Sportsdirect

Reusable bag sales scam

I am writing regarding the deceitful practices of Sports Direct when it comes to the age-old carrier bag issue.

I visited the North Street, Brighton, branch of Sports Direct with my wife on Sat 27th October and fell victim for a "second time" to what I can only call a scam on the company's part.
As I took my purchases to the counter, the member of staff said "Do you want a bag?" and it is this question that I want to complain about. All she said was "do you want a bag?" to which I replied, "yes please". Only to discover that without another word, she had scanned the reusable bag and charged me 59p for the privilege.

I told this to my wife, who was elsewhere in the shop, and she was angered by this, not least because the exact same thing had happened in this exact store 2-3 months ago, and she demanded her money back there and then.
On this occasion she demanded to speak to the manager of the store, who defended his staff...until my wife told him to actually watch his staff in action. As she stood there, this same member of staff at the counter did the same trick on 4 customers, and the manager turned and saw this happening. At this point, suitably embarrassed, he asked for her to be replaced on the till and wait for him out the back.
As this happened before, with a different member of staff, I hardly think this is an isolated incident.

Their staff are asking "do you want a bag?" when they should be asking if the customer wants a "free bag" or a "reusable bag for 59p".
The manager said that the staff should be saying "do you want a bag for life?" yet, still no reference to the charge, which is not small at 59p anyway!! Think how many customers have not noticed the 59p charge on their receipt, or not had the confidence to go and complain - their company is making a fortune out of this cowboy practice.
The manager then said that he doesn't watch his staff at the tills to make sure they say the right thing, to which my wife replied "well maybe you should!"

How can they possibly justify this activity of asking customers if they want "a bag" and then charging them 59p without even telling them? Their employees are presumably told that they have reusable bag sales targets to hit......otherwise how can they possibly explain this?
I emailed them 7 working days ago, no reply..............