Coupon Queen: Cashiers sound off on coupon restrictions

However, consumers aren’t the only people who take issue with the fine print buried within the usage restrictions of the coupon.

Some cashiers have been sounding off, too.

“Dear Jill,

I have some things I want to get off my chest.

I have been a cashier for 18 years, and the fine print on coupons has gotten to the point where it is so tedious.

I honestly don’t think the brands have thought about the fact that cashiers have next to no time at all to read all of these fine print exclusions.

I am required to get shoppers through my lane as fast as possible. We are supposed to keep an eye out for obvious counterfeit coupons, but beyond that, speed is the number one focus.

I also use coupons personally, so I see more and more things brands are putting on there.

There are so many restrictions for size, certain scents, flavors and what not.

Honestly again, it is next to impossible for us to read every coupon, then try to think about whether or not the cocoa butter scent was what the customer purchased, because it was already scanned and bagged up before the customer handed the coupons to me.

I have noticed some coupons even have bold or red letters with messages like ‘CASHIER PLEASE READ’ – but again, the truth of the matter is there is just not time for cashiers to be the coupon police.

If brands want a coupon not to be valid on a certain size or flavor or variety, they need to code them that way in the first place so they just don’t work at the cash register unless the right thing is bought.

The same is true for things like ‘Limit 2 per transaction’ – I am not seeing the shopper’s coupons until after all their items are rung up.

I have no idea how many like items they bought at that point.

Thank you for listening.”

Mandy R.

“Dear Jill,

I am a cashier at a national grocery chain.

While we do get some training on what kinds of coupons to accept and which ones not to, you may find it surprising to know that our store does not tell us to look at the fine print at all.

If a coupon scans, we accept it. We are too busy and under such pressure to move customers through checkout as quickly as possible. I could never do my job if I had to read all of that tiny text (which is another issue in and of itself). I am glad that our registers automatically reject coupons that are expired, but beyond that, we don’t really have anything in place to make sure you bought exactly the right size or weight of a product that might be specified in the fine print.

I guess manufacturers would be sad to hear that, but it’s true. We scan and go.

People who use lots of coupons slow down my speed rating at the register, too, so I always try to go as fast as I can.”

Sarah C.

As someone who deals with consumers, brands and retailers as part of my coupon-related work, I am often surprised that brands believe cashiers are an integral part of their coupon security process.

Over the years, I’ve attended coupon industry conferences where brands discuss adding additional coupon restrictions to the fine print on their offers, assuming that cashiers will have time to read each coupon they’re scanning, then accept or reject each coupon after evaluating what a shopper has bought. The reality is much different. Shoppers want to check out quickly, and cashiers are encouraged to get the shoppers through their lanes rapidly, too.

Many stores rate their cashiers’ performance on the time spent on each transaction, so a cashier’s job performance is often at odds with manufacturers’ wishes for the cashiers to be coupon gatekeepers.