You Can’t Fail Email If You Don’t Have It

(My tractor supply store has a rewards program that we offer to customers so they can earn discounts for shopping with us. The only downside is that the customer needs to provide both a phone number and an email address in order to sign up. Most of my customers are older and don’t have computers, but I’m supposed to ask if they’d like to join anyway. Today, I had this interaction.)

Me: “And are you a member of our rewards program, sir?”

Customer: “Yeah. Phone number [number].”

(I find his account and see he doesn’t have an email registered to this account. It’s a common bug for there to be more than one account for a customer, but the phone number for one gets deleted. Luckily, we can get around that.)

Me: “You’ve given your email address to use before, right?”

Customer: “Yeah.”

Me: “Okay, then. Let’s search for you that way. May I have your email address, please?”

Customer: “What are you talking about? I don’t have an email, let alone a computer!”

Me: “I’m sorry, sir, but in order for you to get discounts and be a member we have to have an email to provide you with your coupons.”

Customer: “Well, that’s dumb!”

(Gotta love people, especially when they listen.)