I was contacted earlier today by Bill Wunner who runs a website called CouponsInTheNews.com He has been following the story about the upcoming change in HEB's coupon policy. It appears, from the article he wrote entitled "Couponing Customers Urge HEB to 'Bring Back the Stack!' that he was able to speak with H-E-B Customer Relations Manager Victor Rodriguez about the changes.
In his article, Bill relates to us what was in the mind of HEB when it set out to make changes. He writes that Rodriquez stated, “Our focus is on a fast, friendly, easy checkout,” and I would whole-heartedly agree with that concept, as I'm sure most, if not all, couponers would as well! We can tell you many horror stories caused by untrained cashiers and managers in various HEB stores across Texas. I wrote a post about one such encounter here and posted the update and resolution here.
It would appear that instead of doing a better job at training their employees, they've decided it was easier to just eliminate the cause of all the confusion. The article goes on to say that HEB shoppers will NOT need a loyalty card or a smartphone to use the new digital coupons and HEB told me that same thing in their reply to my Facebook post. I am interested in seeing just how that will work, and oh, by the way, HEB also told me that they are NOT doing away with the yellow coupons!
I'm more confused now that I was before and am still disappointed in HEB for going this direction. Where I live, HEB is my only grocery store unless I drive into Austin but there's not much to chose from there either. Rodriquez claims that HEB "took everything into consideration" but from outward appearances, I don't think they really did. Otherwise they would have seen that most people don't really like the digital coupons for a variety of reasons.
Unfortunately the TLC Show "Extreme Couponing" has been successful in giving those of us who strive to use coupons with honesty and integrity a bad name. Many people, including retailers, lump all of us in the same pot and because there has been a lot of fraudulent coupons used on that show manufacturer's and retailers have made it so much harder to simply use a coupon to save our families a little bit of money.
I encourage you to email HEB, leave comments on their facebook page and/or call them to voice your opinion about the new policy!
Tell them to BRING BACK THE STACK!
