2015-07-06

When is a 5% discount not a 5% discount?

I ordered a new watch as mine seems to be having issues. It is many years old now. I googled for a new one, saw a range of on-line shops selling them, and ordered from one. I picked Watches2U as they had a good price and the web site looked sensible.

I selected the watch and then got a pop-up offering (as you can see) "enter your e-mail below to get 5% off your order".

There was no caveat, or *, or T&Cs, or whatever, just that I had to enter my e-mail. So I did, and got a discount code by email.

I entered the code and ordered, but the order did not show the 5% discount. Well, actually it did, but showed 5% discount and -£0.-0 as the amount! I queried it and I was told that as per the terms on the email I could not use the discount code on "sale" items (which appears to be pretty much all of their web site).

Of course, I am somewhat annoyed at being duped. Indeed, it seems I have been added to a mailing list as well - without asking me. As far as I can see, they made an offer and I accepted. Indeed, when offering a discount off "your order" I had already selected a watch (that was on sale), so it seems very reasonable to expect the discount to apply to my order. I think adding terms in the email sent after I have accepted their offer is not really on.

The really stupid thing about it is that I would have not had any problem if there was not a 5% discount on offer. It is not a lot of money. But now they have offered me a discount which I have accepted, and then been denied to me, I am cross and annoyed. I have raised a complaint via google now as they are a "google trusted store".

Their 5% offer has made an unhappy customer, even if this is resolved and I get my discount.


Update: Google not interested in fixing, and Watches2U not interested, so reported to trading standards.

7 comments:

  1. Did they show you where these terms and conditions are?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They were in the footer of the email that they sent in response to my accepting their offer and entering my email address...

      Delete
  2. Put in a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority since the discount code email button should have referenced that it did not apply to sale items, but obviously failed to do so.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I suspect my blog is more use than an ASA report :-)

      Delete
  3. "Enter your e-mail below"... which e-mail do they want? The latest invoice from A&A? A random selection of spam? Some random output that cron happened to send me?

    At least they remembered the hyphen in "e-mail", I guess!

    (Then I go to post this comment, and Google's sign-in page says "Enter your email"... <sigh>. Maybe I'm just getting old.)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Steer clear of Krug too they are also a scam.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I'm quite pleased with my pebble time, it has a battery that lasts 3-4 days, shows all my notifications and have multiple watch faces, works with android and apple. Its waterproof too.

    ReplyDelete

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