or start shouting the odds, we will charge the full price. However, if a customer has put something back in the wrong place on the shelf, so it is over a ticket that says £1.00 when the item costs £5.00 but the ticket quite clearly states that it's for a different item, we won't. Although I do have a degree of discretion on the till and will sometimes mark it down for you if it was a genuine mistake.
 
catseye said:
Sometimes it happens in our shop - offers change weekly, and sometimes the shelf edge tickets don't get replaced when the offer runs out. Usually we will just check if you say that you saw something advertised as, say £2.50 instead of £4.00 then we will sell it to you for the £2.50 you expected to pay. But if you are unpleasant about it or start shouting the odds, we will charge the full price. However, if a customer has put something back in the wrong place on the shelf, so it is over a ticket that says £1.00 when the item costs £5.00 but the ticket quite clearly states that it's for a different item, we won't. Although I do have a degree of discretion on the till and will sometimes mark it down for you if it was a genuine mistake.
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Shops and businesses can be fined for displaying incorrect prices though.
 
escargot said:
Shops and businesses can be fined for displaying incorrect prices though.
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I think, and don't quote me on this because I don't have anything to do with pricing, but if the expiration date of the offer is displayed on the ticket, this doesn't apply because the shopper should be able to tell that the price no longer applies. If it's just an ordinary price ticket, and it definitely applies to that item (ie, that description and that weight/size) then yes, you are right. But you would not believe how many customers misread the tickets and think that the £2.00 for a 100g jar of sauce applies to the 500g jar of sauce on the shelf alongside. But because the ticket quite clearly says 100g, we don't have to sell them the 500g jar for £2.00. But quite a few customers try to argue the toss because they don't want to accept that they are wrong (or can't read properly).
 
catseye said:
I think, and don't quote me on this because I don't have anything to do with pricing, but if the expiration date of the offer is displayed on the ticket, this doesn't apply because the shopper should be able to tell that the price no longer applies. If it's just an ordinary price ticket, and it definitely applies to that item (ie, that description and that weight/size) then yes, you are right. But you would not believe how many customers misread the tickets and think that the £2.00 for a 100g jar of sauce applies to the 500g jar of sauce on the shelf alongside. But because the ticket quite clearly says 100g, we don't have to sell them the 500g jar for £2.00. But quite a few customers try to argue the toss because they don't want to accept that they are wrong (or can't read properly).
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I avoid shopping in Morrisons because when I do there's always a mistake or I'm overcharged and I have a row with them about it. :chuckle:
 
We did regular (probably every 3 or 4 months) training on retail pricing when I worked at one of the UKs largest retailers in their Head Office (supply chain). It shouldn't have been necessary really but not only did bits of retail law change frequently, but also the new staff sometimes didn't realise how important it was to be accurate about these things. Errors still crept in though, which I have documented elsewhere.
Like the 'bananas' fiasco which led to people buying whole pallets of boxes of bananas and abandoning them outside the store when they realised that the points they got on their loyalty cards were worth more than the bananas.
And another error with loyalty points which meant that customers were basically being paid to buy 'baby oil' from a certain manufacturer.
The 'offer dates' printed on the shelf-edge labelling are usually there for the staff and is printed very small which leads to a different retail issue which is 'offer perception' - it is illegal for labelling to appear to offer a bargain that doesn't actually match up to the reality of the deal, which prevents stores putting BIG signs on things proclaiming something like "90% off!" and then in small writing state "if bought at 3am on the second Tuesday of the month"
 
Also (and I'm not sure if they still do it) when they 'marked down' stock to clear it more quickly, the last digit would also reduce by 1p each time they marked it down (eg was 12.99 - now 11.98), so if you happened to see something on clearance at (eg) £4.63, you would know that it had gone through 6 'markdowns' already.
 
escargot said:
I avoid shopping in Morrisons because when I do there's always a mistake or I'm overcharged and I have a row with them about it. :chuckle:
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I'm glad it's not just me. On a few occasions I've been overcharged in Morrison's, which has led to me boycotting them for a few weeks.
 
My local Morrisons is usually pretty good. They have had some items just recently that didn't go through the tills at the price they should, and have refunded me, with one assistant exclaiming "Oh not again....everything seems to be going through at the wrong price today".
 
Found the perfect theme tune for this thread.
The late great Vivian Stanshall's Wheelbarrow, from the sublime Sir Henry at Rawlinson End:

"Sitting in a sunken garden...
Pinking in a sinking sun
Thinking of a summer long ago:
When one was twenty-one.

Naming all the flowers so friendly...
Shouting at the shrubs so thick
Lo, behold, Lobelia...
One bite and the Bishop was sick,

(Chorus:)
How nice to be in England...
Now that England's here,
I stand upright in my wheelbarrow,
And pretend I'm Boadicea."

 
I know this is about UK, but since USA has been discussed. Most stores use digital price tags/displays here in Norway, which of course are connected to the prices registered on a central computer in the store or chain, so there's no surprise when you pass through the check out.
 
Vardoger said:
I know this is about UK, but since USA has been discussed. Most stores use digital price tags/displays here in Norway, which of course are connected to the prices registered on a central computer in the store or chain, so there's no surprise when you pass through the check out.
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That's the way it's meant to work in the UK, however...
 
M6 sign.jpg
 
bugmum said:
Why has nobody mentioned the gloriousness of Devon? TWO coastlines, TWO moors (well, one and a bit), cream teas, the inspiration for Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, Agatha Christie and local news that reports "sheep on road" rather than "youth knifes other youth".

