The great "what can you blag by threatening to leave' hunt

There are scores of MoneySaving techniques that involve fighting back and threatening to leave to grab better deals. You can Batter Down Your Mobile phone contract, slash interest with the Credit Card Shuffle and haggle down your Home Insurance.

So I want to find out what other secret special deals companies will offer in a bid to cling on to your custom. Please let us know the best deals you’ve managed to bag by threatening to leave a company, be it free Sky channels, free contact lense supplys, or free cashback.

Please post below to share your best blags.

For a full guide to haggling, read the High Street Haggle article.

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Comments

  • fmhm
    fmhm Posts: 327 Forumite
    we threatened to leave Virgin Media for Sky, we were actually serious though!
    Anyhow, bombarded with phone calls begging us to stay (once we'd given notice) and then offered a rather nice deal consisting of the following:
    free v+ box, upgrade to XL tv package, upgrade to Lrg telephone package all for £30 for the first 6 months and then £35 for the remaining 6 months.
    'I love being married.It's so great to find the one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life' :heartpuls

  • ey143
    ey143 Posts: 435
    First Post First Anniversary Combo Breaker
    Forumite
    I've had my £25 monthly fee waived twice now at Lloyds TSB. The first fee waiver was for 6 months, and as that was coming to an end, I was going to move to another bank and they offered me a final six months.

    That said, I have a very high credit rating rating as I'm fortunate to have a high income go into the account. The benefits of the account are plentiful, free mobile phone insurance (which recently paid £300 for my damaged PDA phone), home emergency cover, worldwide travel insurance for the family, platinum cover AA, Sentinal card cover, identity theft protection, interest free overdraft up to £500 and a few others which I forget now.

    If you want good deals in life, you need to have a clean credit file and keep your payments up to date.
    Be ALERT - The world needs more LERTS
  • ey143
    ey143 Posts: 435
    First Post First Anniversary Combo Breaker
    Forumite
    Oh one more thing, I also get 5% (yes 5%) cash back on up to £50 per months for 6 months my platinum Barclaycard Mastercard and on my visa after I was going to close my 11 year credit card account with them. Again, I have a very high credit rating with them.
    Be ALERT - The world needs more LERTS
  • pkempc
    pkempc Posts: 125
    First Post First Anniversary Combo Breaker Home Insurance Hacker!
    Forumite
    Hi Martin & team,

    I have posted this tip before but its worth another mention.

    I needed to get my Toyota Yaris D4D its 60,000 mile service done so I went to Toyota UK website for a list of main dealers within approx 50 miles. Emailed all of them asking for a quote for the service and a courtesy car. Only two bothered to reply quickly - my local dealer @ £250 and one 35 miles away @ £203 (Yaris does 55 mpg so factor in about £ 5 extra for the fuel). Waited a week for any more replies - nothing. Was just about to go ahead and book with cheapest quote when my local dealer phoned me to ask if their (more expensive) price was ok and did I want to confirm booking?!?! I said no thanks I had a much cheaper quote from rival dealership - brief pause - okay we'll beat their price by a £1. Result! :beer:

    Okay I know there are other independent garages that can do the same job for much, much less and Nationwide accept Tesco 4x deals, etc. However, Toyota have always provided a first class product with superb after care and I have received excellent service from their dealers plus a £ 50 saving means I'm happy to stay loyal - this time!:T
    Assume 1st – then check the facts!
  • I changed my house (buildings & contents) insurance from my mortgage provider to Direct Line 3 years ago, saving about £15 per month at the time. However, the monthly premium has been going up steadily from an initial £25/mth to £39.37 due from March 2008. This included a 10% no claims bonus for being a "loyal customer". I shopped around online, including Direct Line as a new customer and also Tesco (both are RBS companies and the websites are remarkably similar!). Amazingly, as a NEW customer with Direct Line, I found I could get HIGHER contents cover for just £20.74/mth and the Tesco website quoted me the same cover for £18.29/mth. I rang Direct Line and told them I wasn't going to renew and would be taking up the Tesco quote through their own RBS parent company. They very politely offered to keep my existing cover for the Tesco premium and also increase the contents cover to that in the Tesco quote. I have paid the premium in one lump sum, reducing the average monthly cost to just £16.63, a saving of nearly 58% against the original quote. I also paid using my Tesco credit card, earning Bonus Points to boot!
  • NicolaC
    NicolaC Posts: 268 Forumite
    T-mobile.

    Threatened to leave (and meant it). Was both on the Flex 35 plan.
    Got free upgrades on mine and hubbies phones. Our same price plan with £5 discount a month each, plus free evening and weekend calls which means we now never reach our tarrif limits.
    Most things in life are beyond our control,
    for everything else there is a spreadsheet
    ;)
    :D son#1 born 04/01/09 :D
    :D son#2 born 20/08/11 :D
  • I planned to leave Lovefilm. They asked me to phone to cancel and asked why I ws leaving. I told them it was because I was not getting the priority films - the ones I wanted most. They gave me a free month to 'give them another chance'. Got a good selection that free month!
  • Sky are great for offering generous deals at the threat of leaving! I complain and threaten to leave regularly - say, three times every couple of years - and several of my family and friends do the same now, and always they offer a substantial incentive to stay with them.

    Seems that the larger one's package, the more generous they are.

    The trick is not to threaten to leave until you are talking to someone from their Customer Retention Dept - a department the existence of which they strongly deny - whose members have great discretionary powers to offer what it takes to keep your custom. Contract Termination Dept might get you to the right people. You'll know immediately when you get to the right person because the mood changes - they know how to listen!

    You must say the magic words, "I want to cancel my contract".They will ask you why to which I usually reply that I'm angry that a new customer only deal is not available to me, a long term, loyal customer blah blah. They then put the ball back in my court by asking what would it take to keep my custom and I open by asking for my entire package free for a year.

    I failed to get a free HD box from them but then, that never was on offer. Six months at half price for your TV package can be considered a minimum.
  • I threatened to leave T-Mobile and they offered me a deal. I now pay a monthly fee of £7, I get 50 free texts and 750 free minutes. Although the allowances may not seem that great every April I'm offered a free upgrade and this April will get my monthly fee reduced to £2.
  • Pound
    Pound Posts: 2,784
    First Post First Anniversary Combo Breaker
    Forumite
    Best deal I bagged was when I tried to cancel my O2 mobile phone contract. I'd taken it abroad and ran up about £120 of bills over 6 weeks (this might have helped get the deal).

    I phoned up to cancel it later and they said I could reduce to their lowest package, IIRC was £10 a month. I accepted.

    A month I decided I wasn't making that many calls and would be cheaper on PAYG so I called up to cancel again. They then offered me an amazing deal, same free minutes and texts with a £0 monthly charge! The offer lasted for 12 months, after then it went back up to £10 where I could cancel.

    I think it helped that I was already only the lowest advertised tarrif and I had a history of going a stupid amount over my free minutes so it may have seemed like a sensible move to keep me.
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