I hate you Dr. Phil...

[eltf177]

Dr. Phil is a bad joke that needs to go away. From everything I've heard he's a crook himself and his credentials suspect at best.

[i4wolves]

Personally, I like Dr. Phil, however this show can make some SC's.

I think the women on the show needs to get a realty check because stores do not take expired coupons.

I think Dr. Phil can have some good points in his show.

[MaseMan]

Who the heck keeps coupons that have expired, especially over a year ago? It's not like the calendar is going to roll around and that coupon for 50 cents off Spam is suddenly going to become "good" again.

[Magpie]

Who the heck keeps coupons that have expired, especially over a year ago?

I believe the question is "who the heck is organised enough to get rid of all their coupons as soon as they expire?"

[lupo pazzesco]

I believe the question is "who the heck is organised enough to get rid of all their coupons as soon as they expire?"

*raises hand*

I routinely cull through my coupons. But then...I have OCD tendencies when it comes to staying organized...

[Magpie]

Oh, I routinely cull them. Every six months, like clockwork. All the ones that were properly put away get recycled. Of course, that's generally two circulars worth of coupons, and it doesn't deal with the ones that were left out, or the ones that were used as bookmarks. I have coupons that are older than I am, because they were left in books as bookmarks by my parents. DH was wondering what sort of shady place had done such an odd coupon, and then discovered that it was Taco Bell. 20 + year old coupons tend to look really cheap these days.

[CrazedClerkthe2nd]

Here are the 5 things from the segment, which includes the coupon example, along with my own commentary on some of them:

"Five Things You Might Not Know You Can Bargain For:

1) Discount on damaged goods at any store

You can save 10 to 30 percent on items that have a flaw: a missing button or makeup smudge on clothing, a bruise on fruit or vegetables, a package that’s been re-sealed, beaten up or opened. Ask the cashier, and if that doesn’t work, ask the manager.

Oh yes, because the cashier never has the power to do anything. Most jobs I've had where I've used a register I've been able to give damaged product discounts without needing a manager.

2) Expired coupons

Nine times out of 10, simply asking the cashier or the manager to allow you to use the coupon will get it re-activated for you “just this once” — especially in this economy. “If it’s less than two years, go in and say, ‘I’d like to have you honor this coupon,’ because the store uses the coupon as an incentive to get the person in the store to buy.”

3) Competitive services

Dry cleaners, carpet cleaning, gardeners, dog walkers … Any company that provides services is not the only game in town. If they have two or three more local competitors, you can negotiate anything successfully. Start the negotiations with “I am going to call XYZ and ABC providers, unless you can offer me a fantastic deal right now.”

That is so NOT the way to get a deal!

4) Upgrades when traveling

Simply by saying you could easily fly with another company next time, or by writing a letter to the company saying how much you like them and if they could make your next flight more enjoyable, you can get free upgrades. “When I came to the show, I went to the rental car station, waited in line for a hundred years and finally I said to the guy, ‘Can you upgrade me on this for no charge?’ and he asked, ‘Well, what are you looking for?’ and I picked the nicest car on the list and he upgraded me for nothing. It happens all the time but the thing is, especially women, don’t realize they need to ask."

5) Any type of rent

Simply by telling the landlord that you found another place that is cheaper, they often will bend for the sale.

Wendy says women should use what they've got in negotiation. “We have a lot of natural assets. We’ve spent our whole lives learning about relationships and being sensitive to someone else, so you can watch this person. If someone is harried and stressed out, they’re less likely to negotiate, but if you have to do it right then, you could step in and start with a joke: ‘Oh, my gosh, I’m so glad I’m not you, having to rebook a whole plane full of people because they got their flight cancelled.’ Create a rapport. Second, an important asset that women have, they can look at them with empathy and take that empathetic position. What does that other person really want? If they’re a $6-an-hour clerk, what they want is to go home probably. So you make their life easier by saying, ‘Let’s just get to the bottom of this. Give me my money back. Let’s try it.’”

A) Oh yeah, because it's SO much easier to just find another place to live. How long has it been since this woman has shopped for apartments?

