'I was tricked': Loblaws shopper says she was secretly signed up for credit card

LunaKhirfansays she's deeply troubledafter a man posing as aLoblawsemployee told her she'dbeen picked to receive rewards points for being a frequentcustomer when in fact, he was signing her up for a store credit card.

"He said, 'This is customer appreciation day,'" Khirfan said. "And that they were picking customers at random to be given 20,000 PC [President's Choice] points."

Khirfansays the man identified himself as aLoblawsemployee and asked to see her driver's licence, which he then scanned using a tablet.

"He never told me he was going to scan,"Khirfansaid. "He just said, 'Can I look at your driver's licence to verify you are the person receiving the points?'"

Khirfanreceived a PC Financial Mastercard in the mail three days later.

"I was flabbergasted," she said. "This is really deception I was tricked."

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Go Public has learned the man who signed her up actually worked forSDI Marketing, a national company hired by PC Financial a banking company owned byLoblawCos. Ltd.

This is really deception ... I was tricked.- Luna Khirfan

In onlinejob postings, SDI Marketing says it's hiring people to "acquire new credit card customers" for President's Choice FinancialMasterCard.

Sales representatives are offered $13 an hour plus commissionfor signing up new customers.

Khirfansays the man who signed her up never uttered the words "credit card."

"None of the questions they askedindicated in any way that this was going to be a credit card application."

SDI Marketing declined to comment for this story.

KevinGroh, Loblaw'svice-president of communications,told Go Public thatKhirfan'sexperience is "unacceptable and very uncommon."

"At the same time, our expectation is that any rep in our stores will follow industry andLoblawstandards."

Ina statement, PC Financial spokeswomanLanaGogassaid, "The activities you highlight are disappointing and we take them seriously."

The activities you highlight are disappointing and we take them seriously.- Lana Gogas, PC Financial

She said PC Financial would use this example for further training of representatives across the country and remindthem "that they do not benefit by signing up unwilling customers."

She also said the representative who signed upKhirfanfor aMasterCardis no longer working inthe company'sstores, and that PC Financial gets few complaints about its in-store salespeople.

'I asked several times'

Erin Arnold of Vancouver didn't complain to the company, but she told Go Public she had a very similar experience to Khirfan's.

She says she was approached inside a Loblaw'sCity Market owned byLoblawCos. Ltd. about two months ago.

"[The worker] said it was a point card, not a credit card," she said. "I asked several times. A few weeks later a credit card arrived."

Arnold says she cut up the card, and won't go back to that store.

Hidden camera

Go Public took a hidden camera into aLoblaw-ownedSuperstore in Vancouver. Two young men offered a chance to win free groceries for a year in exchange for answering a few questions on a tablet.

There was no mention of obtaining a credit card.

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The survey asked about things like annual income, household income and amount spent on home insurance.

When asked if a credit card was going to be sent in the mail, one worker initially said no, and then said, "Basically, the whole point of the draw is to introduce people to PC Financial products."

When asked what that means, one of them replied, "So like the bank ... points card ... and the credit cards that they have."

At that point, Go Publicdeclined to finish completing the survey.

Both men admitted, when asked, that they work for SDI Marketing a company with a contract to sign up new PC Financial MasterCard customers.

'It's not right'

David Silver, a professor of business ethics at the University of British Columbia, says he's disturbed to hear the sales tactics being used in somestores.

"You don't need a professor of ethics, you can go to preschool to learn ... that it's not right," he said.

Silver says it's not a problem for companies to outsource work, but "the thing you cannot do is outsource your ethics."

"If you hire a firm to do something for you ... it's your responsibility that they act in an ethical manner."

Referring toKhirfan'sexperience, Silver says it was "clearly unethical" to say her driver's licence was needed to give PC rewardpoints, when it wasn't.

Federal laws

In fact, federal laws prohibit retail companies and other organizations from signing people up for credit cards without their consent.

NatashaNystrom, a spokeswoman for the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada, says the Competition Act "contains provisions prohibiting false or misleading representations and deceptive marketing practices."

"The representative taking the application needs to ensure that the consumer has provided their expressed consent for the credit card."

When asked whether PC Financial violated those federal regulations, spokeswoman Lana Gogas wrote, "We are very aware of the guidelines and we design our protocols to match."

'Plastic pitchmen'

Personal finance expertKerryTaylor says besides being unethical, signing people up for credit cards without their knowledge can be financially dangerous.

"We need to stop the plastic pitchmen from peddling us debt products," she said.

"I think it's a little predatory that these businesses and even third parties are coming in and canvassing people to sign up for credit cards on the spot."

"People are unwittingly shopping in the frozen foods section and all of a sudden they're approached to get a card with the bonus of all these points."

It must be working well, she says, because companies keep doing it.

Credit affected

Simply applying for a credit card can affect someone's credit rating, according to theFinancial Consumer Agency of Canada.

A "hard credit inquiry" occurs when a financial institution checks a person's credit to determine whether they qualify for a credit card.

We need to stop the plastic pitchmen from peddling us debt products.- Kerry Taylor, personal finance expert

One hard inquiry could affect a person's credit rating by a few points. Multiple hard inquiries can suggest a person is in financial trouble because they appear to bedesperate for credit.

And that can be a problem if someone is already struggling financially, Taylor says.

Wrong person to 'trick'

LunaKhirfanis an associate professor at the University of Waterloo's School of Planning, and she also serves on the university's ethics committee.

"I have knowledge of the history of deception in research," she said. "And I guess that's why I felt doubly bad. I am aware of deception, and to be deceived in that way was not pleasant."

PC Financial calledKhirfanafter she complained and offered her 50,000 PC Points, which she reluctantly accepted and has not yet used.

She has shredded theMasterCardsent to her, and says the experience has affected how she interacts with store employees.

"In the future, I'm sorry to say, I might be less friendly," she said. "And be moreupfront, 'Is this a credit card application?' So next time, I'm prepared."