Jump to content
Cruise Critic Community

Goodbye from a non-US member

Corfe Mixture

By Corfe Mixture,
in Princess Cruises

 Share

Recommended Posts

fishywood

fishywood

Posted
Posted (edited)
Here in America we are asked for non-required information all of the time, most people freely offer it without thinking about it. Last night I went to the store to return a pair of shoes I had purchased the day before. The cashier asked for my email address and phone number. I told her, "no", and insisted that this information had nothing to do with the transaction in question. She replied that it's "policy". I told the clerk that I too have a policy, and it's to not give personal information unless legally required, and if she needs to input a phone number and email address so badly, she could make one up or use her own. :p

 

totally off topic here, but...

 

There is no "right" to a refund for the pair of shoes I assume you wore once and decided you didn't like the color of. If the retailer requires your personal information before giving you your money back, you need to give it. By the way, the reason they ask for specific identifying information for refunds is to track serial returners, which the combating of allows the store to keep prices in check and a fair return policy for the rest of us in place. Also to identify employees who abet their family and friends' bogus refunds by omitting or putting obviously false information--which is what you asked the cashier to do by refusing to cooperate.

 

Please try to remember that retail sales clerks are entitled to the same respect as cruise line check-in agents and purser's desk employees are when they need to verify your identity. Who no one would consider treating with such disdain as above, right?

Edited by fishywood
Link to comment
Share on other sites
elliair

elliair

Posted
Posted (edited)
Love it! Or you could do what I once did. Same scenario and when I asked why she needed it was told "because I'm told to ask", so I made up a really long email address - and watched her struggle to enter it. At least be honest and tell me it's so that your company can spam me...

 

When they give me the receipt to sign I always sign it Kathy Smith. I give them a phony email and phone number. I never show my driver's license. I give them a hard time when they become intrusive with me. I tell them "It's my money not yours." I have to admit that I am not cooperative with the Census people either, I make them earn their money. They have a long ways to walk to knock on my door with repeat visits.:D

Edited by elliair
Link to comment
Share on other sites
floridalover5623

floridalover5623

Posted
Posted
Love it! Or you could do what I once did. Same scenario and when I asked why she needed it was told "because I'm told to ask", so I made up a really long email address - and watched her struggle to enter it. At least be honest and tell me it's so that your company can spam me...

 

Along the same line....I struggled for a few years to trying to stop my lawn service stop calling me before they arrive with no luck.

I finally just gave them a fictitious telephone number & it's quiet now. I wonder who's getting my calls. :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites
swedish weave

swedish weave

Posted
Posted (edited)
Along the same line....I struggled for a few years to trying to stop my lawn service stop calling me before they arrive with no luck.

I finally just gave them a fictitious telephone number & it's quiet now. I wonder who's getting my calls. :D

 

Now I know who is responsible for all the calls I am getting !!!! haha

 

Thanks a lot Buddy !!

Edited by swedish weave
Link to comment
Share on other sites
dtb55

dtb55

Posted
Posted
totally off topic here, but...

 

There is no "right" to a refund for the pair of shoes I assume you wore once and decided you didn't like the color of. If the retailer requires your personal information before giving you your money back, you need to give it. By the way, the reason they ask for specific identifying information for refunds is to track serial returners, which the combating of allows the store to keep prices in check and a fair return policy for the rest of us in place. Also to identify employees who abet their family and friends' bogus refunds by omitting or putting obviously false information--which is what you asked the cashier to do by refusing to cooperate.

 

Please try to remember that retail sales clerks are entitled to the same respect as cruise line check-in agents and purser's desk employees are when they need to verify your identity. Who no one would consider treating with such disdain as above, right?

 

 

[emoji122]🏻[emoji122]🏻[emoji122]🏻

Link to comment
Share on other sites
CineGraphic "Live from...." Rare

CineGraphic

Posted
Posted
totally off topic here, but...

 

There is no "right" to a refund for the pair of shoes I assume you wore once and decided you didn't like the color of. If the retailer requires your personal information before giving you your money back, you need to give it. By the way, the reason they ask for specific identifying information for refunds is to track serial returners, which the combating of allows the store to keep prices in check and a fair return policy for the rest of us in place. Also to identify employees who abet their family and friends' bogus refunds by omitting or putting obviously false information--which is what you asked the cashier to do by refusing to cooperate.

