I received a parcel through the other day and even though it was addressed to the other half, I opened it to have a look. There were a range of pamphlets and something which looked like an old Palm pilot! I called her to see if she had made some brash last minute attempt to bag a bargain on Ebay and she told me rather that she had signed up for this scheme called National Shopping Monitor.

It is basically a survey type thing.. they want to get an idea of the shopping habits of people, where they go, where they buy etc. Everytime you have bought something from the supermarket, you scan in the barcodes for the objects you have purchased into the Palm type device and it sends the data back to it’s data warehouse (wherever they are).

For the trouble you are awarded points and points provide you with vouchers to spend. There is a list of known brands for which the vouchers are valid.. places like HMV, Argos, Halfords, UCI cinemas, WH Smith, Virgin etc. There are also other member benefits such as discounted AA membership, discounted magazine subscriptions etc etc .

I don’t know if I would have the patience to scan in every single item into the scanner for the cash involved but certainly, as a student, I would do this.

There are some reviews regarding the service here

http://www.ciao.co.uk/TNS_National_Shopping_Monitor__5830081

Their corporate site is here:

http://www.tnsglobal.com/

I am not sure how one joins this programme as my girlfriend signed up but as soon as I find out, I’ll post it to the blog.

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