Use Boots high prices to your Advantage ! (Boots Advantage Card)

Member Name: englishrose

Product:	Boots Advantage Card
Date:	25/03/09 (72 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Points mount up quickly with special offers. You can give yourself treats.

Disadvantages: Not very secure system. Boots is a bit expensive.

Boots Advantage Card is a loyalty card which you use solely at the high street chemist chain Boots: Basically, like all the other plastic cards you have in your wallet, you hand it over at the till when you make a purchase and your points are added to the card via a little chip embedded in the plastic.

Where the Boots Advantage Card is a bit superior to some of those others is that it offers 4 points for every pound you spend: This is the equivalent of 4 pence. Okay, so that's not like winning the lottery but it can soon add up!

The Boots Advantage Card can also be used when shopping with Boots online, you simply enter your Advantage Card number when creating your account, and points are collected in the same way.

Whenever you go into a Boots store, you will see the Advantage Card machines, there will be more than one in the larger stores. You do not have to use them if you don't want to , but they do contain special offers, so I always pop the Advantage Card into them to see what's on offer. It will usually be something like extra points on certain products or when you spend a set amount, or occasionally a free gift.

I never used to use the machines because they used to print up my full name on the rather large screen for everyone to see over my shoulder: However, they have changed this now and it's much more secure and private.

The Advantage Card machine is also used when you have shopped at Boots online - from 5 days after your order is sent to you, you insert your card into the machine instore and it automatically 'adds' the points to your card.

Another way of getting the points to mount up quickly is to take advantage of the extra points offers instore: These will be prominently placed, and consists of, for example, "200 extra points when you buy <insert name of product>" . Then there are the online offers which will say something like "1000 extra points when you spend £60" for example - Not an amount I would normally spend in Boots, but easily achievable during Christmas shopping time.

This only works of course if you religiously stick to only buying things that you needed to buy anyway, or can be a false economy. That is the downside of the generous loyalty card scheme that Boots have, in my experience - Boots is so much more expensive that it's rivals like Superdrug, Savers, or even the major supermarkets, so you need to work out whether what you are buying for the extra points is worth it: I tend nowadays to buy things on special offer in Boots and get everything else from another shop.



Spending your points

When you have built up a decent amount, you can think about what you want to spend them on! Look instore at the barcode/price labels on the shelves in front of each product: if the product name has a little star next to it, that means that you can buy it with your Advantage points. Most items instore are included, so the choice is really wide.

Just take the item to the till and tell the cashier that you wish to use your points to pay for it: You have a choice whether to pay fully with points or part cash, part points, it's really up to you. It's as simple as that.

A serious disadvantage for me is that if your card is lost or stolen, anyone who picks it up can immediately go and spend the points : There is no need to prove identity, and unlike for example the Tesco Clubcard where the vouchers are sent to your home address, this seems quite insecure: So hang on tight to your Advantage Card!

I did once lose my card and I had saved up around £80.00 on it, and I have to say the Customer Services were excellent: I rang to tell them and they immediately cancelled it and sent me a new number etc., so I was lucky that time that I didn't lose anything, thanks to their speedy service. :)

What do I spend mine on? My beloved favourite Chanel No 5 - I could never afford to pay cash for it! :)

VERDICT: Use special offers to get the points mounting up - and then treat yourself to your favourite luxury!

Summary: Use the Advantage Card tactically and you can make it work for you.