Talk:Loyalty program

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The article needs to add a discussion of the use of loyalty cards in the US, plus any other countries where they are used outside of Great Britain and Canada. gK ¿? 04:34, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Contents 1 Merge from cashback/Loyalty programs or loyalty cards? 2 Green Shield Stamps 3 Unencyclopædic level of detail? 4 Inaccuracy

[edit] Merge from cashback/Loyalty programs or loyalty cards?

This article is supposed to be about loyalty programs but instead focusses exclusively on loyalty cards, without describing the actual mechanism of loyalty programs in the detail required of an encyclopedia article (e.g. discounts, points systems, vouchers etc.) This needs to be rectified. I've also proposed a merge from cashback as this seems (to me at least) to actually contain the type of info this article should contain. Zunaid 08:48, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with the proposed merge. First, cashback is even more of a mess than this article, with many grammar, spelling, and factual errors. For example, loyalty programs were around in crude paper form long before e-commerce, in forms like the traditional paper ticket with punched holes. Second, many (if not most) loyalty programs do not provide cash back, in the sense of real legal tender or currency that can be spent at any merchant. Instead, they only provide discounts on future purchases from the same merchant.

When I hear cash back, I think of my Visa credit card which gives me 1% cash back on all purchases, and not those Safeway coupons that reward my loyal use of my Safeway Club Card by giving me $2 off my next purchase of milk at Safeway.

I agree entirely, and this is the most common meaning in the UK too. NFH 13:00, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Of course, it's possible that we may be encountering yet another dialect difference between the U.S. and the Commonwealth. Can anyone in the Commonwealth please weigh in?--Coolcaesar 17:29, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

In the UK, "cashback" is most commonly used in three contexts: 1. Credit cards, whereby one receives a percentage (usually at least 0.5%) annual rebate of all expenditure on a credit card; 2. Cash added to a debit card transaction, whereby the merchant (typically supermarket, pub, post office) gives cash to the customer, which is added to the transaction amount charged to the debit card (made possible by a fixed fee paid by the merchant for UK debit card transactions) - merchants encourage this cashback because it is free way to offload surplus cash compared to the costs of taking cash to their bank (including insurance costs etc); 3. Mortgages, whereby one receives a lump sum from a mortgage lender (to put towards buying furniture etc) at the start of the mortgage, which marketed as free cash but is in fact paid for through the mortgage interest rate. NFH 13:00, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Green Shield Stamps

There seems to be no Wikipedia article on green shield stamps, the grandaddy of the loyalty card, introduced (I think) by Tesco in the 70s. Should this oversight be corrected?!? Something more on these stamps (scroll down to #3): http://tv.cream.org/specialreport/bringthemback/5-1.htm Richard W.M. Jones 19:24, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

I remember NAAFI also giving out stamps - I believe they were a discount scheme of some sort but being sent by my mum at age 8 or 9 to do some last-minute shopping I had no idea what the lady at the checkout was trying to give me :-) PeteVerdon 00:49, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unencyclopædic level of detail?

Just going through the article, there seems to be a very high level of detail in describing loyalty card schemes for different stores in each country. One or two examples should suffice for the entire article. Also, is it necessary to describe the different schemes by country? The only factor should surely be the different mechanisms involved (e.g. discounts, vouchers, points systems) regardless of the country. Zunaid 08:57, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I believe further detail should be given, although it might be better to have links to this information on the articles on the stores in question. -Tim Rhymeless (Er...let's shimmy) 09:15, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

No, I don't think providing a description of every loyalty card program in the world is such a good idea. In some places it gives too much detail; a list of loyalty programs may be a better idea. A brief overview of loyalty programs in each region of the world should suffice. What the article needs most is a references section. Richard001 21:37, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Inaccuracy

Some supermarket customer loyalty cards inadvertently work at the scanners of other non-affiliated stores. For example, a Kroger card has been successfully recognized as a respective loyal club member at stores in the Food Lion, Pathmark and Winn-Dixie chains. [citation needed]

This is not what the article implies. Store cards are printed using the same black bar design as UPC codes and store cards are entered into the computer as a sequence of 11 digit numbers. There are merely recognized differently from product UPCs. So a Kroger card isn't the same as a Food Lion card, as the Food Lion company may have assigned that particular number to a different customer.