Loyalty - a strong feeling of support or allegiance.
Loyal- giving or showing firm and constant support.
Now that I have the meaning out of the way let me tell you what this is about.
It is about ‘Loyalty cards’ and I have never felt supported by having them!
It is believed that the early roots of customer loyalty programs started with “premium marketing” in the late 18th century. At this time, retailers began to give customers copper tokens with purchases that could be later redeemed for products, on future purchases. Loyalty and rewards programs have now become commonplace in our society.
As a young lad, which now seems like eons ago, we collected bottle tops, opened cans to see if the word, “Lucky winner” was engraved on the inside flap and bought various types of snacks and chewing gums etc in an attempt to get lucky .
No such luck ever dawned on me or on anyone I know.
Now a days, in every part of the world, every corner store, grocery, supermarket, hotel chain, gymnasium and the like have their own version of loyalty programmes. Me, being a sucker for loyalty, have any number of cards in my wallet – so much for privacy and all that hogwash.
Let me relate three short instances that actually enlightened me about these ‘Loyalty cards’ and how they work. By the way, all told me made me believe that I was a very special and valued customer!
The first was when I was on a business trip a few years ago & checking into a well-known five-star hotel in Mumbai. On this occasion they were giving me a room with ‘no view’ whatsoever. With a certain amount of elan and oodles of confidence, I pulled out their loyalty card and asked them whether it stood for anything at all. The pretty young lady at the counter smiled & said “Sir, all our customers have these cards”. I never quite understood why I was carrying their card around in the first place.
The second was the Loyalty card of a very large mall. I was given the black and gold edged card after shopping one evening and was congratulated on joining the special programme for valued customers. I gathered points for many months, every time I made a purchase and was regularly intimated by mail about how many points were in my kitty. I often saw people redeeming their points while clearing their bill, but I felt that I would rather gather more points and redeem them once and for all. Silly, stupid me.
Then for some obscure reason, we stopped going to that mall as we found one closer to home. A few months later we happened to be at that same mall , and it dawned on me that I may as well ‘cash in’. So, I walked up to the ‘Customer Care counter’ and produced my card. I had a few thousand points and was pleased as punch as finally I was going to pay my bill with my ‘loyalty card’. You have guessed what happened- The programme had been cancelled! They asked me if I wanted to join a New and Revised Loyalty Programme !
No, was my vehement answer. Obviously.
This morning I completed the grocery shopping at the Hyper market next door and produced my ‘Loyalty card’ to pay my bill.
After two people stared at the card long and hard, logged into a computer to confirm details, talked to a superior in under tones on a phone, asked me my name and mobile number & confirmed that I was the rightful owner of the card and no impersonator, they told me very politely that I had already used my points. It was almost like an inquisition.
They smiled, with a certain degree of satisfaction while doing so, and I felt rather stupid. I could swear that the couple behind me were sniggering, but I could be wrong.
That is when I almost lost it! I was vehement that the points had never been redeemed. By now there were about six or seven people in the line behind me and I was being given dirty looks as they were getting delayed. So, I did what was right – I paid my bill with cash but was still determined to find out about the so-called card, and why I could not redeem it.
Finally, after much humming and hawing and checking their app on my mobile phone, I was assured that the next time I shopped there, they would redeem my card. To their credit they offered me some sanitizer and a tissue to clean my phone. I smiled and looked around to see if anyone was listening – all those who were behind me had paid and left .
Knowing my luck and the way these cards function, I will not be surprised that the programme gets canceled and a new one starts mid- week
Keeping my fingers crossed!
I must add, that filling in the forms for these cards is quite painful as well. They need their ‘valued customers’ to fill in their name, father’s name, date of birth, mobile number, address, weight, height, income, birth mark and what have you ( okay that may be a bit exaggerated) but I guess you get the drift – so much for privacy !
Not sure why, but I always seem to fall for these ‘Loyalty programmes’
They are fun – aren’t they?
