Fort Worth O.
Giant Eagle/PNC Bank/PNC Financial Services Illegally Fished My Personal Information, Stored It, and Sold It
Giant Eagle, Inc. is an American grocery store owned and/or operated by PNC Bank/PNC Financial Services. They have stores in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Indiana, and Maryland. I recently contacted Giant Eagle via the chat function on their webpage regarding a product I purchased that I afterward realised was already past the expiration date. The woman said she was in their executive offices. I do not know if this was true or not, but she asked for my name, address, email address, phone number, and other information including the UPC code from the packaging. Like any unsuspecting innocent would do, I gave her every bit of information she requested. I believed she was going to send me a voucher or some coupons to make up for the expired product. This is what many companies do as a gesture of goodwill in cases such as this. I was wrong, and it turned out to have been a very bad mistake to have given her all of my private, personal information. After I provided all of the information, she advised me that I do not have a rewards account with them. I told her I know this. All she had to do was ask me if I had a rewards account, and I would have told her no, I do not. I did not need to provide all this private information to her just so she could inform me that I did not have a rewards account with them. Why ask me for all this information? In turned out they were fishing for private information to store and exploit. She then told me that since I do not have a rewards account with them, there was nothing she could do to help me and to take the product back to a store. I told her I am old enough and experienced enough to know I can return an item to a store, but I am no longer NEAR a store, which is why I contacted them via chat. The upshot was she was not going to do anything about it. I then asked her at least 4-5 times in plain English if they were they going to store my personal information, and what were they going to do with it. She kept answering with non-answers, telling me things I did not ask. This was a very, very bad sign. Finally, I told her if she did not answer my question, I would file a BBB complaint against them. This time she responded that she did not know what they were going to do with my information. At this point I filed a BBB complaint to get answers. I was promptly contacted via email by one Scott Unrue in their Executive Client Relations Office. (I did not add my phone number to the BBB complaint.) He apologised for the aggravation and offered to send me a gift card. I replied that would be nice and thanked him. I said I still needed my questions answered. He asked me to phone him. I told him there was absolutely NOTHING more I could tell him, so there was no need to phone him. I wrote everything in the BBB complaint and again in the email to him. I said I still did not have any answers to my questions and demanded answers. There was no reply from Mr. Unrue. The BBB contacted me back to ask if my problem had been resolved. I told them no, it had not been. I told them my questions were STILL unanswered. Mr. Unrue then replied to my response and said he had emailed me and tried to phone me. I responded that I received a total of two emails from him, but neither one of them answered my questions, and that since I had not supplied my phone number on the BBB complaint form, it logically followed that they were indeed storing my information including my phone number. By the way, I did not receive a voice mail from Mr. Unrue. Once again, I requested on the BBB site that Giant Eagle/PNC Bank/PNC Financial Services advise me if they were storing my information and what they were going to do with it as well as how long they would keep it. I am NOT one of their "clients," and I do not want my information stored, sold, or used for any purpose. I did NOT agree they could do this. There still has been no reply. My information was illegally fished, stored, analysed, and sold. There was ZERO reason for the agent to ask my name, address, phone number, and email address. All she had to do was ask if I had a rewards account with them. I would have said no, and she would have said she could not help me. Instead, she fished all of my private, personal information, information that they could otherwise ONLY collect if I opened a rewards account with them. Now, they are storing and using my personal, private, personal information. Companies routinely do this. It is an invasion of privacy, but they get away with it if you sign up with them for something and agree to their privacy policies which usually states you agree to let them use and "share," i.e. sell your information. I believe this is morally and ethically wrong, and in this case illegally obtained. I have now filed a complaint with the Attorney General's Office for Consumer Protection. BEWARE OF THIS COMPANY.

