My New Dislike for Tesco of Ireland

Today, shopping at Tesco was a disaster. Let me just start off by saying, my roommate and I have been shopping at Tesco one to two times a week since we moved to Dublin, Ireland on February 1, 2012. We have NEVER had anything like this happen before today, even though, it is apparently "policy". Our whole shopping excursion was going great until we got to the check out lane. My roommate picked up a bottle of wine while shopping and since it was in the top of her bag, it was the first thing to get put on the check out conveyor. As she continued to put her other groceries on the conveyor the woman just stared at her instead of starting the transaction. I should have known this was a bad sign, seeing as there were people behind both of us in line.

The checkout woman, Yvonne, asked my roommate for her ID. This was a first for either of us at Tesco. We are 21 and 22. In Ireland the drinking age is 18 and believe me, neither of us looks younger than 18. My roommate provided her drivers license which Yvonne told her was not acceptable. She offered to provide her visa card which we got when we moved to Dublin, which was also not acceptable. Apparently, we were expected to carry our passports around with us in order to buy alcohol. Of course, we didn't do this because, like responsible American college students, we leave them locked in our flat so we don't lose them or have them stolen. 

Yvonne then told Kelsey she was absolutely not allowed to purchase the alcohol. To the two of us, this was completely ridiculous seeing as we have bought lots of wine from Tesco and never had any issues. The real kicker was, Yvonne actually told us, 'you look over than 18 but not 25'. Apparently the Tesco chain has a rule if the purchaser doesn't look over 25 you must ask for ID. I don't understand why when you say we look OLDER than 18 (the actual age to purchase alcohol) it has to become an issue OR why we'd never been questioned before. To put her rudeness into perspective, my roommate and I have not met another person disrespectfully rude since we've moved to Ireland in the last three months. So of course, Kelsey asked to speak to a manager. 

The woman who Yvonne provided as the 'manager' did not have a 'manager' tag on her name badge and was as equally as rude as Yvonne was. She informed us that we would have never been able to purchase alcohol without our passports at the Santry Tesco. Naturally, we told her we've been doing it since February which she informed us DID NOT happened. Okay lady, what ever helps you sleep at night. After being graced by this so called manager, since neither of us had our passports, the wine was taken away from us (literally). At this time, my roommate produced her credit card to pay for the rest of her food. Let me point out, this is the same credit card she has used EVERY time we've shopped at Tesco, once a week, since February. 

Yvonne took one look at the card and said 'we don't take those here'...what??! She told us because the card said 'ask for ID' on the back instead of having a signature the store would not accept the card. Ha, really? Kelsey immediately pulled out every form of identification she had on her but none of them were good enough for this control freak, Tesco employee. Yvonne said no one would accept those at Tesco, however, very clearly everyone else but Yvonne accepts this card at Tesco. Luckily, Kelsey had enough cash on her to pay for the rest of her groceries.

After leaving, we were so upset by how she treated us we decided to contact the Tesco headquarters and make a formal complaint. In America, someone would easily get fired for the way Yvonne treated the two of us. Our formal complaint resulted in a 5€ (about $6.60) gift card for each of us as an apology for Tesco's lack of company wide policy enforcement and customer mistreatment. I think we were worth at lest 20€ but hey, apparently we're not that valued in this country. 

The apology letter Tesco sent me with a 5 euro gift card.