The Mobile Outlet: any good? (merged)

adgupta

Hi,
My experience with MO is exactly the same. My cashback deal got rejected because I did not send the original dispatch note. What ticks me off most is that just before sending my claim, I sent them an email asking what has to be sent; and the customer service agent replied with the procedure, but did not mention anything about the dispatch note. She obviously referred to the t&c document where the dispatch note is not mentioned. I did exactly what I was told at that time (which is to send the first 6 months bill within 21 days), and my cash-back got rejected. I wrote to them twice (once back in August and once after 4 weeks from then) alongwith the print-out of their initial email outlining the cashback process, but did not get any satisfactory reply.

In the last letter I asked them to reply within 2 weeks, which they did not do. I think, writing to TMO is a waste of time.

overworked_underpaid

The Mobile Outlet currently has a number of phones on T-mobile that qualify for 12 months free line rental. Have the cashback problems with Mobile Outlet been resolved? Would anyone still recommend buying from them now?

jeremygiles

Hello adgupta. If you email the MO forum queries address, you should hopefully get your problem sorted out. You just have to persevere. As I said in my earlier post, I have finally got my cashback issue resolved, and I am hoping that payment will be in my account next Monday. MO say they are currently responding to queries sent to the forum queries email address within 24 hours, to quote a message posted on another website's discussion forum this morning:

"With regards to customers receiving a decline due to the dispatch note not being included with the claim. This was a genuine error where the incorrect terms and conditions were posted by our dispatch company. This has only become apparant in the last week. If there are any customers which have their cash back claims pending or declined due to this reason, please email forumqueries@themobileoutlet.co.uk and we will resolve the issue within 24-48hours. We can only apologise about any inconveniecne that may have been caused by this issue.

Kind Regards
forumqueries@themobileoutlet.co.uk
https://www.themobileoutlet.co.uk

adgupta

Thanks for your advise jeremygiles. I have now sent an email to the forum address and hopefully it would be resolved soon.

Update: Just received a mail from TMO Forum Queries team apologizing for the "problem" and informing me that I would get the cashback by BACS within 7 days. They have got round the problem, it seems. I am keeping my fingers crossed. This forum has done a good job.

Reestit_Mutton

jeremygiles wrote:

to quote a message posted on another website's discussion forum this morning:

"With regards to customers receiving a decline due to the dispatch note not being included with the claim. This was a genuine error where the incorrect terms and conditions were posted by our dispatch company. This has only become apparant in the last week. If there are any customers which have their cash back claims pending or declined due to this reason, please email forumqueries@themobileoutlet.co.uk and we will resolve the issue within 24-48hours. We can only apologise about any inconveniecne that may have been caused by this issue."

Yes, but everyone who has thus far wrongly found themselves in this situation should have been measured against the OLD T&Cs in any case.

As the dispatch note was only added to the requirements list as of 03 July, when the timeframe for the first claim was also shortened to 4 months (for all 12 month contract offers where more than £200 cashback is due) the absolute earliest that anyone on the new T&Cs could have received their 4th bill would have been about a week ago (assuming their first bill was dated 03 July and allowing approx. 7 days for posting the bill out to the customer).

Even if some of these people immediately submitted their first cashback claim they wouldn't yet have received any response from The Mobile Outlet to complain about. This is because TMO allow 28 days for processing cashback claims.

What's more, any customers since 03 July that have been issued with the wrong T&Cs wouldn't even be submitting their first claims right now as the old T&Cs stated that the first claim should be submitted in month 6 (i.e. from the beginning of December onwards).

Ergo...all complaints aired thus far should be from people for whom the issues regarding the supply of the wrong T&Cs are irrelevant.

No, I genuinely believe that all incorrectly failed first claims are currently the result of the people tasked with validating claims simply measuring ALL FIRST CLAIMS against the new T&Cs since they came into force, regardless of when the customer placed their order.

While I'm pleased that The Mobile Outlet seem to be finally acknowledging that mistakes have been made, it would be nice if they could at least be a bit more forthcoming about their own part in this unfortunate affair rather than taking the easy option of pointing the finger at an unnamed third party.

If they were to name that third party then at least the company concerned would have the right of reply...and I wouldn't be in the slightest bit surprised if they exercised that right.

Reestit Mutton

lufupa

Hi All

its been 4 days since the email sent to the email address provided on this forum. No word from TMO. any ideas on how long its taking for them to respond? and how long one should wait before proceeding to the next step?

members who corresponded with TMO, how long did it take to respond & a good resolution/outcome?

jeremygiles

I had one of the 2 emails I sent to MO returned to me today, 2 days after I sent it. The accompanying error message was basically saying that it couldn't deliver my email because it was "...unable to connect successfully to the destination mail server". When the MD called me yesterday, he said that they had had new mail servers installed, and spam filters may have stopped my email getting through. Perhaps your email has also gone into some kind of "black hole" as mine appear to have done. I would suggest resending an email or calling them, as they are starting to sort the cashback queries out, as we have seen in the forum.

lufupa

Thanks jeremygiles

i will send them another email.

mbamick

adgupta wrote:

In the last letter I asked them to reply within 2 weeks, which they did not do. I think, writing to TMO is a waste of time.

Try using the email address they provided in post number 132, Adgupta. (Email: forumqueries@themobileoutlet.co.uk).

Nothing ventured.....!

mbamick

overworked_underpaid wrote:

Would anyone still recommend buying from them now?

I'd need to ask myself whether

(1) I could be confident that TMO would pay the cashback cheques, when they fell due [assuming the customer followed the correct procedure];

and

(2) Would I feel partly to blame if TMO didn't pay up?

The answer to (1) = NO.
The answer to (2) = YES.

...so the answer to your question is NO - I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND TMO TO ANYONE AT THIS TIME.