Your Email, Their Data: The issues with Digital Receipts

Digital receipts…where shall I start with this? Recently, I visited a store. I bought a jacket and at the point in the transaction when I should’ve received my receipt. The screen was turned to me and the assistant said “Put in your email address”, to which I said “Why”?, their response was “for your receipt”, I said “I’d like a paper receipt”, their response, “but if you lose it, we won’t be able to exchange your item, so if you give us your email address then we’ll keep it safe for you so that you could come back”.

I reiterated, I’d like a paper receipt. I also then said I do not wish to have my inbox bombarded to which I was told we (as in the company) would never do that, and as soon as a period has passed. “We delete your email address”. I shook my head took my paper receipt and left, I thought?—?how naive. ? ?

You may well ask, why have I reacted in this way? My issue is, if this was real then my inbox would not be bombarded with constant emails from companies some sending emails, sometimes four times a day and in most instances all irrelevant.

This is a topic I discussed on the “Tech Journey Insights” podcast recently. ? ?I made a snap decision not to have digital receipts until it is a legal requirement or I’m charged for a paper receipt. Then a couple of days later, I was foiled again, this time there was to be no receipt unless I gave an email address. I had no choice! ? ?

In my opinion, Digital receipts are not for my benefit nor are they beneficial for the environment, as everything that is stored digitally is full reliant on data centres and tech in the background, which utilises lots of energy, so the environmental and climate argument falls down for me. In my possibly blinkered view, they are only beneficial to the company selling the product because then they have a way of interacting with you endlessly. ? ?

Having discussed this with friends and colleagues quite a few people have email addresses which they use solely for shopping purposes because of the deluge of emails. How do you manage? Do you feel digital receipts are good?

Let me know your thoughts and do check out the TikTok clips from the “Tech Journey Insights” podcast where I’m joined by my co-host and we discussed our observations and insights along our tech journeys.

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(I previously published this article on Medium)