Has any one had any of their MBNA SonyCard Pulsebeats taken away?

rachvt

Reinstatement and allowed time to redeem before expiry.

I called them 3 times on 3 different days to complain about it.
First time, he told me the points were deducted because they have an expiration date of 3 years. Then he advised me to complain to Sonycard. I didn't ask him for the Sonycard number, and he never offered it to me either. I said his response is not good enough for me, is there someone else I can complain about this to. He said my best bet is to write to MBNA about it.
I hung up, thought about what he said, then realised it doesn't sound right, because he said "3 years" but 3 years from when?! I certainly will never spend £6654.66 in one month on my Sonycard, be it 3 years ago or now!

So I called them up the second time, and a different operator (who sounds ethnic of origin) completely refused to talk to me about it. He insisted he wasn't trained to discuss such issues, and insisted I should call Sonycard to complain instead. He offered me the Sonycard number, and I called it.
Lady at Sonycard told me she's sorry but the crediting and deduction of Pulsebeats is something that the guys at MBNA are responsible for, and she said I wasn't the first to complain about them (??) She advised me to put my complaint in writing to Sonycard so that they can then forward it to MBNA. I said the guy at MBNA told me to write to MBNA directly, so which is better? She said its up to me. Then I said wouldn't it be better if I wrote Sonycard a letter and CC it to the guys at MBNA? She said its up to me, but that if I wrote just a letter to Sonycard about this, the people at Sonycard could then forward it to the guys at MBNA.

I hung up, and thought about what she said... and somehow deep down I don't really know who to trust anymore. It sounds ... just weird.

Third time I call them up, firing all my questions now.
I said I agree there is a 3 year expiration on these Pulsebeats, but I certainly never spend £6654.66 in one go 3 years ago. Its obvious you've decided to deduct a whole chunk of Pulsebeats in one go in Dec 08 - a chunk of Pulsebeats which were accumulated slowly over the course of several months. Why deduct them all in one chunk in Dec 08?
He said "cos you first opened a Sonycard account in Dec 01, and we take that as the reference month for deducting Sonycard points".
What !!!!!!!!. Its obvious MBNA has decided to deduct points off everyone on Dec 08... don't tell me everyone who had their points deducted all first signed up for a Sonycard in December of some year???

He also said the people at MBNA are not obliged to notify customers when they will deduct points.
I said that when Sonycard was managed by Bank of Scotland, good ol' Bank of Scotland always sent me a notice a few months early to tell me that my Pulsebeats are expiring on what month and year, and that I must redeem them before that date or they will be lost.
How was I to expect that when MBNA took over, they would not be doing things the same way as Bank of Scotland, when MBNA has never sent me any letters to tell me this was the way they did things! It isn't even stated in their T&Cs.

He didn't have anything to say to that. And he said his manager will call me back in 48 hours. I said could you please ask your manager to call me back at the landline number I'm calling from? He said yes.

Then guess what? No phonecall came. Instead, when I checked my mobile phone yesterday and saw that it had a missed call. Ugh... NO! Can't believe it. Have sent a complaint to the sonycard email addy from one of your posts. Will write a formal letter of complaint to MBNA and Sonycard soon if I still don't get any joy from these folk. I'm thinking of just closing my Sonycard account if they continue to be so unreasonable and unfair.

jimmyvx

Reinstatement and allowed time to redeem before expiry.

Rach read post #40 this explains what was done to pulsebeats in 2005 and why they have suddenly expired Dec 08.

jimmyvx

Reinstatement and allowed time to redeem before expiry.

I recommend people check the subscribe to topic option at the top of the page in the thread tools menu, you will get instant updates via email when someone posts.

cj20uk

Nshah wrote: »

Hey, good result here. How long did it take for SonyCard to respond to you? Did you email or write to them? I've emailed a couple of times - but no response as yet. Please advise - as i expect everyone who has had points taken away will be interested.

I wrote a letter to Sonycard at their Diss address on 15th December. Since receiving the email, I emailed back asking when the re-instated points would expire. I have had another email that doesn't answer this question but says:


Thank you for your email regarding expired pulsebeats.

Please be advised the reason you have not experienced expiration before is due to when the card issuer changed from HBOS to MBNA, lifetime of all points prior to that was reset to zero at that points in time.

We forwarded your email to our Head Office and they have agreed that as a sign of good faith we can authorise crediting 4710 points back onto your account.

Please accept our apologies for any upset or inconvenience caused.

IrnBruiser

Reinstatement and allowed time to redeem before expiry.

I stumbled on this thread today and whilst I'm sad to read so many tales of appalling customer service I'm at least comforted to know I'm not the only poor soul who's been shafted by the mighty Sonycard!

Like many on here I joined Sonycard about 6 or 7 years ago and have been a loyal customer ever since spending many thousands of pounds over the years with the specific goal of one day redeeming them against a really good high value item - in fact the Sonypoints was the prime reason for getting the card in the first place.

So, my troubles began in early December when I decided that due to the credit crunch I would supplement my xmas pressie budget with a couple of Sony gifts using my accumulated points. To my horror I discovered that I'd lost approx 50000 points overnight and without warning!

