joeblow69

I just signed up for the free 30 day subscription to Walmart+, because my car broke down and I couldn't get to the grocery store for food, and I didn't want to pay extra instacart fees to get something delivered. Turns out it's actually a pretty bangin deal.

• free Paramount+ membership (I didn't have this so, that's a def + for me)
• free delivery of groceries (this is actually super convenient )
• $15 free Lyft voucher (a 1 time thing, but it's free with the 30 day trial ... you might as well just sign up for your free $15!)
• free delivery for anything that "ships from walmart". A lot of this stuff is better priced than at amazon, as you pay the same price you'd pay at the store, not the amazon marked up price
• 10 cents off a gallon of gas at all Exxon, Mobil, Walmart, & Murphy stations
• access to Sam's Club gas
• 6 months free spotify premium
• When you do shop in store, you can use the app to scan UPCs as you put them in your cart instead of all at the register

It's $13 a month, but I think only $98 a year, and it's really seeming like a better deal than amazon prime to me. I've only got 2 months left of Prime, going to try to ween myself off and see if Walmart is a decent enough replacement.

fujishig

Last I looked the selection was a little limited compared to amazon. The other thing is that unless you can't get to the grocery store (like in your case) it feels like grocery delivery is hit or miss and (IIRC) you still have to tip the driver even though they're not really gig workers but employees.

I didn't know about 10c off gas in Mobil/Exxon though. Around me those gas stations are few and far between (lots of Shell, 76, and Arco) but for people who fill up at those that's pretty cool.

bahgee

How do you use the gas discount when paying at the pump?

The Cow

It varies a bit by station type, but in general you use the mobile app in some way.

https://www.walmart.com/plus/fuel-discounts

BobO'Link

You don't have to tip the driver - you can select "custom" and enter $0. You can also wait to see if they do a good job and tip after delivery if you wish.

My wife got it for grocery delivery. She's mostly satisfied but it's absolutely hit or miss with availability of stuff. She's often not gotten something she needed with the delivery, I've checked online to see it's supposed to be in stock, driven to the same store that failed to deliver the product, and picked it up off the shelf. I've had the same thing happen with doing a store pickup of an order. We have 3 WM within 2 miles (2 super centers and a neighborhood market) so a trip only takes 15 minutes or so. Considering you *still* have to make a minimum $35 order for delivery, even as a member, I don't think the value's really there.

I've not been that impressed with the overall service though they *are* quick to refund if there are issues. The gas savings is a pain - you have to use their app as there's no card (IMHO, another negative). For me it's not worth the ~$1/month I'd save to have them tracking me with that, too (yeah... I don't burn a lot of gas as it's a whole 2 miles to my office from home and it's about the only place I go). Sharing the account in a household is also a pain - you can have only 1 account everyone has to use. With Sams Club my wife and I have a shared club membership but separate Sams accounts for making online purchases.

We have no use for any of the other perks. Their selection of products is so poor I rarely use them for anything outside groceries and their prices are, in my experience and for what I normally purchase, typically higher than Amazon, unless it's a "price rollback" product which Amazon normally PMs. When I do order from WM, it's easy to get up a $35 order for free shipping.

fujishig

This is now half off (60 bucks for the year) until 11/3.

joeblow69

It's only $49 (at least for me) and I jumped on that deal. Still valid until the end of the day.

fujishig

Oh you're right it's 49 bucks. I'm glad you were able to get in on it because I think it's not valid for current subscribers, so that was really good timing with your free trial.

kahuna

I was going to try the 30 day free trial offer. Just so I could get access to the early BF deals. But from what I been told the if you sign up for the 30 day free trial offer you don't get early access to BF deals. It's bad enough we always get a surcharge when buying something from Walmart Website.

joeblow69

So I noticed something kind of strange/kind of neat/kind of creepy ... Apparently walmart has kept track of everything I've ever bought physically at the store with my credit card, so when I'm shopping online, and click on the "re-order" button, it shows me EVERYTHING I've bough there, not just the stuff I bought from the website. I guess I didn't realize it would correlate that stuff, but it sure as hell did.

fujishig

Are you sure you don't enter some kind of membership number when you buy stuff at the store? I know Target does this with in store purchases but only if you put your phone number or whatever in, I don't think they track by credit card number.

