Dear Jim'll Fixit

[Jemski]

Please could you fix it for someone to take a loot at the glitch I've found in the '%off cheapest item' quantity based discounts that leads to bad discounting. It is very easy for anyone using Actinic to lose money through this glitch an it's been causing trouble for me and a lot of other people for a long time. I have described the problem and the cause below but I am not profficient enough at Perl to fix it myself. Please help.

Having looked at Actinic V8 code as far as I can see the problem persists in the new version and really needs fixing. This isn't just a little bit of an irritating bug or a problem with the way users are setting the discounting up - this is a genuine flaw in the discounting code that has the strong potential to lose money for anyone using quantity based '%off cheapest' discounting such as '3 for 2' offers.

The problem is in ActinicDiscounts.pm - search for 'reward % off cheapest'

As far as I can see Actinic sorts items by value high to low to identify discounts. Then counts backwards from the most expensive to calculate '% off cheapest' quantity based discounts.

If you offer 3 for 2 (100% off cheapest when you order 3 from a group of items) and the items cost £3, £2, and £1 and someone orders one of each this is fine, they get the £1 item free. But if people order more than 3 items from the discountable group the problems start. This is because the code is working on the principle that the next item on the list is the cheapest. However ...

If I order 2 x £3, 1 x £2 and 1 x £1 items then on our 3 for 2 offer Actinic counts backwards from the most expensive and discounts the 3rd item i.e. £2 - but the cheapest item is actually the £1 item. Worse still if I order 3 x £3, and 1 x £1 then it still discounts the 3rd item on the most expensive list ... which is £3!! Not the cheapest qualifying item which is £1. Try it - I'm not kidding.

I can think of a number of potential ways to fix this but I'm no Perl programmer so I don't know which is best. The crux is that the discounts should be applied to the last qualifying items on the list not the next qualifying items.

[Nadeem]

Hi Jem

I'm getting some feedback from Development regarding this, In one of your older thread, it was mentioned that it was working as designed, but let me get some more information for you.

Kind Regards

[jont]

I have had to abandon several multiple discount schemes due to this phenomenon - as Jem says they do not work rationally as expected in the real work

[zmagyar]

Having looked at Actinic V8 code as far as I can see the problem persists in the new version and really needs fixing.

It wasn't fixed in v8 because it is working as designed at the moment. When discounting was designed our purpose was to maximise the benefit for the shopper not for the merchant. It is clearly to avoid shoppers placing multiple orders to maximise the benefit.

If I order 2 x £3, 1 x £2 and 1 x £1 items then on our 3 for 2 offer Actinic counts backwards from the most expensive and discounts the 3rd item i.e. £2 - but the cheapest item is actually the £1 item.

If discounting would work on the way you described then the shopper would place two orders (£1 item in a separate order) to get the maximum discount.

[jont]

The reward type inside Actinic actually says "% off cheapest" which it necessarily isn't.

As a shopper in Tesco or wherever I would expect if the promotion said "cheapest is free of half price" then it would relate to the cheapest item in the deal ... if I wanted more I would buy the deal again.

The current set up certainly favours the customer but with complex deals it is quite confusing and creates a loss of income for the retailer

[zmagyar]

The current set up certainly favours the customer but with complex deals it is quite confusing and creates a loss of income for the retailer

On what way please? If I were the buyer seeing the discount changing on this way

a) I would call you complaining about my loss

b) If my complains are hitting a brick wall then split my order

I don't think either of the above costs less you than the customer favouring discount.

[fleetwood]

I'm not using any of these promos myself yet, but reading the above, I have to side with the Actinic boys.

You go into Tesco's, and there is a promotion on choccie bars - 3 for 2 (cheapest is free).

You grab 3 twix @ 35p, and a finger of fudge at 10p (all are part of same promotion).

When you checkout, would you really expect the 10p finger of fudge to be the freebie, so you'd pay a total of £1.05?

Surely, if this were the case, you'd say, OK, I'll take the 3 twix and pay 70p (with one free), and then I'll take the fudge seperately, paying a total of 80p.

as a retailer, you are not losing out - you are actually fullfilling the promotion, with the customer getting the cheapest one free out of a grouping (the grouping being the 3 most expensive items), and then getting a bonus sale of the fourth item.

At the risk of labouring the point - if you purchased 3 twix and 3 finger of fudge in one sale, wouldn't you expect one free twix and one free fudge, and not simply 2 free fudge?

Think about it - it does actually make sense.

[pinbrook]

At the risk of labouring the point - if you purchased 3 twix and 3 finger of fudge in one sale, wouldn't you expect one free twix and one free fudge, and not simply 2 free fudge?

gotta agree with Fleetwood

[Duncan Rounding]

I've got to agree with Martiin & Actinic on this one - although I don't think the customer would completely think it through in the detail we are discussing here.

