I am looking into the Square Loyalty program but I have a few reservations....

[Candlestore]

Hi all, I am thinking about starting the Square Loyalty program and switching from my out dated system.  The outdated system is just the paper Punch card system.

1.) I have buy 12 get one free.  So the customer walks up with 13 jars and pays for 12 essentially.  I already have a Discount when a person does this in the Store.   No programs or signup required.  So my question is if I setup the Loyalty program so customers do not have to buy 12 today to get the 13th one free, would these both work together when a Loyalty customer buys 12.... would they end up getting the Loyalty reward and the Discount at the time of purchase so 2 free candles?

2.) Is there a way Square can auto generate a Customer ID?  Basically the same way it auto generates a SKU for Square for Retail Plus.

3.) is it possible in my case where a person comes in with a Punch card with say 7 Punches to give that person 7 Stars points or whatever it is Square terms the rewards?

4.) I was thinking of ways to have a Little tag for on a key ring, but thought that could get expensive.  So is there a way I could email / text the Code to the customer when one is assigned to them?  

Any help would be appreciated or ideas or warnings about this program.

[TheRealChipA]

Hey Keith!

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1.) I have buy 12 get one free.  So the customer walks up with 13 jars and pays for 12 essentially.  I already have a Discount when a person does this in the Store.   No programs or signup required.  So my question is if I setup the Loyalty program so customers do not have to buy 12 today to get the 13th one free, would these both work together when a Loyalty customer buys 12.... would they end up getting the Loyalty reward and the Discount at the time of purchase so 2 free candles?

This would not work in Loyalty as it stands now.  This is because the points are not assigned until after the payment is completed.  So the customer can not buy 12, get one free, using loyalty.  The only way you could do that currently is to have an automatic discount at your POS.

2.) Is there a way Square can auto generate a Customer ID?  Basically the same way it auto generates a SKU for Square for Retail Plus.

The customer’s cell phone number is their customer ID.  There is no other ID, and the cell number is required to be a loyalty customer.

3.) is it possible in my case where a person comes in with a Punch card with say 7 Punches to give that person 7 Stars points or whatever it is Square terms the rewards?

Yes, we can add and remove points manually through the POS and the online dashboard.

4.) I was thinking of ways to have a Little tag for on a key ring, but thought that could get expensive.  So is there a way I could email / text the Code to the customer when one is assigned to them?  

See answer to number 2 above.

Any help would be appreciated or ideas or warnings about this program.

Otherwise if you want to chat about your ideas for your program, I’d be more than happy to chat with you via phone.  Feel free to PM me and we can coordinate something.  I’ve used this for two years now and, honestly, it has been a big hit, as well as something that is not costing me an arm and a leg.  I resisted it for as long as I could, but customer suggestions finally broke through that resistance.

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[TheRealChipA]

Expanding on my answer to #1, you’ll need to keep your POS discount.  It would work as you want it to, if I’m understanding you correctly.  It would not “double discount” them for that sale.

[Candlestore]

@TheRealChipA 

Hey Chip!   I was going to tag you but did not want you getting notified over the weekend.  Do you know, does the Phone number that ends up being the Refrence ID, have to be a cell number?  I did not know the Reference ID ended up coming from the Phone number.  Especially since you can have a phone number, secondary phone number and secondary contacts phone number.  I was thinking of making tags that could be scanned with the Reference ID, but did not want personal information on it like their phone number.  Especially with all the identity problems people do have. Maybe I should put in a request for that to be able to auto populate the Reference ID for people with the Loyalty program.  Still let stores look up customers by name, phone, and reference ID.

Thanks for letting me know that Stars and an auto Discount will not be doubled at a single time.

[TheRealChipA]

It must be the phone number.  Even more, it must be a phone number that can receive and reply to a text in order to opt in to the program.  Requests have been made to consider changing this, but it is what it is currently.

Now to your double discounting.  What I mentioned was only at the time of the sale.  In the future, you have the ability to control what rewards the customer can redeem.  It depends on how you define reward levels.  When my customers come in and ask us to look up rewards and they have a coupon or other discount, we remind them that they can’t do both.  They can either discount OR redeem a reward.  It’s in our control. That rarely comes up for us, though.

