A Little Rite-Aid As They Transition

Since Rite-Aid has come out as it where with the news of discontinuing the Plenti Points Program(say that 10 times quickly)and I even got an email from Rite-Aid yesterday informing me of the demise of Plenti on 10 July, I thought I'd go in and "buy" a few things.

But first here is my R-A "cheat sheet" with all my PPs, Bonus Cash and Allergy Rewards tracking totals.......

On D's card I have 5 x $5 and a $3 BC.  That card also has $27.09 in Plenti Points and $56.92 tracking toward an Allergy Reward.

So here is what was bought on that card.........it was two transactions but I photographed it all together.........

First Transactions was--
3 x Visine $4.63 w/20% Wellness discount=$13.89
2 x Rimmel mascara BOGO50% sale($5.79/$2.89)=$8.68
2 x Rimmel eyebrow/eye shadow BOGO50% sale($3.89/$1.84)=$5.73
1 x Burt's Bees lip shimmer stick 20% Wellness discount=$4.39
2 x Burt's Bees lip tint 20% Wellness discount($3.99)=$7.98
SubTotal....$40.67

Coupons Used
3  $2/1 Visine R-A ad Q=$6.00
1 x $2/1 Visine CatalinaQ=$2.00
2 x $1.50/1 Visine IPQ=$3.00
4 x Rimmel $3/1 eye product IPQ=$12.00
3 x Burt's Bees $1.50/1 lip color product IPQ=$4.50
Coupon Total.......$27.50

$40.67-$27.50=$13.17 +.11¢ tax=$13.28

$13 in BC came off(2 x $5, $3)leaving .28¢ left on my bill.

It seems that even though I have $20+ in PPs left on that card AND that my total owes was under $2 the register still applied my .28¢ owed to my PPs total.........

Of course this transaction was fraught with problems(as is usual at R-A).
The register took off all 3 of the R-A add Qs, one of the $1.50 Visine IPQs and then started beeping and not scanning the rest of the Qs(even the other $1.50/1 Visine IPQ which was strange because it took the first one no problem).
Qs the register scanned are listed with the item applied to on the receipt(don't know if you can see that)........

But Qs that have to be manually put through appear on the bottom of the receipt after all items are rung up.........

The manager mentioned something about the registers now won't take/scan more than 4 or 5 Qs before refusing and Corporate doesn't want the stores manually putting Qs through....even though the Qs are valid and match the item being bought. Ugh.
So now in order to not have to have Qs manually put through we need to start breaking up transactions so that we don't use more than 4 or so Qs at a clip.  What. A. Hassle.
I offered at that point to cancel this transaction and break this transaction into 2 or 3 smaller ones to comply with this policy but the manager said no, just get it done and move on. ;-)

So after manually putting the other $1.50 Visine Q through(with the manager standing there watching)the cashier tried scanning one of the Burt's Bees Qs again and it went through....huh?
We got all 3 of the $1.50/1 Burts Bees Qs scanned but the register still wouldn't scan any of the $3/1 Rimmel Qs or the $2/1 Visine Catalina Q.

So after those were put through manually, 2 x $5 and 1 x $3 Bonus Cash came off and .28¢ was applied to my Plenti Points total.
Here's the strange tally now where my Rewards are shown on the receipt.............

Where it says "Available BonusCash Rewards is the $1.72 balance of the $2 in PPs that came off my PPs total to cover the .28¢.  And notice my PPs total is now $2 less than before the transaction(Was $27.09/Now $25.09).

So according to this receipt I "only" have $1.72 in BC and earned $10 in new BC($6 for the Rimmel items and $4 for the Burt's Bees items).

But actually I went into this transaction with $28 in BC, used $13 in BC/earned $10 in BC so I now have $25 in BC + $1.72 in BC(converted from PPs)so $26.72 in BC.
Got that? lololz

I then bought 3 more of the Burt's Bees(I wanted to see if the Q would work on a color product besides the $9 one before I bought all 6 Qs worth that I had....and it did)...........

1 x Burt's Bees lip shimmer stick 20% Wellness discount=$4.39
2 x Burt's Bees lip tint 20% Wellness discount($3.99)=$7.98
Subtotal......$12.37

I used 3 x $1.50/1 Burts Bees lip color product IPQs so $4.50 off making my total $7.87 +.18¢ tax=$8.05.

A $5 BC came off so $3.05 was due and the register used $3.05 of my Plenti Points total to cover it.

Now this receipt shows I have $22.04 left in PPs, the new $4 in BC I earned on the Burt's Bees items and I have $1.72 Available Bonus Cash(which was from the last transaction).

The word on the street was that as of last week you could choose what to use to cover your total-Bonus Cash and/or Plenti Points.  But at my store, after you Wellness card is scanned you get a screen that says "Do you want to use your Reward Savings" today? and you hit the yes or no button.
No mention of Plenti Points OR Bonus Cash.
I remember I looked at the cashier and said, "What the hell is a Rewards Savings?".  She shrugged and said, "Beats me.". lololz

So what I am concluding here is that the R-A system is Firstly applying Bonus Cash to your total, then if you have PPs and a balance, your PPs get applied BUT, if your total owed is less than $2, the system takes at least $2 off your PPs balance and converts any leftover PPs not used on that transaction to BC.

Got that? 8-))

So now I have on this card..........
$25.72 in Bonus Cash(the leftover $10 from before today, the $1.72 converted from PPs, the $14 total earned in BC today)
I have $22.04 left in Plenti Points.
I have $70.81 tracking toward the Allergy Reward(didn't update that one before I took the photo).....

Also notice at the bottom of the receipt that where it tells you you earned a BonusCash reward it no longer tells the amount you earned.

And another thing, see this coupon in the ad?........

The Q is worth $2 off 1 Visine item(which you can stack with a ManuQ/IPQ).  Fine, but you can also earn a $10 BC if you purchase $40 in Visine items this week.  I don't know about you but that is a BUTT LOAD of Visine and my store doesn't even have enough bottles of Visine on the shelf every week for you to find $40 worth to purchase. lolz
After my 20% Wellness discount I'd have to buy 9 bottles of Visine to reach $40(using the lowest priced Visine products here).  Sure, it would be a .33¢ moneymaker deal after earning $10 in BC and IF I could find 6 more $1.50/1 Visine IPQs AND 6 more bottles on the shelves. 
But seriously?  Who needs 9 bottles of Visine in one fell swoop? ;-)

When all was said and done I spent down $5.31 total in assorted points/rewards on these 13 products I bought.

I don't know about you but I will be so GLAD when Rite-Aid finishes transitioning from Plenti to this BonusCash system fully!


Sluggy