Shopping Discussion

Sportchek and other merchants unable to understand "average income" people?

  • Last Updated:
  • Sep 23rd, 2016 3:21 pm
Tags:
Deal Addict
Feb 22, 2016
4745 posts
4409 upvotes
You all realize SportChek and Atmosphere are both owned by Crappy Tire, which should explain your bad experiences.

Crappy Tire's empire includes all of: Crappy Tire, PartSource, Mark's Work Warehouse, Athletes World, Atmosphere, Intersport, Hockey Experts, National Sports, Nevada Bob's Golf, S3, SportChek, Sport Mart, Sports Experts, Tech Shop, Pro Hockey Life, The Fitness Source

I avoid all of them.
Deal Addict
User avatar
Oct 21, 2009
1535 posts
94 upvotes
Markham
Yes I know their crappy empire, and the worse part is they own Mosport, the closest track to where I live..
Need help on Rogers plans? Don't bother unless you like spending hours with them...
dumping Rogers? hmm...
Sr. Member
User avatar
Jan 4, 2008
773 posts
189 upvotes
Gatineau
I am trying to understand your problem, but I'm not sure it's the broken english or you have a hard time getting a point across...but I'm completely confused. Could you try without making silly comments, explain what your issue is so we can try to help you?
Deal Fanatic
User avatar
Dec 3, 2009
6029 posts
1391 upvotes
Toronto
I read the OP a few times and I think I have the issue....

The OP made more than one purchase on high ticket items (different sizes?) and used more than one card and got flagged.

Is this right?
Remember to be an RFD-er and NOT a degenerate.
Deal Expert
Dec 5, 2006
16792 posts
12573 upvotes
Markham
Op, i totally understand your frustration. But you dont know fraud behavior for sportchek, might be your behavior triggered their fraud alarm and not necessarily means your purchase amount. But again, they wont tell you. Fraud detection is behavior pattern
Deal Addict
User avatar
Oct 21, 2009
1535 posts
94 upvotes
Markham
Yeah exactly those reasons. Whatever behavior triggering the detection just seems too sensitive. The fact when I called in to their center and they ask I used 2 different cards surprised me. These days don't people have many cards as a default? You can't even use VISA at Costco so you're forced to either use cash/debit or MC there, so if you don't own MC then you probably would get one.

My point is, using multiple cards in different orders is not unreasonable. Some people like to divide purchases between cards, one might be for business use, one for personal etc, but all billed /ship to same person.

I feel this type of generalization will lead to profiling, it's almost same as police asking why someone is driving to point J, K, L when their home is A and their destination is B. Well maybe they are running errands, picking up friends/family or doing other stuff, or maybe they just want to drive around. Why does according to "behaviour" that one must drive A to B always, and if they don't, they are doing something wrong.

Everything is being blown out of proportion now a days.
Need help on Rogers plans? Don't bother unless you like spending hours with them...
dumping Rogers? hmm...
Deal Fanatic
Jun 17, 2013
5120 posts
1501 upvotes
Montreal
Yes...everything is blown out of proportion these days. Your reaction included.
Deal Addict
Feb 10, 2013
4783 posts
1327 upvotes
Richmond
simple solution. Pay down your card to make room. Otherwise you have a spending issue. And if you don't have the income to support such a large limit you should be looking somewhere else


Stay tuned for op's next thread on help with his debt in personal finance.
Deal Addict
User avatar
Jan 3, 2014
3252 posts
3029 upvotes
Vancouver(ish)
FlashEngineer wrote: It is normal, unless they don't know what they are selling even, like I said, are they selling dollarstore items?
Well, realistically, their stuff is junk when you're looking at the serious people who'd actually spend upwards of $1500.

They're kinda like Canadian Tire from that perspective. You know..."if it's not in the flyer, don't buy at the Tire". If it's not on sale at Sport Chek, I don't buy it. :)
Proud RFD member since January 31, 2007. Feel free to add 3,034 to my post count.
Deal Fanatic
User avatar
Oct 22, 2007
9280 posts
3006 upvotes
London
FlashEngineer wrote: My point is, using multiple cards in different orders is not unreasonable. Some people like to divide purchases between cards, one might be for business use, one for personal etc, but all billed /ship to same person.
Ordering similar multiple items on multiple credit cards looks like fraud. The chances of this being fraud is greater than the chances of this being legit... why would any retailer bother?
Deal Fanatic
User avatar
Jun 1, 2006
7972 posts
9093 upvotes
Toronto
Image
FlashEngineer wrote: Ok I'm not sure if this is just specific to SportChek/Atmosphere or it's general to all online merchants/stores so I'll leave this here first.

I'm trying to place a few orders due to the Friends/Family 25% event, which I hope their "security" department knows and people are going to buy some items fast due to LOW stock. Most of the stock isn't even in stores so you HAVE to buy online. Now most RFD know, buy now, think later, and of course if you can't even buy in store, how can you try it or see how it looks? Therefore the obvious solution is to buy whatever items, different sizes and return ones you don't want.

So is it that surprising to Sportchek or other merchants that people do this?

Or they never have people who actually have "average" income buying stuff from their store? They are selling jackets and other outerwear at $700-$900 a piece, so it's safe to say people who buy these aren't people who are scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Most people also have multiple credit cards and want to distribute points to different card on different orders. That's another surprising thing?

Now add up the math, if you're ordering a few items, different sizes, each about $700 a piece. That's like $1500-$2500.

If someone who has low income/no income with garbage credit, I don't think they can even have a $1500 limit credit card. So I'm not sure what they are worried about here.

Normal facts of "average income" people, not even 1%ers, that merchants should know.

1. Have multiple credit cards
2. "Average" limit on them, not $500 or $1000 limit
3. Purchase multiple items for self or spouse/friends/family or buy/try return.

Seriously, if anyone works in the "fraud" department on merchants please chime in.
I swear to drunk I'm not God 😝
Deal Guru
Nov 15, 2008
12993 posts
8360 upvotes
I find it hard to believe that given a choice of XS, S, M, L, XL, you could not just pick one.
Deal Guru
User avatar
Oct 14, 2003
14325 posts
1241 upvotes
hvwozq wrote: What exactly is OP trying to say here?
He was flagged by Sportchek's fraud department because he bought a bunch of different winter coats in multiple sizes and on different credit cards.
Science
is the new
rock 'n'
roll.
Deal Addict
Jan 10, 2009
2596 posts
1987 upvotes
Boom and Bust Calgar…
Meth not even once.
Deal Addict
User avatar
Jul 15, 2003
3566 posts
1038 upvotes
Ontario, Canada
OP. if your explanation to sportscheck fraud department was in any way similar in comprehension level as your original post, then i can see why they would just flag it as fraud and not want to deal with you.

And no i personally don't agree with you that the 'average' person will buy multiple $700 items on multiple credit cards all shipped to the same location. Yes i'm sure some people legitimately do that. But that's no where near the average and statistically is more likely to be fraud.

Top