 

Please try to remember that retail sales clerks are entitled to the same respect as cruise line check-in agents and purser's desk employees are when they need to verify your identity. Who no one would consider treating with such disdain as above, right?

 

I don't want to hijack the thread since this is as you say, "off-topic", but that's the only accurate statement in your post.

I returned the shoes because I found them for $20 less online.

They were never worn and still had all tags attached.

The store did not need my id to take my money, nor do they need it to give it back to me.

The store has plenty of ways to identify fraudulent returns without my having to give out personal information.

Retailers currently track how often you use your card, how often you visit, how long you stay, etc, thanks in part to customers walking around with smartphones which can be easily identified and tracked.

To show you just how mindless the cashier was, while inputting the refund into her register, she asked is I had the credit card with the last 4 digits 4330, I said, "yes" and she asked me to swipe the card.

Two seconds later she asked me what the last 4 digits were.

If you want to mindlessly answer every question asked by every under-lackey whenever you need to purchase something, so be it.

There was a time when all a store wanted from you was your money.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
actuarian

actuarian

Posted
Posted

The words "social media information" are not really very well defined. Nevertheless, I think that the CBP person who wrote the proposal was thinking of sites like Facebook or LinkedIn, not Cruise Critic. I do not think CBP cares whether you prefer Princess or Celebrity!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Cruisin' Chick

Cruisin' Chick

Posted
Posted
totally off topic here, but...

 

There is no "right" to a refund for the pair of shoes I assume you wore once and decided you didn't like the color of. If the retailer requires your personal information before giving you your money back, you need to give it. By the way, the reason they ask for specific identifying information for refunds is to track serial returners, which the combating of allows the store to keep prices in check and a fair return policy for the rest of us in place. Also to identify employees who abet their family and friends' bogus refunds by omitting or putting obviously false information--which is what you asked the cashier to do by refusing to cooperate.

 

Please try to remember that retail sales clerks are entitled to the same respect as cruise line check-in agents and purser's desk employees are when they need to verify your identity. Who no one would consider treating with such disdain as above, right?

 

As someone who used to work in retail I can see this. Mail order returns we can easily see if someone has been serially ordering/returning software as the name would go on the shipping package. Most of the time we had our sales staff try to put customers' names on invoices while purchasing in stores. But also we would ask to make sure they were buying the right thing (MAC or PC, etc.). Just in case someone grabbed the wrong package.

 

It did cost us to take back returns as an opened package had to be returned to the vendor for replacement and would be out of inventory for the time being.

 

I can see not wanting to give an email address as that's probably a way to get on the company's email list and should be mentioned to customers first so they can choose. I don't have a problem with giving our landline and I don't think we've ever got sales calls from that.

 

BTW, the sales clerk is being told to get this info. I'm sure most would rather not have to ask and input the info.

 

The words "social media information" are not really very well defined. Nevertheless, I think that the CBP person who wrote the proposal was thinking of sites like Facebook or LinkedIn, not Cruise Critic. I do not think CBP cares whether you prefer Princess or Celebrity!

 

If one is upset about this, blame the bad guys who post on FB questionable, angry, etc. threats. This also extends to local bad guys too (including teens who will post threats on social media, whether they mean it or not). Who can blame anyone for reporting such posts to police? But I don't think Homeland Security gives a care if you post a link to a political article or give your opinion about who should win DWTS. As someone else said, they don't have the personnel for this. I would be more concerned about potential employers reading your social media.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Times Prince

Times Prince

Posted
Posted
The words "social media information" are not really very well defined. Nevertheless, I think that the CBP person who wrote the proposal was thinking of sites like Facebook or LinkedIn, not Cruise Critic. I do not think CBP cares whether you prefer Princess or Celebrity!
They might, however, care if your roll calls show regular visits to countries near where there is unrest, especially if posts indicate "visiting friends in _____".

 

Personally, however, I think the OP is overreacting to this proposal.

 

Cruise Critic is a pretty benign site as far as Social Media goes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Corfe Mixture

Corfe Mixture

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)

Sorry, one really final post, enabled by the fact that my emails, including one to the moderator who contributed to this thread, asking that my account be deleted all went unanswered.

 

 

Do you really think we should find that article re-assuring? All it does is to justify the action and suggest that it should become mandatory.

