A big one is grocery stores that function like membership clubs and restrict sales only to cardholders! If you're traveling it might be a chain you don't even have in your hometown, and the cards have troubling privacy possibilities. Even if a store currently has no intention of using customer-purchase data to market to the customer or share with third parties, a company that acquires it may not have such scruples. Only LAWS on that will help consumers, and the situation in the U.S. on those just isn't adequate. You can bet that any databases will be treated as important assets in any acquisition.

Also, Wal-Mart Supercenters just keep getting worse. They'll let lines back up rather than hire more people even at the $9-10 an hour they're paying as a way to prod people toward the "self-checkout." Those things just aren;t ready to deploy; they'll easily falsely accuse people of putting unscanned items into the bag (the weight mechanism doesn't really work, but they're paranoid about shoplifting), and a surprising number of things require "cashier approval" anyway. Like fuel-injector cleaning fluid. Wal-Mart had a great chance to scoop up customers who didn't want to always carry a lot of membership cards, but they're very close to blowing it.

I hate it when the bagger thinks it is OK to put my food in the same bag with household chemicals. I don't want my apples next to any household cleaners.

My other pet peeve is having soft items placed at the bottom of the bag instead of on top. Nothing like a loaf of squished bread

everyone (myself included) is complaing about the preferred shopper cards. one way to easily get around them is to use one from another store. it seems that most of them use the same set of numbers for their cards. i know that i can use the same card at CVS, Giant Eagle, and Kroger. Its easy at the self checkout...otherwise, I just scan it myself, because I've tried it before only to have the guy at Giant Eagle say "this is your kroger card"

Topless men. How disgusting.

During summer more and more MEN walk shirtless through stores. Sweaty, hairy, flabby men, bending over fruits and vegetables.

Sorry guys, that's vomit inducing, disgusting and not hygienic at all. And you are not nice to look at. Really not.

And I am not sure if I would be more pleased about topless women.....

W

No shirt
No shoes
No service

That's the way it is here so luckily I never see that. Now some of the clothing some people choose to wear shopping is just as bad.

Now I remember being in Arkansas years ago and watching everybody smoking as they shopped and watched one lady drop ashes into the vegetables she was looking at then put her cigarette out on a head of lettuce and throw the butt in amongst the heads of lettuce. Didn't eat for 2 days till we left and haven't been back in the state since.

I see no problem. I go to the store office and sign up with a ficticous name and a ficticous address. They give me a plastic card and I buy the goodies. It takes more than 2- minutes and the savings can be $10+. I keep a stash of the cards in my traveling pack.

MisterNice

Same here. I'm consistent, using the same name and address at each chain. It's an extended version of my "Starbucks name".

Dumbest retail question of all time? "Can I have your work number, please?", when paying by check (which I haven't done in decades).

I did not know the cards were interchangeable. I have used one that came from a different chain with the same parent, even after the parent sold one of them.

I was walking through a Walmart supermarket (something I do once on leap year) and a woman was in a bikini. That's it. No, coverup, skirt, sarong even. Just a bikini and high heels. Now, I would understand maybe if we were in a convenience store at the beach but we're in Las Vegas, a desert, in the middle of a strip mall. It's hot but that's something that shouldn't happen.

I have a couple of other pet peeves. One is when people behind me in the checkout line invade my personal space and are about 6 inches from me, esp. while I'm using the PIN pad.

The other was when I was in the checkout line with a six pack of soda and some other things. The guy behind me said I had too many items. I asked him if he was going to pay for his bunch of bananas one by one, too.

"...I go to the store office and sign up with a ficticous name and a ficticous address...." MisterNice
I've had to fill out their forms to get a discount also. Where it says "address or phone number" I just fill in "I live under a bridge". The manager informed me that I would not be able to cash a check.... I told him I didn't think the store was a bank and all I was seeking was my discount.

of course, all people who are gonna bonce a check or give a fake check will give their real phone number

it seems to work for me, at least so far. my grocery store in cleveland (heinens) doesn't event require the card to get the sale price

Definitely people who write checks. I specifically try to avoid going in lines with elderly women who always seem to be the ones to do this. If you want to use your checking account, just get an ATM card. Faster, safer, and easier.

As for the loyalty cards, I've gotten some applications where I can just check a box and not provide any information. In general, I do provide valid information though most of mine are now probably out of date. Not that I use them much anymore since I don't like any of the grocery stores around LA (either too expensive or not very good). I miss Wegman's from upstate NY (or actually most stores from northeast).

My Safeway store card from Maui works fine in CA, PA, DE etc. Actually I lost this card years ago but I give'm my Maui telephone number, they punch it in and say "Thank you MisterNice, your savings today are $6.27 or whatever." Also it is valid at a Genardi store etc.

MisterNice

In the local stores, if you have a check you sign it, hand it to them, and the register prints it out, it's actually faster then somebody banging away at the atm thing.

My new one, from this week - stores that close 15 minutes before their close time. I needed two things, and 15 minutes was plenty of time to get them, scan them, pay and leave. But no, they closed early.

I was able to go the two minutes to another store, get what I needed, check out, and be passing back by the first one still before their "closing time"

Because they don't want .99 in change.

Most stores around here have a "store" shoppers' card they'll use if you don't have one so you get the discount.