Thai Stores Chains' Member Cards - Which Ones Are Useless, Which Help To Save ฿฿฿?

[samlowry]

Hello!

Pls, explain, how major Thai stores' member clubs works. I just tried to read about Big C and Tesco.

Ok, I learned about 1, 5 and 10 baht Big C cr*p. What else their membership provides?

Tried to learn about Tesco point system, but didn't get - how many points you getting from 1000 ฿ bill? How points converts to bahts?

Pls, tell in the topic about other big networks (Central, Watsons, Boots, Makro, etc) works. Which ones worth to use? Which ones are waste of time?

For example, we are in Chiang Mai Rimping Supermarket club. After 3 yrs of living here we received 300 points. Some simple cr*ppy prizes starts from 500 points. So - if you aren't person, who're buying fresh imported blackberries there everyday, don't sign into their club

[inthepink]

Central cards seem to be quite useful. I managed to save enough points to get a substantial discount - several thousand baht, when buying something there. Generally speaking though, I never use supermarket points cards, it's mainly a way for them to track what everybody is buying and I'm not interested in helping them with their market research, or receiving targeted marketing material based on my purchases.

Even the hospitals here seem to sell private data, judging by the number of calls we received from companies touting their crappy milk formula products after having a baby. Never managed to get them to say where they got our details from but the hospital seems the only likely source.

Edited January 29, 2013 by inthepink

[hellodolly]

I use them and have yet to lose any thing doing it. I could care less about there marketing as long as they have what I want I am a happy camper.

As yet I have not cashed in in on one as I don't really feel the need for some thing yet I will just let them keep accumulating and never feel a negative thing about it.

[inthepink]

Well, I'm not keen on the big brother aspect of store cards but if you are quite happy to have all your purchases stored in a database somewhere for commercial organisations and government authorities to peruse, then of course it's nothing for you to worry about. Maybe I'm just odd.

Edited January 29, 2013 by inthepink

[canopy]

I don't bother with supermarket member cards, but thumbs up for the pizza company card. Buy 1, get 1 free for 6 months validity. More than pays for the cost of the card on the very first usage.

[Bluetongue]

As far as I can tell the Lotus card gives you vouchers every 6 months or so which are equivalent to 1% of the purchase (except grog). These are redeemable as cash discounts on purchases. They also send you other vouchers at the same time which are discounts on specific products, you have to ensure that you select the right product though, if you select the wrong size - no discount. I could not care less about their marketing strategy either but its absolutely no skin off my nose and as we usually grocery shop there we get vouchers in the mail for a 4 or 5 hundred baht discount. When we take other family members shopping they also swipe the card and this is happily done by the staff.

[jaideeguy]

it used to be green stamps in the old days and I never played 'the game' then and don't bother here either. Why not forget the games and just lower the price by 5% across the board?? It must cost that much to maintain and promote the games.

Wives love it and she hates when i don't bother and refuse points.

I just ask for discounts from the independent merchants.....corporate shops don't give.

[watcharacters]

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it used to be green stamps in the old days and I never played 'the game' then and don't bother here either. Why not forget the games and just lower the price by 5% across the board?? It must cost that much to maintain and promote the games.

Wives love it and she hates when i don't bother and refuse points.

I just ask for discounts from the independent merchants.....corporate shops don't give.

Yeah, whatever happened to the green and then blue stamps. I recall the "wars" some retail outlets had about how many times the purchase they'd give in stamps. But even gas cost fairly little then Oh well.

[bunta71]

When I lived in Chiang Mai I also had Rimping's card. We lived very near one and shopped there a lot. If I remember correctly (big if), after spending about 300,000B over a few years , we got a cheap $10 toaster. What a deal...

[thenervoussurgeon]

we have a tesco card and every 3 months the wife gets a voucher for 3 to 6 hundred baht ,so no problems there also have a central and tops card ,they are good.

[lannarebirth]

Well, I'm not keen on the big brother aspect of store cards but if you are quite happy to have all your purchases stored in a database somewhere for commercial organisations and government authorities to peruse, then of course it's nothing for you to worry about. Maybe I'm just odd.

I wouldn't like that aspect of it either, but here in Thailand, where most major businesses can't even maintain a website or answer an email I doubt that there's much to worry about.

