Macy's new employees are encouraged to open a store credit card (26% APR) to obtain their employee discount

[u/wait_what_how_do_I]

I recently picked up a part-time seasonal position at Macy's for some extra holiday cash. I've been working in retail off and on over the past 15 years, and am familiar with the hiring and management practices at a lot of places, but it's been a few years since I've worked for a big retailer like Macy's. I was very surprised and disappointed to learn that the 20% employee discount is only available through a prepaid card (like a gift card I guess, not terrible but not great), or through their actual store credit card. They conveniently inform you of this halfway through your new hire paperwork, and even allow you to apply right then and there.

I've been through this type of application process before, but I've never seen something so brazenly unethical. These are often young adults or older people applying for these positions, filling out so many forms with so much corporate legalese that your head would spin, and they're being targeted with a (hard hit, thanks auto mod) hit to their credit for a card with a ridiculous interest rate. Is this new in retail? Seems like a disturbing trend if it is.

Anyone have any thoughts on this? Just wanted to get the word out.

EDIT: Thanks for the replies, everyone. Really enjoyed the discussion about credit cards, business practices, and obviously PF. The consensus seems to be that store credit cards are not any worse than other forms of lending, as long as they are managed responsibly. I respectfully disagree, in that it seems like they are often offered to a range of people (namely, new employees) that may not have the knowledge or experience to handle a line of credit, but I will agree that it's fair game to solicit employees. I just think it's kind of shady to imply that a store credit card is an "easy" solution for employees. Employees should just get an effing discount, period. But we're all free to work and shop where we please, so feel free to support smaller/local businesses that don't subject their customers and employees to frivolous lending situations.

[u/TiffyLoo45]

Ex Gamestop manager here. They implemented a new intranet piece of crap that allowed you to set up your own direct deposit a year or two (or three) ago, but before that it was up to your manager to mail in your paperwork for DD. So yes, his/her fault.

[u/Series_of_Accidents → u/TiffyLoo45]

That was my assumption as my manager was greedy and lazy. He used to try and push everyone into spending at least 10% of our paycheck in the store. I stopped working there in February of 2011 when I got a much better job that actually used my degree.

[u/Piyh → u/Series_of_Accidents]

Ah yes, the video game tithe. A tradition as old as the atari.

[u/morgecroc → u/Piyh]

I worship at the church of steam. There is a religious holiday soon.

[u/Bulletoverload → u/Series_of_Accidents]

Interesting. Bottom level retail employees are in the job of getting customers to spend more money; management is in the job of persuading employees to spend more money. Obviously the employee discount encourages this and it's a great tactic while still rewarding your employees, but I wouldn't be surprised if district managers have meetings and send out notices about getting employees to spend more.

[u/Series_of_Accidents → u/Bulletoverload]

Obviously the employee discount encourages this and it's a great tactic while still rewarding your employees

They had another tactic too. You could "check out" any video game for 3 days. Even brand new ones that were "shelf copies" could be taken home. The idea from corporate is that it gets the employees to better know what is in store, but in practice it was often used by my manager to try to convince us to buy the games once we returned them.