[fleetwood]

although I don't think the customer would completely think it through in the detail we are discussing here.

for online sales, that is true, as it can sometimes be rather complicated trying to fathom the workings of an invoice or online checkout receipt, but if you were in a B&M shop, it would be far clearer, which is why I chose to illustrate with the Tesco/choccie bar example.

In truth, when I first started reading this thread, my gut instinct was to agree that Actinic was getting it wrong - it was only when I stopped and thought it through, that it did in fact make sense this way.

With tounge firmly in cheek - wouldn't it be fun to see who could offer the most complicated promotion on the run up to Christmas...

I go for the "Buy 3 get the 2nd most expensive at 25% off the cost of the cheapest"

[TraceyHand]

and indeed thats how retailers like Boots, for example, details their 3 for 2 offers... all items are listed in order of price and,starting from the highest, every 3rd item is free.
It's what customers expect nowadays.

I think the problem is the wording used by the software, in that it's not accurate when ordering more than 3 items.

[Jemski]

I do see your point - I guess there are 2 different ways of looking at what buy 3 and get the cheapest free means when you order more than 3 qualifying products and to be honest I'd never really seen it the way you've described. I actually found it highly suspect when it wasn't the cheapest item being discounted. I am certainly willing to bow to the majority. But I do have 2 main points on this.

Firstly, Boots (and TESCO for that matter) don't really count because they can afford to give you the 3rd most expensive item for free. It makes them look good and I'm pretty sure any retail buyer will tell you that it is actually the supplier (not Boots) who foots the 3 for 2 bill. I don't know about you but I don't have that sort of clout with my suppliers and my margins are slim - a penny saved is a penny gained.

Secondly, and this is the real problem for me (as alluded to above), if I was buying 4 items from a site that said get the cheapest free and then gave me the third most expensive free I'd wonder whether I'd understood the promotion, how reliable their shopping cart was and whether I should trust them with my credit card details. Don't get me wrong, I'd be chuffed but suspicious. So yes, perhaps it is the wording more than anything that needs changing - also the help files as for a long time I thought this was all just me doing something wrong.

On a more pedantic note, in Actinic if you have a 3 for 2 promotion and a customer orders 2 items the shopping cart says 'Order 1 more item and get 1 free'. This isn't strictly true and is a little misleading. Actually the customer has already qualified to get 1 free, they just need to choose an additional item. "Order 1 more and get 1 free" when you already have 2 items in your cart makes a 3 for 2 offer sound like a 4 for 3 offer. Again, confusion and potential loss of sales.

[fleetwood]

Hi again Jem

I think this is worth getting right, as your way of thinking this promotion through has the potential to cause you a future problem with trading standards.

I do not believe that there are in fact two ways of looking at what the promotion means.
What you need to be clear about in your own head, is that the promotion
refers to just three items, not four. The fourth is an additional sale (even if it is under the same promotion).
By adding a fourth item, the customer is adding an extra sale.
You are better off than you were with the customer buying 3 items.
You are only giving the same discount as you would do had the customer bought just 3 items, PLUS you are getting an extra sale of 1 undiscounted item.

Tesco's and Boots are subject to the same trading standards and rules as you are, and vice versa.
I don't think you will find that this sort of promotion would be open to your own 'small guy' intrepretation, if challenged by trading standards.
They do indeed have more clout to negotiate than us little guys, and yes we do need all the extra pennies we can get.
However, if you decide to offer a promotion, and have calculated that you can afford to give this sort of discount, it is not costing you any more to give the 3rd most expensive free on a purchase of 4, than it is to give the cheapest free on a purchase of 3 - the fourth (and cheapest) item is irrelevant to the calculation.

On your second point, which customer do you think will return -

1) "Kewl, I thought I was getting the £1.99 item free, but I got the £2.99 item free. I don't geddit it, but I'm happy"

2) "Wait a minute, I don't understand this promotion. I thought I was getting the £2.99 item free. Why did I only get the £1.99 item, free?"

Happy customers pay compliments and return far more than disgruntled customers complaining (unhappy customers will usually say nothing and walk, never to return, rather than tell you they are unhappy).

On the final point, it sounds like a simple change of text might be an idea, when 2 promotion items are in the cart.
Changing "Order 1 more and get 1 free" to "order 1 more and get the cheapest free".
You can usually modify these sort of text expressions withIN the software.
I'll hand it over to one of the boffins to tell you how (if it can indeed be done).

[zmagyar]

You can usually modify these sort of text expressions withIN the software.
I'll hand it over to one of the boffins to tell you how (if it can indeed be done).

Take a look on the phrase 2394 in Design | Text.

[TraceyHand]

totally agree with Martin.
Regardless of how the promotion is worded, cusotmer will expect (thanks to the likes of Boots etc making it clear how their 3 for 2 works) the 3 most expensive item free if they buy 4 or 5 items.
As Martin said, if they then discover that the cheapest out of 4 or 5 was the discounted one, they're likely to complain, if only to themselves, or, worse still, go elsewhere.
FWIW as a consumer, that's my opinion anyway