[lopburi3]

You are spending (or she is) a lot to get 3-600 baht from Lotus every 3 months. But nothing lost and do not feel a cookie there is any more of a threat than on the internet (and allow here also). Indeed it helps to get coupons you might actually be interested in using. And it can lead to new offers as just got 110 baht off for next four weeks on any purchase of 1,100 baht or more as promotion to new Lotus Extra conversion of my normal outlet. S&P has a 10% off card that often use.

[spacemand]

Tesco

You get 1 point for every 2 baht you spend but no points for booze, beers or cigarettes. Sometimes you get extra points for example 100 points when buy 1 1/2L coke.

The every 3 months you get vouchers to spend in Tesco 1 baht for every 100 points you have.

So it works out to 1000 baht spend is 5 baht.

Big C

Buy for more than 500 baht and you get a 5 baht coupon for next time (no booze, beers or cigarettes) 1 coupon per day.

They also count you running total so every time you have spend 2000 baht you get a 10 baht coupon.

Sometimes they have specials for example buy for 800 baht and get a 40-80 baht coupon usually a limit on the number of coupons I think 3 is the max I have seen.

In my opinion Big C have the better deal with their specials which is usually at the end of the month when everybody gets paid.

I shop at both places and usually use my card since a baht saved is a baht earned and I don't care about them seeing what I am buying.

[thurien]

this leads to M Card (combi for The Mall, Emporium, Paragon)

http://www.mcardmall.../en/m_expat.php

gives you a visible direct discount every time you go shopping (total has to be over thb 800) and a few hundred or more cash thb towards the end of the year; hustle-free, just cash while you shop

mind you: the whole site in English

Edited January 30, 2013 by thurien

[LALes]

I've had Villa and Central cards for years and never got s**t out of them. You have to spend at least 500 baht at Villa for it to kick in

and, living alone, I rarely do that. I once got a 40 baht (!!!!) redemption voucher from my Central card. Whoopeee!!

Actually, the Swenson's card is probably the best one I have. 10% off every time I go there and coupons for deals on quarts of ice cream

every month. More than pays for itself over the course of a year. And I never receive any junk mail or emails from these cards.

[candypants]

I don't bother with supermarket member cards, but thumbs up for the pizza company card. Buy 1, get 1 free for 6 months validity. More than pays for the cost of the card on the very first usage.

unfortunately, the reward is a second lousy pizza for free

[candypants]

I've had Villa and Central cards for years and never got s**t out of them. You have to spend at least 500 baht at Villa for it to kick in

and, living alone, I rarely do that. I once got a 40 baht (!!!!) redemption voucher from my Central card. Whoopeee!!

Actually, the Swenson's card is probably the best one I have. 10% off every time I go there and coupons for deals on quarts of ice cream

every month. More than pays for itself over the course of a year. And I never receive any junk mail or emails from these cards.

i am unsure as to how exactly you can spend less than 500 thb at villa. I certainly cant.

I have an asia books card, it was free and saved me 350 baht the first time i used it. (10%)

[seancbk]

I have what they call The 1 Card, it's issued by the Central Retail Corporation and gives me points based on spending at Tops, Central Food Hall, Central, Zen, Robinsons, Power Buy, Super Sports, B2S, and Office Depot.

I do roughly 50% of my grocery shopping in Tops, so by using the card I sometimes get sent cash discount coupons. I think my last batch was the equivalent of about 400 baht.

The trick is to check when you are buying something to see if the card is valid in that store, for example I'm looking to buy a new TV and only just realised that the card is valid in Power Buy, so I'll probably buy the TV there and get the bonus points.

As for tracking what I buy etc, I hope they are so they know to stock more of what I like!!

Edited January 30, 2013 by seancbk

[madmitch]

The Homepro card is worth having as you actually receive proper cash discounts on purchases when you have built up enough points, but you do need to spend quite a lot to get a worthwhile points total.

No idea what we get for the other cards, though TOPS does have a lot of discounts for cardholders only.

[mca]

My wife's got one for Watson's and it's pretty handy as members get a buy one get one free deal on quite a bit of stuff that we use regularly like shower gel etc.

[Globeman]

I don't bother with supermarket member cards, but thumbs up for the pizza company card. Buy 1, get 1 free for 6 months validity. More than pays for the cost of the card on the very first usage.

That is assuming of course that one enjoys eating crap at bargain prices.

[Suradit69]

I use "The 1 Card" which covers Central, Zen, PowerBuy, Home Works, B2S, Office Depot, SuperSports and Robinsons.