[TheRealChipA]

Oh and the integrated customer lookup in POS allows us to lookup a customer a few different ways, and see their loyalty status then.  So I think you would be more than covered without the added expense of a plastic card.  We haven’t used those and never felt the need for them.

[TheRealChipA]

LOL… even better, once a loyalty customer uses a card for payment, that card will automatically know they are a loyalty customer the next visit.

[Candlestore]

@TheRealChipA ;

Chip I tried this this morning before opening.  My Discount applied correctly so that the 13th Jar at time of purchase was free.  So that worked.

But then I also got Loyalty (Stars Points) for that transaction, which should have been used up by the Discount.  Now I could be reading this wrong since I am new to trying this.  I have attached pictures of my Stands Messages at the time of sale.  Sorry about the bad images from the phone.

This picture shows the Discount Was applied correctly.

The Below picture I am confused on.... Does this mean I bought my 12 jars and now can redeem my Stars for a free jar?

So that would give the Loyalty person basically 2 Free is my understanding.... One at time of Purchase (AutoDiscount) then 1 Free when they Return to use a Loyalty reward. 

I am just pointing this out because either I am miss reading this or if you are using this the way I want to you might be doubling your Free item to your customers without knowing it.

If this is the case, any ideas how to be able to Give one at time of Purchase without the free one counting as a Loyalty point if I comp the Free Candle?  Since it shows as a Discount, I am assuming Square would see it as a 'Purchased' Item and accumulate a Point.    Or is this just a thing I need to figure out a work around for?

Thanks for your Help.

[TheRealChipA]

Keith,

Color me surprised!  After I saw your post, I went to my POS and ran a couple of tests myself.  Obviously, I’m seeing the same thing you are.

You have found (I think) a bug.  I didn’t see it before because I don’t have discounts like that.  Here’s what I saw in my tests

1. I rang up my toddler-sized kinder cone ($1) and applied a $1 loyalty reward to that transaction.  When I completed the transaction, I got the message that the transaction did not qualify for new loyalty points, which is the way it should be.
2. I rang up my toddler-size cup ($1.50) and applied a $1 loyalty reward to that transaction.  When I completed that and paid it to cash, I got the same message that the transaction did not qualify for new loyalty points.  Again, as it should.
3. However, if I ring in an item and apply a discount to it (I have a 100% discount code that I use for testing purposes and giveaways), that fully discounted item earns loyalty points.  That seems like a total bug to me. And it is consistent with what you are seeing.

I’m going to tag @_Violet on this to get a bug report investigation going.  Customers should definitely not be receiving loyalty points for discounted items, whether those discounts are loyalty rewards or regular discounts/coupons.  Obviously, the engineers knew this because it works correctly when loyalty rewards are applied, as I proved above.

For now, I’m not sure how you work around this if you want to implement a loyalty program.  My first thought is that you’ll need to manually adjust the customer’s loyalty points after such a sale — not ideal, I know.  I guess you could also get rid of automatic discounts and manually apply those to checks where a customer is not a loyalty subscriber.  Again, not ideal.  I think I’d lean toward not implementing a loyalty program until this is fixed, especially if you have lots of transactions with various BxGO schemes.

[Candlestore]

@TheRealChipA ;

Thank you   I think for now I agree with you.... No loyalty program until this is fixed.   

I have a Manual discount that works fine for when a customer comes in with the old punch card with say 10 punches already and buys 2 more and can get the 3rd one free.  I just do 100% discount on one of them manually.

Thanks for all the information.

[TheRealChipA]

Also tagging @trisha_m @Elyn @kellyj  Because there were admins on recent Square Loyalty beta tests.  Can one of you three look at Keith’s post above (dated 9/30) as well as my reply?  Loyalty seems to be awarding points for items that we discount manually (or automatically) using the POS discount functionality.  Since loyalty does not award points for items when a loyalty reward is redeemed, it seems that it should not aware points for any discounted item.  This is a form of discount stacking that penalizes loyalty sellers who aren’t aware it is going on.  Looks like a bug/oversight to me!

Thanks!

