When Tesco called the police when a HfP reader bought 3V cards ….

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• Marco says:

  15 Dec15 December 12:50

  This reminds me of my recent bad experience where I was “banned” from buying more 3V cards from the Tesco Extra in Newbury. I must be the only HFP reader in the Newbury area as the Newbury Tesco Extra (and occasionally the Newbury Superstore as well) have always had an abundance of 3V cards on the shelves at any one time. Unfortunately I got too greedy, buying too many cards at a time, and attracted the attention of the managers. Eventually I was pulled aside, interrogated about it and actually accused of fraud! The result is that I’ve been “blacklisted” and banned from future 3V purchases, with the warning that, were I to be caught buying 3V cards again, I would be banned altogether from shopping at the Newbury Extra. The managerial staff know my face now so that’s the end of the line for me!

  • Wibbling says:

    15 Dec15 December 13:12

    My other half is always saying it won’t be long before my mugshot is displayed in Tesco stores with a warning ‘do not sell gift cards to this man’ haha

    • Alan says:

      15 Dec15 December 13:15

      Lol I’ve been sticking to four at a time and not had any issues – thankfully there don’t appear to be too many other HFP readers in the area so there’s normally still some left when I return. On my last trip I got a whole chunk of food for free too thanks to Christmas and helping hand vouchers 🙂 Shame about NS&I but will pay off some more power/Sky bills then get some Amazon purchases made.

  • Mr Bridge says:

    15 Dec15 December 13:45

    of course, legally tesco do not have to sell you anything.
    having an item on their selves is an offer to sell at that price, however they do not have to sell if they chose not to.

• Wibbling says:

  15 Dec15 December 13:10

  Respect to David for not losing it, not sure I would have been so restrained.

  Whilst I appreciate stores are nervous about credit card fraud and T should not be allowed to get away with treating customers like this (personally I’d be foaming at the mouth for blood), there’s always the risk in pushing too hard for recompense, apology etc that Mr T will just get wise and kill the gift card points promo we’ve been enjoying this last year. Just saying…

• david gibson says:

  15 Dec15 December 14:41

  Hi,
  But do you still get the bonus cc points if you buy £50 worth of giftcards?
  thanks

  • TimS says:

    15 Dec15 December 15:12

    Yes the 150 cc points are per £50 of gift card spend. The extra 100 cc point vouchers in the magazine at the moment are 100 points per £20+ gift card.

    • david gibson says:

      15 Dec15 December 17:54

      thank you Tim. appreciate it.

• kh2040 says:

  15 Dec15 December 16:25

  So Tesco thought the customer was using a fraudulent credit card, took him to a room, gave him a drink and called the police. Doesn’t seem too awful to me.

• takke says:

  15 Dec15 December 18:18

  It just seems absurd that they were identifying cards for fraudulent transactions on the basis of the last four digits, do they not realise that there is more than one card with the same digits? If the card is being used for fraud then surely it would be cancelled by its owner anyway, why would there be a need to warn stores of fraudulent use of three cards?

  • Tim says:

    15 Dec15 December 20:14

    quite. My wife and I both have Amex cards with identical last four digits. We both have the Avios habit but we don’t have that many cards!

    But I agree with your analysis. If a card is being use for fraud then the card issuer blocks the use of the card. Shop staff shouldn’t need to be issued with lists. That might have been what happened in the 1980s, but not in 2013

• Tony says:

  15 Dec15 December 20:50

  Tesco may have overreacted, but I’ve never got involved in this blatant “churning” business. There’s a line that takes you into the realms of money laundering or other frauds and IMO the smell test to the uninitiated would put you across that line.

  Get into this kind of game at your peril. Same goes for buying Sterling travellers cheques for the miles then cashing them into your account.

  • Keiths says:

    15 Dec15 December 23:08

    Sorry Tony, I have to disagree.
    There is absolutely no hint of Money Laundering or fraud here.
    There is a specific offence of Money Laundering which has very specific criteria, none of which would be remotely met by this churning. The whole premise of Money Laundering is converting ‘dirty’ money into ‘clean’ money. In this instance it is clear that the funds are already ‘clean’ – especially once Amex etc had vouched for the OP.
    You would only be ‘across the line’, as you say, if the ‘uninitiated’ alludes to it and has no idea around the fundamentals of Money Laundering and what it really is. In reality, that is only crossing the line in their mind, not in the real world. In my mind I may think I am a cross between Robert Redford, Paul Newman with the physique of Arnie, but in reality that is not the case. It would be better that Tesco train their staff rather than just giving them ‘phases’ that they can latch onto, but don’t understand.
    Re the ‘fraud’ aspect – again, there is nothing illegal in this churning. It may not sit comfortably with people, and it may be against the ‘spirit’ of the offer, but that is up to the retailer to be smarter when making offers. We can’t blame the consumer for spotting an opportunity just because the retailer is incompetent when drawing up the T&C’s of the offer. After all, if it wasn’t for these opportunities then HfP would close down.
    It is a far cry from doing something illegal.

  • Ralph says:

    16 Dec16 December 00:01

    What planet are you on buddy, this isn’t converting drugs or prostitution cash to legit money, this is a legitimate transaction. As is depositing sterling travelers cheques that one has bought into ones own bank account. Get a grip you Muppet.

    • Rob says:

      16 Dec16 December 08:18

      The point, I think, was that if you do stuff which looks like it could be dodgy – which would include depositing large slugs of travellers cheques – then you shouldn’t be surprised if questions are asked. However, you should also expect no trouble once you have answered those questions.

• Graeme says:

  15 Dec15 December 21:39

  While you can liken this to money laundering, there’s money laundering and there’s money laundering. This is a perfectly legal thing that these companies have done deliberately – no-one is defrauding anyone. Tesco staff aren’t to know that, sure, but that doesn’t make this wrong.

  I’m just gutted that this has only recently come to my attention. I’m now paying my Sky bills using these cards, but I’d have gone all out if the National Savings avenue hadn’t been closed.

• rslicker says:

  15 Dec15 December 21:51

  I’d get in touch with my solicitor if this happened to me. The OP has a good case for damages in the civil courts at the very least.

  • Josh says:

    16 Dec16 December 10:03

    Damages for what?? And they’ll be nominal if you can even make the claim stick. Capricious claims like this are the bane of the lower courts

    • Ray says:

      16 Dec16 December 17:00

      Wonder if the OP did sue Tesco’s…could they ask for any damages to be paid in CC points 🙂

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