Only had it a short time when I was able to knock Baht 300 off my bill when shopping at the grocery store in the food court area at Central Festival on Pattaya Beach.

I assume I should have enough credit to do something similar again now. Since I do shop fairly regularly in most of the places that accept the card, it's easy to build up a credit quickly. A few hundred baht back ever so often isn't all that exciting, but if it adds up to a couple thousand per year, why not go for it.

If someone wants to know what shampoo I buy or that I bought a new rice maker two weeks ago, it hasn't cost me any sleepless nights.

Edited January 30, 2013 by Suradit69

[candypants]

The Homepro card is worth having as you actually receive proper cash discounts on purchases when you have built up enough points, but you do need to spend quite a lot to get a worthwhile points total.

No idea what we get for the other cards, though TOPS does have a lot of discounts for cardholders only.

homepro card save me thousands when i furnished an entire house (appliances etc)

[SICHONSTEVE]

Well, I'm not keen on the big brother aspect of store cards but if you are quite happy to have all your purchases stored in a database somewhere for commercial organisations and government authorities to peruse, then of course it's nothing for you to worry about. Maybe I'm just odd.

Maybe you are odd!!!

[beano2274]

Have the MCard (The Mall), the 1 card (Central), and a few others.

I regularly use TOPS SPOT Rewards card, you just spend money and collect points, after collecting so many points you get discount vouchers in the post, and other vouchers. Also lots of offers in the shop are only for SPOT Rewards cards.

Also if they have a machine at the entrance you can swipe your card and you get a list of special offers of the day especially for you.

[Cuban]

A supermarket/wholesale place we use gives reward gifts based on the amount you spend, typically 2-3,000 Baht results in 30-40 Baht 'worth' of plastic basket or small cooking oil bottles etc. No cards, points or vouchers to play around with just instant reward. Works well.

Many people here travel 30 minutes to visit this store rather than use the nearer Tesco-Lotus.

Likewise with the fresh market we tend to get rounded down prices on meat/fruit etc or extras thrown in because of being known customers - and this includes me when shopping alone, it's not only a Thai-Thai thing.

Big business is happy to run the cards points systems because they gather a lot of data about your shopping habits and can use marketing to target you more closely - Tesco-Lotus is very skilled at this.

Use smaller businesses.

[hellodolly]

Well, I'm not keen on the big brother aspect of store cards but if you are quite happy to have all your purchases stored in a database somewhere for commercial organisations and government authorities to peruse, then of course it's nothing for you to worry about. Maybe I'm just odd.

I wouldn't like that aspect of it either, but here in Thailand, where most major businesses can't even maintain a website or answer an email I doubt that there's much to worry about.

You are rite on with the uselessness of trying to track purchases with the card here in Thailand.

Leaving that aside how do people feel that it hurts them. Is there some thing that is happening to them that is a direct product of the card? What have they lost or what is being done to them? I don't like it is a true feeling, but defiantly not a reason for turning down free things (meager as they may be).

Could there be a chance that it helps the store to lower costs? Not that I think that but it is as reasonable a reason for the use of the card as I don't like it is for not using the card.

Now put me back home with my Safeway card where they can even track my travels the card might have a meaning. But it does not hurt me so I could care less and will continue to save money with it when I am traveling through North America,

[inthepink]

Do they hurt me? Perhaps not. I'm just not interested in helping companies to collect data relating to my shopping habits, as I pointed out earlier. The Central ones can save you a fair amount of money but I doubt I'd get much use out of a Tesco card. I also hate it when I have just finished buying things at stores such as Tesco and they attack me and try to encourage me to take my receipt to some information desk to get some promotional points or silly gift. I just want to get my shopping and go home. I don't want to join a club, collect stamps for a free coffee, buy three for the price of two when I only need one, or partake in any other silly promotions.

Edited January 30, 2013 by inthepink

[samlowry]

Guys, you're going too deep. Talk about companies, who collect your data, is stupid nowadays. You write about your paranoia at Thaivisa and seller of some trace cleaning software knocking to you via PM. I don't want to talk about Google with presence of Google Analytcis at every second Web site, Facebook, etc.

Is member card saves your money? Yes? Use it. No? Don't use it.

[inthepink]

I don't want to stray too far off topic, but you can use browser add-ons such as ghostery to stop google analytics fun and games and other data gatherers. Plus, I never say anything online that I'm not happy for others to know about me.

Edited January 30, 2013 by inthepink