Get Discount Prices With Department-Store Fixings

DEAR HOT: I love department store clothes, but can no longer afford them. The prices in discount stores are better, but I get the creeps in those places. Maybe I’m a hopeless snob, but I need carpeting, dressing rooms with doors, good lighting and other amenities that department stores traditionally offer. What do you suggest?

--J.K., Westchester

DEAR J.K.: As much as we’d like to prescribe a therapeutic trip to Filene’s basement in Boston (famous for such shopping frenzy that women didn’t bother with dressing rooms and tried on garments in the aisles), we can’t. The legendary store doesn’t exist anymore.

We can recommend, however, that you visit the clearance centers of the major department stores. Sometimes taking up a floor of an existing department store, sometimes encompassing an entire separate facility, these centers are collection depots for the sale goods from numerous stores in a given region. Grab your charge cards; here are the clearance centers of Los Angeles-area department stores:

* The Broadway: 8333 Van Nuys Blvd., Van Nuys; 444 N. Euclid, Anaheim; 8739 Sepulveda Blvd., Los Angeles.

* May Co.: 8252 Van Nuys Blvd., Van Nuys; 6067 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles; 8450 La Palma Ave., Buena Park, and, opening July 28, 1530 W. Covina Blvd., West Covina.

* Robinson’s: 600 W. 7th St., Los Angeles, fourth floor (clothing), sixth floor (furniture).

* Bullock’s: At the Bullock’s stores in Lakewood, 5005 Clark Ave., fourth floor, and in Grossmont, 5500 Grossmont Center Drive, first floor.

* Nordstrom: Topanga Rack, 21500 B. Victory Blvd., Woodland Hills; Chino Rack, 5537 Philadelphia St., Chino; Santa Ana Rack, 3900-C S. Bristol St., Santa Ana; San Diego Rack, 824 Camino del Rio North, San Diego.

* Neiman Marcus, Saks Fifth Avenue and I. Magnin: Unfortunately, if you want to visit these clearance centers, you’ll have to travel a bit. Neiman Marcus’ is in Austin, Tex. (411 Capitol Highway). Saks Fifth Avenue’s is at Franklin Mills Outlet, 1618 Frank Mills Circle, Philadelphia. And I. Magnin’s Finale is at 500 S. El Camino Real in San Mateo, Calif.

DEAR HOT: I am the mother of a teen-ager who is a little too hot to shop for my taste. I pay for all her clothes, but what she wants now is to use my credit card when she goes to the mall with her friend. She says all her friends use their parents’ credit cards, and I am “way uncool” for not doing it, too. What do you think?

--I.N., Monrovia

DEAR I.N.: As much as we adore shopping under virtually any circumstance, we wouldn’t want to be the ones to give the green light to an Imelda Marcos in the making. So we checked with Dr. Hyla Cass, an Encino-based psychiatrist who has a 16-year-old daughter. It turns out that Cass allows her daughter to use her credit cards.

But Cass, who is also an assistant professor of psychiatry at UCLA School of Medicine, warns that this privilege may not be appropriate for every kid: “I never worry about it (use of credit cards) because my daughter is more responsible than a lot of adults in terms of what she spends. Teen-agers really enjoy shopping with their friends. It’s a fun and social event. But the decision on whether to let a teen-ager use your credit card really varies with the individual child and the family.

“To some kids, you can give a credit card; you can trust them and they will use good judgment. Other teen-agers may need more supervision, in which case you give them a weekly clothing allowance. And if they want to buy something beyond that they can save up for something special.”