[GroceryJoe]

Bumping this thread because it is an issue we are seeing too and I didn't see any Square replies yet @trisha_m, @Elyn, @kellyj, @_Violet. In the example above we also don't want to offer 2 free items when they get 1 free in the automatic discount and a 2nd via points. For us at least we'd be happy with limiting the discount to members only. Or at least prevent earning loyalty points on discounted cart items.

EDIT: according to https://www.sellercommunity.com/t5/Square-for-Retail/Loyalty-Programs-amp-Discounted-Items/td-p/1443... this is not a bug. 
> If you have a program that is set for customers to earn points on a per dollar basis, they'll still earn points for every dollar spent even if items are discounted.

[Emmaoivia23]

Hey there! It's great that you're considering the Square Loyalty program. Here are some insights to address your reservations

:

1.) With Square Loyalty, you can customize rewards to align with your existing buy 12 get one free system. Customers can still benefit from the discount and loyalty rewards simultaneously.

2.) Square can automatically generate a unique Customer ID, similar to SKU generation for Square for Retail Plus, streamlining the process for you.

3.) You can easily convert punches from the old system to Stars points in Square, ensuring a seamless transition for your customers.

4.) Instead of physical tags, you can efficiently deliver customer codes via email or text, saving on costs. for other info you can

Feel free to explore the program further and leverage its benefits for your business!

[rtfulk]

@Candlestore I have been researching having a loyalty card for the customer to scan. We use a barcode scanner already so everything is inplace. You can replace the phone number in the reference section in the customer field so when you scan the card it will pull up the customer. We have been so busy this season that I just haven't had time to implement it. below is a link to a customizable loyalty card just to show the card. 

Loyalty card 

[Candlestore]

@rtfulk ;

 I appreciate your idea of scanning the phone number in the refrence field.  But my main issue is that, my daily loyalty is buy 12 of my large candles and you get one free at time of purchase.  Well Since Square gives a loyalty point at the time the sale is complete, then my customer would not get the automatic discount when they pickup 13 candles in store.  But the next time they come in they would have the points for a Free candle.  So I am trying to see if there is a way that when my customers buy the 13 jars in store the get the Free 13th candle then but the loyalty is reset to Zero since they bought 12 and got the automatic discount of 1 free.  So far when I tested this my custmers got the automatic discount at the time they brought 13 jars to the checkout.  Plus they get a loyalty reward to get one free their next purchase, essentially giving the customer 2 free candles for buying 12 instead of 1.    That is my main issue i had testing the loyalty program,

I also have a scanner at my POS with Square and have been using a 2D scanner so I can scan alot of information in a small 2d code with multiple layers of data correction and error prevention.

[_Violet]

Hi all @GroceryJoe @Emmaoivia23 @rtfulk @Candlestore - I've reached out the the Square Loyalty to see if they can provide some more insight on this.

I'll reach back out to you here once I gather more info!

[_Violet]

Hi @Candlestore - For more context, the Loyalty Team wants to know if you created an automatic discount in the scenario you mentioned above.

I'll keep an eye out for your reply!

[Candlestore]

@_Violet ;

Yes I created the automatic discount in the above mention scenario.  I did that so people who buy 12 jars do not have to come back for the free one.  We have customers that around Holiday shopping may buy 36, 48 or more candles and drive 2 hours or more for these, needles to say they do not want to return for their free candles.

Would be nice if the automatic discount takes place  that the loyalty point shows no change since the automatic discount was used.  Even if it is just a text on the receipt right under the Discount stating No loyalty pts for this purchase since you got the reward for this purchase.

[JJ_]

Hey there @Candlestore

I have escalated this over to our team for them to provide their input. I will come back here with an update once they reply.

[JJ_]

Hello there @Candlestore

Sorry for the long delay in our reply. I was waiting for our team to look into this and give us an answer. 

Here is their response:

"With this, they would just want to set up automatic discounts. With loyalty, it's a coupon that's earned, so unless they check the customer out in 2 transactions, they wouldn't be able to have loyalty apply automatically. That's just not a feature of loyalty. With custom discounts, they can still link it to a specific group of customers, or they can have it set up, so it will apply to all customers who do buy 12+ candles."

They also provided this video:

I hope this answers your question.