Though it does kind of weird me out that those ipad payment platforms remember my email address to send me receipts.

TheBang

Do you use Walmart Pay on the app to pay in-store? Or do you scan your receipts into the Purchase History area? Those are the only ways I know of that they track your purchases.

darkdaze73

I don't use any type of membership number, pay app or anything other than my debit card and I can see on their app and online via website what items I have purchased in store. I have previously had my Walmart account connected to my Ibotta app, but I rarely used it in there.

PhantomStranger

Same thing happened to me. Walmart paired my online site data with my entire retail purchase history at Walmart. I imagine they used the credit card connection.

Pretty sure now every Fortune 500 company is doing the same for their customers in America, if not publicly than privately. They couldn't get away with it in the EU due to its strict privacy laws.

joeblow69

Nope
Nope
I've only just used a credit card to buy stuff at the walmart store. No memberships, walmart pay or anything. It just magically connected everything via credit card number. on one hand it's creepy, but on the other hand, it is kind of helpful when I'm doing my shopping online ... it's so hard to remember the random stuff I usually buy when I'm in the store.

One thing I've found super annoying ... there are very few cold&flu medicines that walmart will let you have delivered. Super stupid

Abob Teff

Retailers have tracked a profile for you through your credit card purchases for ages ... long before memberships, rewards cards, and online shopping. Those just gave them more info and more data points. This is nothing new at all. It was Target sending out targeted advertisements/coupons for maternity items that blew the lid off of it.


Here is the original Forbes article that is commonly attributed as the first article to expose this: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmir...h=1339da016668

While looking for that, I found an interesting 2020 article at Medium claiming this never happened. I gave it a read in case anything may have changed in exposing that story. Turns out the article at Medium is poorly written and provides no evidence beyond the author's beliefs. It almost seems as if he never actually read the Forbes article he is writing about. Ironically, his byline states he is a data scientist at Facebook. For that example of modern "journalism" ("I never left my desk, never actually contacted a source, and I have no proof"), here is the link: https://medium.com/@colin.fraser/tar...d-a6be13b973a5

TheBang

I stand corrected. Tracking via your credit/payment card number is another way that they associate your purchases. They even explain this on their website:

https://www.walmart.com/help/article...9f0124daa49108

There are instructions on that page on how to opt-out of tracking your in-store purchases by credit card.

dvd-4-life

How many nation wide grocery stores (besides Walmart) charge same as in store prices for home delivery?

I noticed recently Krogers doesn't do it any longer with Instacart(at least in my area) making their prices beyond outrageous.

TheBang

Target does, because they own their own delivery service.

dvd-4-life

I used to have a Target in my area but it was department store only.

Decker

I didn't think it needed a new thread, but I have to ask : Is Wal-Mart magic?
I bought some groceries last week. Didn't enter my phone number, didn't use an app. Just paid and left
Today I made an online purchase. After I checked out, I just checked the online status to make sure the order went through.
On the order status page, I see all the groceries I bought. I guess they matched up the Visa card number with my account. That is a pretty neat trick. It kind of blew my mind.

TheBang

Look at 4 posts above your post.

Decker

Sure enough. I missed that.

dsa_shea

The addition of Patamount Plus makes it a good value. I would rather pay a tip and order online than go into a Walmart and spend an hour or more of my time dodging customers who aren't always courteous.

BobO'Link

The only way to "opt out" is to use a different card in store than you do online. Few people are going to go to that much trouble.

On one hand I find this somewhat handy in a limited way, but it's also a bit disconcerting. Under the guise of "making it convenient for you" they're doing nothing but building a database for targeted marketing. I've yet to find a single instance of that being "beneficial" to me.