I have the feeling that I was misunderstood first time round, so I’m trying again.  Here’s my second email to Waitrose customer services:

Dear Lorraine,

Thanks for your email, but I think that you have missed the point of my original email.

I understand that it is company policy to insist on customers having a partnership or account card to use your quick scan service, and that is what I am querying the ethics of.

It seems unethical to insist that customers apply for credit with you to use the quick scan service, even though, as your very friendly and helpful quick scan lady told me, you don’t have to use the credit card.  But is that not putting unnecessary temptation to use credit in the way of customers who simply want to use the quick scan service?  You only have to read the newspapers these days to be told that record numbers of the British public are in debt up to their eyeballs, and that three times the number of people have declared themselves bankrupt this year compared to just 2 years ago.

The quick scan service is attractive to me, and so I’m sure to many other housewives and mothers too.  Many people will, therefore, have no problem in applying for credit so that they can use this service.  Once the credit card is there, it’s easier to spend on it without thinking about it.

I will not apply for a credit card on principle, and am therefore excluded from being able to use a service that would be most useful to me during Waitrose shopping trips.  So, to improve my supermarket experience with small children, I will consider taking my custom to Sainbury’s where I can use their quick scan service without being required to sign up for one of their "financial services".

To re-iterate what I said in my previous email, I have chosen Waitrose as a place I like to shop because of your admirable ethics, sourcing local foods, making sure that products are from fairly traded sources, and stocking so many natural and eco-friendly cleaning products and toiletries.  So this approach to getting people to sign up for credit took me by surprise, I didn’t expect it from Waitrose.

Yours sincerely,

Tracy Stokes 

Well, it seems that I received the standard customer services reply from Waitrose, and that no-one bothered to read my email properly.  Here’s what I got:

Dear Ms Stokes, 

Thank you for your E-mail

I was most concerned to learn of your experience when shopping at our Goldsworth Park branch, and I hope you will accept my sincere apologies.

We pride ourselves at Waitrose on the emphasis we put on Customer Service and quite simply in your case we have let ourselves down. I have taken this opportunity to discuss your concerns with the Branch Duty Manager who would like to extend his apologies.

However he has stated that it is the company policy in order to use the quick check you would have to have a partnership or account card . Payment for goods does need to be made using this card so only needed in order to release the handset .

Please accept my apologies for any inconvience or dissappointment caused .

Thank you again for taking the time and trouble to bring this matter to my attention. I can assure you that your experience does not reflect the high standards we aim to achieve and hope you will continue to shop with us at Waitrose in Goldsworth Park.

Regards,

Lorraine Laye

Waitrose Customer Service.

It is with a certain degree of guilt that I set off on supermarket shopping trips these days.  I believe that locally sourced food is better for the environment and the local economy, and so I prefer to shop at a local farm shop when possible.  But, and it’s a big but, I still need things that aren’t available at the farm shop or in a local shop, our village has become one of take-aways, estate agents and very few proper local shops since Sainsburys arrived on the scene a few years ago.

We have a Co-op in the village that is good for picking up organic milk and the odd Ecover product, but I can’t get Ecover dishwasher tablets, rinse-aid or washing powder there.  They don’t stock much organic produce, and what they do is imported.

The nearest alternative to Sainsburys is Waitrose.  It is situated in a shopping centre in the centre of a housing estate near our village, is closer for me to get to than Sainsbury’s, and although it is smaller, it is often less crowded.  The store recently re-opened with a bigger store and a better selection of organic products, I was delighted to see that I’ll now easily be able to get hold of natural shampoos, conditioners, hand soap, cleaning products as well as ethically fished seafood, local(ish) meat and organic British veggies (not that we need many of these with the allotment).  I was quite excited to see that they had introduced a new "quick scan" service to speed up the queueing process at the end (people with small children appreciate this sort of technology), however, you have to sign up for a  credit card in order to use this service.  Ethical alarm-bells starting going off!  How ethical is it to force customers to apply for credit in order to use store-services?  I’ve writted to Waitrose to enquire about the ethics of this and wait to hear from them.

In the meantime, I still hestitate over my shopping choices. 

I bank with smile, the internet bank.  Have done for the past 6 or 7 years.  They really are a super bank, great interest rates, friendly and eager to please, their online interface is easy to use, very secure, and whats more, they are as ethical as a bank comes.  Just incase I had forgotten how much I liked them, they sent me a bag of sunflower seeds last week, to grow my own bouquet.  I’m smiling!  There’s even a contest to see which customer can grow the biggest sunflower.  What a cool bank!

And, if anyone reading this is interested in joining smile , they are offering you 12 bottles of wine to you and to me (for up to 3 people signing up for a current account as a result of my praises of them).

Here’s the technical stuff:

To make sure you get your wine, you’ll need to enter your special offer code when you apply: BCHAEIBHDAFG

Visit http://friends.smile.co.uk now to apply – it’s easy peasy.

And just in case you were wondering what else you might be missing out on with your current bank:

• 3.04% AER (3.00% gross) on every penny when you’re in credit
• £500 12 month fee-free overdraft, to help out when you need it
• a dedicated team to make switching simple and hassle-free
• 24/7 control over your account
• the only on-line bank with an ethical policy.

You don’t have to take our word for it either, since a massive 95% of our customers would recommend us to their friends! *

* Nunwood customer research, November 2005.