 

It is about as re-assuring as the length of queue in the photo at the head of the article.

 

You just don't seem to understand.

 

There are plenty of instances of UK families arriving at the airport only to discover that, for no obvious reason, one member of the family has had their ESTA withdrawn.

 

In one case it was later reported that the problem was that the member had been contacted on social media by someone who, unknown to them, was perceived to be a risk and was being monitored. When the family member did nothing more than reply to the person being monitored, their ESTA was cancelled.

 

This is not a case of freaking out or being paranoid, it is simply a case of being risk averse. Quite simply why take the risk?

 

Social media is not important to me, I post on my yacht owner's forum, which I, and my friends, use to discuss technical problems and events at various ports we visit, but all the people I am in contact with on that site are either known to me personally, or at least I know their full name, telephone number and boat name from the members handbook,

 

I do not have any of a Facebook, Twitter or Linkedin account and social media is not important to me.

 

So, given that, other than the yacht owners' forum, the only forum / social media site I use is this one, it makes absolute sense to leave the site.

 

I am not paranoid, nor am I freaking out

 

I have never had a problem visiting the US, and, before the days of the Visa waiver schemes held a B1/B2 US Visa. I am however aware that the DHS take the view that all overseas visitors are potentially unwelcome visitors to the USA until proven otherwise.

 

So whilst I don't anticipate any problem, I am quite simply taking the view that, as a person who is currently welcome in the US, there is no point in taking any unnecessary risks and quitting all but essential social media is nothing more than a sensible course of action.

 

CM

Edited by Corfe Mixture
Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 2 months later...
pablo222

pablo222

Posted
Posted
Sorry, one really final post, enabled by the fact that my emails, including one to the moderator who contributed to this thread, asking that my account be deleted all went unanswered.

 

Worse -- someone seems to be continuing to post using your account.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
UK Cruiser2

UK Cruiser2

Posted
Posted
OP

 

You are over-reacting IMHO

 

1. It is a proposal.

2. It is proposed to be optional.

3. Don't tell them - they are not going to spend resources trying to find out whether you have posted garbage on FB etc..

 

If you restrict the things you want to do because some paranoid FW proposes something stupid (which this is), you are the loser. Provided you do not use certain phrases which will spook GCHQ/Langley;) you have nothing to worry about.

 

I think this answer is spot on. They won't know and I don't think they would bother trying to scrutinize everyone's forum type posts,there must be thousand upon thousands of forum type websites.The authorities know who they are looking for and monitor suspects they may consider a threat not everyone in the whole world.Do you think the sad people of the world that are causing catastrophes such as 9/11 bother with cruise critic and similar relatively trivial chit chat sites.If they do you can bet that Big Brother is already watching out for them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Corfe Mixture

Corfe Mixture

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)
Worse -- someone seems to be continuing to post using your account.

 

No, but I have changed my posting habits. I did reflect on that decision and concluded that the principle risk was one of being judged by association by contributing to a debating thread.

 

I recommenced posting a few weeks ago, but did not make any statement regarding my change of mind as it would have been rather arrogant to assume that others would care if I contribute or not.

 

I have however decided to be very careful about getting into any debate with people who seem to enjoy conflict and I now try to limit my contributions to statements of a factual nature.

 

To be honest, I am a little flattered that anyone even noticed, but having said that, I am perhaps not surprised that, if anyone was going to bring up the subject of my partial change of heart, it would be you.

Edited by Corfe Mixture
Link to comment
Share on other sites
pablo222

pablo222

Posted
Posted
To be honest, I am a little flattered that anyone even noticed, but having said that, I am perhaps not surprised that, if anyone was going to bring up the subject of my partial change of heart, it would be you.

 

While I appreciate the compliment, I'm sure there are others

who have read your posts.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share
Go to topic listing
  • Forum Jump
    • Categories
      • Welcome to Cruise Critic
      • New Cruisers
      • Cruise Lines “A – O”
      • Cruise Lines “P – Z”
      • River Cruising
      • ROLL CALLS
      • Cruise Critic News & Features
      • Digital Photography & Cruise Technology
      • Special Interest Cruising
      • Cruise Discussion Topics
      • UK Cruising
      • Australia & New Zealand Cruisers
      • Canadian Cruisers
      • North American Homeports
      • Ports of Call
      • Cruise Conversations
×
×
  • Create New...