Anatomy of a Sears sales receipt

I am not a fan of long receipts.

Not because of environmental concerns (although that would be a valid argument for some of these companies) but because they are an inconvenience. And not just because they are an inconvenience, but because the company knows it is an inconvenience and does me wrong anyway, laughing in my face, because I can't do anything about it.

Granted, most Americans don't save receipts, track their expenses, or generally care about anything related to financial management, but as someone who saves receipts for credit card statement validation, then saves them again for possible future warranty issues or returns, I don't need this amount of paper in my wallet, kitchen drawer, and file cabinets.

The information in these receipts has no value to me. I don't need my entire day itemized on my receipt, and I don't need to have my sales receipt double as a PDA with all of the latest company news.

Buy one sandwich at Subway (see image on the left) and pay with a credit card, and you will walk out with a foot-long receipt that tells you the card swiped was approved, the authorization number, the host order ID, the reference number, the processor date, whether it was swiped or keyed, the ticket number, the account number, the expiration date, the card company, the card member name, the amount charged (again), a signature line, and a thank you for the order (Subway thanks you three separate times on the receipt).

Wow. Information so important, it makes me wonder how Wal-Mart manages to stay in business with just an account and approval number on its receipts (There is no confirmation on the rumor that Subway plans to include your BMI, college transcripts, and paycheck withholdings on future sandwich receipts.).

Target initially pleased me years ago when, during the Christmas season, cashiers asked if you wanted a gift receipt. If you said yes, then they would print out a separate receipt that included a "to:" and "from:" line and a barcode for gift exchanges, so your receiver could easily exchange the gift without knowing everything else you purchased.

Now, however, Target puts this at the bottom of every receipt whether or not I want it, which has now become an irritating extra five inches of paper with every visit (surely Target must know that not 100% of my purchases are gifts for others?).

And yes, Home Depot is a pain in the arse with its coupons at the end of the receipt and messages that are completely unrelated to my purchase. I bought a replacement cartridge for a leaky shower faucet last week and the receipt had a paragraph stating that Home Depot has a 30-day return policy on all gasoline powered equipment. Great. Now you tell me. My six-year-old son was just asking me about that the other day, and boy did I feel stupid for not knowing the answer!

But the king of long receipts, without equal, is undeniably Sears. In 1906, Sears opened an office in Dallas, Texas. The mail-order plant, with more than three million square feet of floor space, was the largest business building in the world. A cynical person might say its intent was solely to hold copies of all its sales receipts.

Everyone has heard the anecdotal evidence. A family in Pittsburgh, purchasing dishes and appliances for a new home, ended up with a receipt which, if laid down flat, would stretch around the earth three times. During the big East Coast blackout in 2003, rumors are one woman in New York survived two weeks solely on the heat produced from burning receipts saved from four visits to Sears.

I acknowledge sometimes these stories may be exaggerated, so I decided to find out for myself. We usually don't shop at Sears, but we needed a new vacuum, and the one ranked number one in Consumer Reports was at Sears. So last week we bought a vacuum, plus an extra bag. Two items. The receipt? Twenty-freaking-seven inches long. Over two feet of paper. I kid you not.

A closer look at the Sears sales receipt shows that it can be broken into three sections, each eight inches long. The first section is the most traditional, with your item, cost, date, payment method, etc. But where Sears wastes real estate is that it has a huge box for you to sign your name plus ten lines of explanation about your role in all of this (by signing this receipt, you agree to pay for the merchandise... this explanation is understandable, given that the credit card has only been around for about five decades and many people don't understand how it works).

The second part of the Sears receipt (see image on the left), is the phone book section of the receipt. I guess it is nice that Sears is proactively giving me information I can find in the phone book or web site, but it is a bit disconcerting that they are so eager to tell me their parts and service department numbers... does a new product break so often that someone decided it would be most efficient to print out four different phone numbers on every receipt? Given that, it is disappointing I don't also get the address and phone number of the nearest Target and Wal-Mart, so after I return my defective Sears product, I can go get one that works.

The third section of the receipt is the shameless promotion section. In this case, they are offering $20 if you use H&R Block to do your taxes. Hmm. H&R Block? Is that the tax consultant company who admitted this month it
underestimated its own state effective income tax rate in prior quarters and owes $32 million in back taxes? The same company that in an August 2005 filing with the SEC said that it had overstated net income for 2003 and 2004 by $91.1 million, due mostly to accounting errors? The same company that announced this month a slower start to the tax-filing season than in previous years, in part due to a new software program that sent an estimated 250,000 customers to rivals with some offices unable to process taxes?

Well... let's see... I could either spend $20 and use Turbo Tax and not be audited, or I can spend significantly more, go with H&R Block, and hope that I get out of jail in time for my kid's graduation? No thanks.

(Another strong alliance decision by Sears, for those who felt the K-Mart acquisition was an anomaly. I am surprised Sears doesn't include the IRS phone number in Section two of the receipt, along with my nearest Jackson Hewitt rep.)

Following the coupon, Sears again feels the need to give me six inches of legal jargon. Do I really need to be told that my $20 off of H&R Block prep fees cannot be applied to fine jewelry or Levi's jeans? Don't I know this? Is there really a use case out there to justify the cost of printing this out? Has anyone at Sears done a CBA on this?

Jewelry Cashier: "That will be $450."
Customer: "I think you mean $430... I have a coupon here for $20."
Cashier: "This is for H&R Block consultation only."
Customer: "I don't understand."
Cashier: "You can't use this on jewelry."
Customer: "Well, then you should say that clearly on the receipt, right under the coupon then! I am never shopping here again!"

Perhaps the length of receipts is a result of Sears clinging to its past, when it was a mail order catalog of over 300 pages in the early 19th century. Perhaps it is way for a conservative executive council to get back at Spotted Owl legislation by killing as many trees as possible with every corporate revenue (an irony that keeps them laughing all day).

Either way, clearly companies, specifically Sears, can save the consumer some time and the environment some waste by just letting a receipt be what a receipt is supposed to be: simply a record of a sale.