Nectar Card / Club Card Prices - unfair ?

[ed_pete]

I'm wondering how long the supermarkets can run these schemes that discount the price of items for those with a loyalty card. As so often is the case these days it seems to exclude those in society that don't have access / can't use technology.  And the price difference can be large, for example I bought some sugar in Sainsburys yesterday (cake baking) and the normal non-Nectar price was £2.05, the Nectar price was £1.15 - that's a huge difference.  The Nectar price of some tomatoes was 75% of the non-Nectar price.  It seems unfair to exclude these lower prices from those that don't have a supermarket loyalty card.

[Froglander]

Wow, that’s a huge difference!

[Twoddle]

With the Tesco one you need a good connection to the internet in the store to use it at the till. Sometimes they have WiFi but the App still takes ages to open. I ordered the card version but of course it never arrived in the post.

The Coop one is insulting, takes me six months of regular shopping to build up a couple of quid on the card. They had adverts on the telly recently advertising huge discounts, that lasted a couple of weeks on very few actual products.

Of course the real reason for these schemes is so they can collect data on you so they can charge more. Look what happened to the price of milk and baked beans. Express Coop don't even stock their own brand of baked beans any more. Prices correlate with calorific count these days so you can't escape it.

It's artificial intelligence gone mad and what the computer says goes, no human interaction except for them to tell you what the computer says.

Edited October 15, 2023 by Twoddle

[Pugwash]

There was a recent article in Which Magazine which queried the validity of these savings as they found that some nectar prices related to costs a couple of months (some times weeks ago) and the 'new full price' had been deliberately inflated.

[alice]

Nevertheless if you don’t use the card you pay the higher price

[ed_pete]

59 minutes ago, alice said:

Nevertheless if you don’t use the card you pay the higher price

Exactly.  It would be different if you paid for the card in the first place but you don't.  Just curious - is it possible to have a card without access to a computer and/or an email address ?

[Castleton]

You & Yours on R4 covered this yesterday, interesting listen

[Guest]

Get a card and get your discount. well worth doing. 

[Guest]

Actually, it is the You and Yours programme from 16/10/23

Check prices between supermarkets and see who is offering the lowest price and if the loyalty card helps you get that, them all well and good.

But it is on branded items not supermarket own brands, however you gain points (minimal that equate to money)

 

[ed_pete]

According to the You and Yours report, the CMA (Competitions and Markets Authority) is looking at supermarket pricing and due to report back in a few months.