Frederick Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 Today in Makro UK I think I came accross a French trained supervisor . The store recovering from a power cut with systems playing up had a bit of paper on the door "Cash only " Forced to limit my purchases to within what cash I carried I got to the check out to find the till and bar code scanners working and printing out the lists of purchases plus or minus vat as they do . The card readers were not working for bank transfers . I said to supervisor " I have my cheque book and £250 bank card . I would like to get all my purchases and pay by cheque " Reply " We cant print the cheques at the moment " I said " I will write it out you can put the card number on the back " reply "We are not allowed to take hand written cheques You will have to pay by cash " Thousands of pounds of lost sales today I suspect as cheque carrying customers walked away and Sunday in the UK is a big shopping day . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Coeur de Lion Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 hahahah serves them right. Won't take hand written cheques. How pathetic, obviously they must be doing well in the recession. Don't they want money? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quillan Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 Actually I think I know the answer to this.In France they use a system where when they print the cheque the system automatically checks to see if the money is in the account and/or gets a guarantee from your bank that they will get the money. I think the money is then 'reserved' until the cheque arrives/is presented at the bank.I guess somebody somewhere, probably a bean counter, sent a directive out to say if the system is down don't take a check in case it bounces. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frederick Posted November 15, 2009 Author Share Posted November 15, 2009 Quillan.... You have cracked it ! Now I understand ...does not make me feel better after a 30 mile wasted trip though . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Coeur de Lion Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 [quote user="Quillan"]Actually I think I know the answer to this.In France they use a system where when they print the cheque the system automatically checks to see if the money is in the account and/or gets a guarantee from your bank that they will get the money. I think the money is then 'reserved' until the cheque arrives/is presented at the bank.I guess somebody somewhere, probably a bean counter, sent a directive out to say if the system is down don't take a check in case it bounces.[/quote]And yet they will lose far more money by applying that directive compared to the small chance that a cheque might bounce. Plus they annoy customers in the process. Oh well, their choice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quillan Posted November 16, 2009 Share Posted November 16, 2009 Aah but you are using English logic, which is of course always right [:-))]. When you have been here a while you will understand that French logic (?) is a little different to ours. Just do what they do, pout and shrug your shoulders then go to a nice restaurant, have a nice meal, a few slurps of wine and the world is put back to rights. [;-)] Believe me the quality of the food in the restaurant will be far more important than the fact the shop couldn't take a cheque. [:D] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mme poivre Posted November 16, 2009 Share Posted November 16, 2009 My english logic says that if you had a £250 cheque card the cheque is guarenteed anyway so whats the problem?Thats the whole point of having the card in the first place isnt it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chancer Posted November 16, 2009 Share Posted November 16, 2009 I am confused [8-)]The first pôsting said that he went into Makro UK and wanted to pay with a cheque up to the £250 limit on the cheque guarantee card.What has this got to do with France?Ae there in fact Makro's in France? I saw one once beside the autoroute in Belgium. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frederick Posted November 16, 2009 Author Share Posted November 16, 2009 If you have ever experienced the stone wall attitude of supervisors in French storesyou will understand why I suggested this one was trained in France Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quillan Posted November 16, 2009 Share Posted November 16, 2009 Yes Chancer you are right, sorry.I believe Makro is called Metro in France (and other places) and the cards work in both places. I have seen an English couple use a Makro card at the checkout in Metro. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chancer Posted November 16, 2009 Share Posted November 16, 2009 Thank you Quillan that is very good news indeed!Except that I leave my Makro card in the UK for my neighbour to use [:(]Your hypothesis was in fact valid as the OP said that the checkout person must have been trained in France [;-)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Coeur de Lion Posted November 16, 2009 Share Posted November 16, 2009 Just as a sie question, are cheques still heavily used in the UK? France does seem to be rather obsessed by them. From what I remember from living in Australia, cheques had pretty much become a thing of the past, pretty much nobody uses them anymore. Either cash or card. Covers every evenutuality.Must be another cultural thing.I do wish they'd install the same card machines they have at motorway tolls in supermarkets though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chancer Posted November 16, 2009 Share Posted November 16, 2009 You mean the type that just checks whether the first 4 digits of the card correspond to a bank card regardless of whether it has expired/account closed/no funds etc?Me too then I could get free shopping as well [6] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Coeur de Lion Posted November 16, 2009 Share Posted November 16, 2009 Dunno how they check it and I'm not too bothered, but anything to get me out the shop asap rather than waiting 5 minutes for their machine to wake up! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quillan Posted November 16, 2009 Share Posted November 16, 2009 [quote user="Richard"]Just as a side question, are cheques still heavily used in the UK? France does seem to be rather obsessed by them. From what I remember from living in Australia, cheques had pretty much become a thing of the past, pretty much nobody uses them anymore. Either cash or card. Covers every eventuality.Must be another cultural thing.I do wish they'd install the same card machines they have at motorway tolls in supermarkets though. [/quote]Judging by the state of the UK economy and that fact it has one of the highest personal debts per person in the world I would say that no they don't use cheques, they just slap it on their credit card then spend the then 20 years paying it back. [;-)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Judith Posted November 17, 2009 Share Posted November 17, 2009 [quote user="Richard"]Just as a side question, are cheques still heavily used in the UK? France does seem to be rather obsessed by them. From what I remember from living in Australia, cheques had pretty much become a thing of the past, pretty much nobody uses them anymore. [/quote]I'm a year out of date on this one, but certainly before I left the UK (and when I was there last summer) there are now places (supermarkets etc) which will not accept cheques any more. Completely different from France, where they are still very much the norm .....!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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