B) WHAT??? Anyone who tells me me "let's make this easy, give me money back", woman or not, will NOT get much from me and that goes double to people who think that $6 an hour "clerks" have nothing to do except go home.

[Argabarga]

I wonder if any of the people who write these "how to haggle" tutorials have ever even tried them, because they simply don't work.

Or is it a case of 1 time out of 400 attempts, they got them to work, so you just have to keep trying!

[Dreamstalker]

Seriously, has Dr. Phil and everyone like him that says "negotiate" ever worked retail?

Most likely not.

[Evil Queen]

Guys, Dr Phil's show comes on during the day. So a retail/business associate isn't going to catch it unless it's their day off. Dr Phil is directed to housewives and househusbands that don't work to begin with.

It would surprise me greatly if Dr Phil ever worked a customer service based job.

[trailerparkmedic]

I will say that negotiating with a landlord can work. We went to renew our lease and found out that our rent was going to go up. Fiance emailed the office, told him we had been looking at other cheaper apartments in the area, and asked if he could help us. The manager halved the increase. Of course, we were non sucky, have been good tenants and didn't expect anything crazy.

[Cashier]

Great, can't wait for customers to come in and try to 'negotiate' using expired coupons. I'll tell them they can send them to Dr. Phil for reimbursement. :-D

[mikoyan29]

Somebody at work told me when I went on my train trip you can sometimes get a sleeper for cheaper if you ask for it on the train. I was thinking about that as I heard another person do the same thing and the car attendant told him that they don't do that anymore (gee, I wonder why?) and if he wanted a sleeper car he had to call the 1-800 number.

I think the same thing goes with the airlines, you might be able to get a good deal if you go through a site like expedia or what not but not at the counter. As far as the easily fly with another company, that's all well and good if you live in a city like New York, Chicago or LA where they have more than one carrier using those cities as a hub. It gets tougher in a city like Atlanta, Minneapolis or Detroit where it is one company that has 85% of the flights, in many cases they are already the cheapest flight.

As for the expired coupon thing...I wonder if Dr. Phil advocates driving with expired plates too?

[JustaCashier]

Dr Phil airs on one of our local affiliates at 4:00pm, but that is also the time that another local station airs it first evening newscast, and I 'm a bit of a local news junkie.

Our Dr. Phil affiliate re-airs the same day episode on its sister (UHF) staion at 8:00 in the evening, so after seeing this thread yesterday afternoon, I figured I 'd tune in at 8:00.

Dammit!! they were airing hockey playoffs (or something) instead! But, after reading CrazedClerks synopsis, it's probably best I didn't see it. I probably would have smashed the TV.

Now that it's rerun season, I've found myself tuning into Dr. Phil more and more, if for nothing else, background noise. Once in awhile he'll have a topic that I'm at least mildly interested in, sometime somewhat more interested in.

But yeah, quite often he just seems like Springer Lite.

One episode I was really looking forward to, was about a week ago. It was being promoted as being "Behind the Scenes". I really like learning what goes on behind the scenes in things, so was pretty anxious to watch.

It ended up (IMHO) to be little more than a Dr. Phil self-promotion. I was really hoping, and expecting to see stuff like "Well here this camera person, getting directions from [whomever] and this is what he/she does", and "Here's our Producer, and our control panel", etc.

There was a maybe a tiny bit of that, but as I mention above, mostly recapping show visitors' issues, and saying "So we did [whatever] for them." They also brought back some of those people, and they sung Dr. Phil's (aw crap, somebody using his name every 5 seconds in that episode rubbed off on me! ) praises for all he had done.

Mike

[bainsidhe]

A number of months ago, MSN had an article and news blurb dedicated to haggling in stores. The reporter managed to score a number of discounts at the mall and local retail giants. BUT. She had to keep escalating and "politely" argue over and over to get her way. Although the reporter was calm and civil, she came across as very pushy and EW-ish. It's true she didn't start yelling and causing a huge scene, but that doesn't mean her actions weren't rude. I wish people would stop treating stores like a garage sale and pay what's owed.