Free Toothpaste

If there's one grocery shopping tip I hope you all adopt, everywhere, no matter which grocery store you shop at, it would be this: at the end of the shopping trip, check your receipt.

It's not uncommon for a cashier to accidentally double scan an item, or key in an incorrect produce code, and if there's one thing more annoying than paying for groceries, it's paying for groceries you didn't even get. Other times, the item simply scans in at the totally wrong price (more on that, in a minute).

I do my best to try to watch items get scanned at the till, but it's not always realistic. Between unloading the cart, packing the bags, price matching, finding my loyalty card, paying, and managing my 3 helpers, it's pretty likely that I'm not going to see every item that was scanned. Add that to the fact that items are scanned super quickly, and the odds of me catching a mistake in the moment are pretty slim. Instead, I've removed hawk-eyeing the till from my list of checkout responsibilities, and instead, I check over my receipt before I leave the store.

It's important that you check the receipt while you're still in the store, so that you can quickly zip to customer service to remedy the issue. If you wait until you're in the car, and your groceries/kids/whatever are already out of the cart, the chances of you going back in to the store are super low. Trust me. Even I am reluctant to unbuckle the family and drag them back inside for $1.46. If you don't check until you get home, it's even worse, because then you just feel mad that you missed it, and threw money away at the grocery store.

For a double scanned item, or incorrect produce code, it's an easy solution: Hi, I only bought 1 jar of pickles, not 2. Hey, it says here I bought 2kg of cauliflower but it was actually a cabbage. Easy. An item that scans in at the wrong price can take a little bit more time to rectify, but it's worth it to head over to customer service.

Why?

Because of the Scanning Code of Practice. If I could make trumpets sound and bursts of glitter fly out of your screen as you read those words, believe me, I would. The Scanning Code of Practice is an awesome bonus for paying attention at the grocery store.

This sticker is posted at all the tills, and customer service desks at the grocery store (and lots of other stores, too).

Basically, the Scanning Code of Practice says that if an item scans in higher than the shelf tag says, you get the item for free, or $10 off of the shelf price.

Example: On Friday, I went against my own, only buy what you're going to use right now rule, and "stocked up" on toothpaste. The little tubes of Crest were on the shelf at Superstore for $1.00 each, and I had a Checkout 51 offer for $2.50 back when I buy 3. Usually when I see an offer that asks me to buy multiples of the same item, I'm like "pft, no thank you, scammers" but, considering that I'm pretty sure my kids finger paint the bathroom with the toothpaste when my back is turned, if I can get 3 tubes of toothpaste for $0.50, I'm taking that deal.

Isn't it fun to watch your money get squeezed directly down the drain? Also, letting your kids be independent or whatever is really super messy.

After paying for my groceries (and price matching for a savings of over $7), I repacked my stuff, and quickly scanned through my receipt. The toothpaste scanned in at $1.78 each instead of a dollar. If they were $1.78 on the shelf, I probably wouldn't have bought them. My after rebate spend of $0.50 was now up to $2.84. Nope. So, I headed over to customer service where I told them that the toothpaste rang in at the wrong price. After a quick price check to confirm what the shelf tag said, she fixed the issue as per the Scanning Code of Practice. First, she refunded all 3 toothpastes, then she rang in the first one for free, and the other 2 at the shelf price. So, instead of paying $5.34 for 3 toothpastes, I paid $2 for 3 toothpastes, and I still was able to redeem the Checkout 51 offer for $2.50 back. So, it's kind of like I got paid 50 cents to buy toothpaste, if you want to do some math gymnastics.

I saved my receipt all weekend so you could see my price match savings/toothpaste refund, but now I can't find it, so please enjoy this photo of a toothpaste painting on my kids' bathroom wall. Mixed media Crest + Colgate on Drywall. 2018.

To me, it's always worth it to stop at customer service if I've paid the wrong price for an item. Like price matching, it's an existing store policy that you are using, and is not you being a difficult customer or trying to bend a rule to apply to you. If you are diligent with checking your receipt and being aware of the price of the items you've agreed to buy, the Scanning Code of Practice is kind of like a reward for your work. You might look at your receipt and see that an item you thought was $4.99 actually rang in at $5.99. You might think, "I'm not going to make a fuss over $1," but because of the policy, you're actually making a fuss (and it's not even a fuss at all) over $6. This is your money. You don't owe it to the grocery store to just suck it up and leave knowing you paid more than you were supposed to for an item. Get your money. Don't pay a shame tax because you're too embarrassed to point out an error. The policy already exists. It's posted at every till in the store. Use it.

People often tell me, "by the time I get to the till with my groceries, I don't remember what the price on the shelf said!" You guys, neither can I! But you know what I do? I write it down. I write it all down. Everything I'm buying is on my list. On my list, I write down the price of everything I put in my cart. Again, why trust yourself to remember something, when you can just write it down and save yourself the frustration? This is especially helpful for items like produce that scan in at the price per kilogram. Does anyone know offhand the price per kilogram of red onions? Of course not. Just write it down. (It's in super small print on the shelf tags, fyi, all the big prices are price per pound, because stuff looks cheaper that way).

Make your list. Check it twice. Find out if you paid too much for your rice.

This is another reason I like using my grocery notebook. I can keep all my meal plans and grocery lists in the same place and flip back to see if there are patterns for the prices of the things I buy. Instead of looking at the bread and thinking, "sure, this looks like a good price for bread, I'll buy 25 of them for the freezer" I can flip back in my book and say, "well, this is a terrible price for bread. I'll buy it next week" or, "this bread looks like it goes on sale for this price every second week, so I probably don't need to fill my freezer", or "start the carrrrrrrrrr!" and load my cart and the cart behind me with really cheap bread.

You can buy even more of the really cheap bread (or anything else that you actually want) if you take a minute to check your receipt and make sure you're only paying for the stuff you actually bought, at the price that was advertised to you. You likely buy groceries at least once every week. If you wouldn't take $5 out of your wallet and just leave it at the front door on your way in, you owe it to yourself to check your receipt and make sure you're not leaving that money somewhere else in the grocery store, instead.

(Also, if you're ready to sign up for Checkout 51, you can download it from the App Store, or use my referral link here: https://checkout51.app.link/6v56rG1qXQ)