Plus, if you want Forteana, we have Berry Pomeroy castle, the Hairy Hands, ABCs, stone circles that I'm told still show signs of use, the man they couldn't hang and a UFO that burnt somebody. And Totnes, centre of weirdness for the county.
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That brings back memories - back in 1991 I hiked solo across Dartmoor for 5 days during a hot summer spell, sleeping in a bivvy bag, no tent (I wouldn't recommend this now for all sorts of reasons, but the most pressing one at the time was that daddy-long-legs were attracted to my body heat and the bag filled up with hundreds of unwanted companions).

Just above Postbridge, I came across a Bronze Age cist at dusk, and I put down my bivvy bag to sleep nearby, but kept seeing movement out of the corner of my eye coming from the cist (a small stone chamber that the Bronze Age folks used as burial chambers for their cremated dead). I went over to investigate, it's a long time ago now, but I don't think the cist can have been much more than a meter across, four upright slabs of stone formed the sides, maybe standing about a foot or slightly more above ground. It was topped with another slab laid across it, but there were big enough gaps in the sides (perhaps six inches at the corners) that with a torch I could see inside the small chamber. Inside the small chamber was a dead adult sheep in advanced decomposition. So someone (actually more than one person, because those slabs of rock are heavy) had lifted the lid of this cist, put the sheep in (presumably already dead), and resealed the cist. It creeped me out enough that I moved on to sleep a bit further down the valley.
 
escargot said:
I avoid shopping in Morrisons because when I do there's always a mistake or I'm overcharged and I have a row with them about it. :chuckle:
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I always keep my receipt and check it before I leave and again more thoroughly when I get home. Even if I've only been overcharged by 10p on something I'll get my money back. Principal.

Until recently I hadn't used our Lidl for about 5-6 years, due to the fact that the service at the tills was terrible- people queing up the aisles as far as the eye could see, and also because just about every time I went in there'd be a mistake with the price on at least one item I'd bought- but they've done it up now and it's much better and different staff. (And far better quality/price on veg/salad than Sainsburys.)
 
Floyd1 said:
Even if I've only been overcharged by 10p on something I'll get my money back. Principal.
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Indeed.
I remember being in a pub once when my mate was short-changed by 50p and when he told the bar staff they 'looked down their nose' at him and said, disparagingly, "It's only 50p!", to which he replied "Yeah....but it's MY 50p!", and they said they couldn't open the till so wouldn't refund him.
Later on in the evening he went and got a round of drinks and counted out the money to pay and deliberately handed over exactly 50p short.
The bar staff said in an annoyed tone "Hey . . . It's 50p short!" and he replied (of course)...."Oh, but It's only 50p"....
 
Trevp666 said:
Indeed.
I remember being in a pub once when my mate was short-changed by 50p and when he told the bar staff they 'looked down their nose' at him and said, disparagingly, "It's only 50p!", to which he replied "Yeah....but it's MY 50p!", and they said they couldn't open the till so wouldn't refund him.
Later on in the evening he went and got a round of drinks and counted out the money to pay and deliberately handed over exactly 50p short.
The bar staff said in an annoyed tone "Hey . . . It's 50p short!" and he replied (of course)...."Oh, but It's only 50p"....
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Overcharging pub customers for drinks is so common it's more or less normal. Staff have to get their tips somehow. :wink2:
They normally target drunks so your mate was sharp to spot it.

*waits patiently for the* :sstorm:
 
Trevp666 said:
Indeed.
I remember being in a pub once when my mate was short-changed by 50p and when he told the bar staff they 'looked down their nose' at him and said, disparagingly, "It's only 50p!", to which he replied "Yeah....but it's MY 50p!", and they said they couldn't open the till so wouldn't refund him.
Later on in the evening he went and got a round of drinks and counted out the money to pay and deliberately handed over exactly 50p short.
The bar staff said in an annoyed tone "Hey . . . It's 50p short!" and he replied (of course)...."Oh, but It's only 50p"....
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I'd argue for 1p let alone 50p!
 
CharmerKamelion said:
Re: scons/scones, I gotta say, the whole "jam first/cream first" thing baffles me. Just slap the bloody stuff on any old how and get it down your neck. Honestly.
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Yup, scones are Scottish so they should be referred to with that distinctive kilt-and-sporran inflection.

As for the jam/cream first dilemma: I'm off to Morrisons later* to purchase a ready-assembled Cream Tea Kit. You get the scones, jam and cream all ready to lob together and cram down the gizzard.
I will conduct the experiment in private **and report back later.

* For another row. sigh
** Techy's not having any.
 
escargot said:
Yup, scones are Scottish so they should be referred to with that distinctive kilt-and-sporran inflection.

As for the jam/cream first dilemma: I'm off to Morrisons later* to purchase a ready-assembled Cream Tea Kit. You get the scones, jam and cream all ready to lob together and cram down the gizzard.
I will conduct the experiment in private **and report back later.

* For another row. sigh
** Techy's not having any.
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Apparently scones were mentioned in Virgil's Aenaid around 29 BC, but it's unclear whether the ancient Trojans put their cream or jam on first.
 
escargot said:
Overcharging pub customers for drinks is so common it's more or less normal. Staff have to get their tips somehow. :wink2:
They normally target drunks so your mate was sharp to spot it.

*waits patiently for the* :sstorm:
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I once read a book called "How to be a Yorkshireman." about a southerner moving to North Yorkshire. The author related a story about taking his neighbour to the pub and buying him a pint.

The Yorkshireman picked up his pint, carefully examined it and asked the barman. "Could you squeeze a whiskey in that?"
"Of course sir."
"Well fill it with bloody ale then"
 
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