I then had the misfortune of having to speak to both Sonycard and MBNA customer services who only succeeded in winding me up by a) insisting it had nothing to do with them and pointing blame at each other and b) quoting the T&C's and telling me I should have read them 7 years ago and should have remembered they expired after 3 years - how very helpful! After numerous of pointless conversations I was given an address in Diss which I should write to. That letter was written and posted on 11th Dec and as yet I've yet to receive a response or even an acknowledgement. I chased a response up today and was told the post is slow in December (thanks very much Sonycard, very helpful!).

What really amazes me is the total disregard for customers and a compete lack of appreciation on how customers are feeling. I work for a large UK organisation with >10Million customers and like most organisations of that size our primary guiding principle in how we operate is customer experience. It's not surprising therefore we have a large and largely happy customer base - it's a pity that the people at Sonycard (or is it MBNA) don't recognise the same importance of having happy customers!!

Whilst I think we can all recognise that the 36month clause does indeed exist in the T&C's I find it quite astonishing that I should be told by MBNA that I should have remembered that particular clause from 7 years ago. There has been absolutely zero communications with customers over this and it's quite unacceptable that they should unilaterally decide to change policy on this T&C without any comms to customers - it's really simple Sonycard - all you had to do was write to us or put a note on our bills, it's not like you don't know where we live! So now some bright spark has had a great idea to save money - lets start taking customers points away and save ourselves a load of money from giving them rewards they've been saving years for - oh and why not do it just before xmas!

What I don't get is why a worldwide and highly prestigious brand like Sony would want to be associated with such a scandalous abuse of customer loyalty. I'm sure those in long trousers who sit in Weybridge will be cringing to read these various blogs about their shocking behaviour.

Well I for one will now be forwarding my letter from December to the email address provided by Sonycard and if necessary I will be writing to Watchdog, The Sun, The Daily Mirror and the execs in Weybridge until I get my points back. I'm encouraged btw to see that some people are now having points re-instated - I hope they do this for everyone regardless of whether they have noticed or claimed - if they have a conscience they will reimburse everyone.

One final point, now we know you've changed your policy, how are we supposed to manage our points balance - unfortunately I don't have the desire nor the will to log and manage my points over a 36month period so are Sonycard going to provide a mechanism for managing our points and as a minimum an early warning about any points which are due to expire - now that would be customer focused...

rimuhouse

I wrote a diplomatic but firm letter to MBNA earlier this week and also sent an email last night to the sonycard email address posted.

This morning I was pleased to receive an email confirmation that all my points have been recredited with a 3 year expiry date.

Unfortunately I cannot verify this as the customer service line is only updated to the 2/1/9.

I suspect that the person responsible realises in retrospect that what initially seemed a good idea was inherently flawed and would not stand up to scrutiny if further action was taken by the cardholders.

I suggest that everyones writes a non confrontational letter.

regards

wildfireuk

Reinstatement and allowed time to redeem before expiry.

:j :j :j :j :j :j :j
EUREKA!!! A successful outcome to a very painful and long succession of letters to Sony, MBNA, a number of watchdog bodies, Trading Standards, directors at Sony and Finally posting on Moneysavingexpert!!

Funnily enough having recently redeemed 3500 points to ensure no more are deducted in January, my Sony headphones arrived today, along with an e-mail in my inbox on the same day from Sony Card advising the following:

Dear Mr #####

Thank you for your Letter regarding expired pulsebeats, please accept our apologies in the delay in getting back to you.


We forwarded your Letter to our Head Office and they have agreed that as a sign of good faith we can authorise crediting 41,405 points which have been added to your account as of today.

Please be aware these re-credited points have a 3 year life as of today also and that all terms and conditions are available on the members website www.sonycard.co.uk/members.


Please accept our apologies for any upset or inconvenience caused and do not hesitate to contact us if you have any further queries.


Kind regards


The SonyCard Team
______________________________________________________________

If it helps, I have put the SonyCard e-mail address below that might also be worth contacting, if it helps others out there get their pulsebeat points reinstated!!

[EMAIL="customerservice@rewards.sony.co.uk"]customerservice@rewards.sony.co.uk[/EMAIL]
I hope everybody else has some luck and this gives some light at the end of the tunnel to a number of people who have also had lost points!! :j
PS: I wait with bated breath to check that my Sony TV hasn't increased in point redemption cost!! and that the points are actually there!!!

Nshah_3

Reinstatement and allowed time to redeem before expiry.

Well - as posted earlier, i asked the question about when my next points would expire - didn't get a response to that but was told by email my credited points would expire 3 years from today. Funnily enough, just called MBNA and although SonyCard said my points were given back to me today - MBNA are still quoting me "less 28000 points". So i'll give it a few more days - and hopefully the Sony pigeon gets to MBNA and updates their computer systems accordingly.:p

Shanker

A statement of when and how many points are due to expire.

I have had another letter from MBNA Europe again today.

Basically its an empty thankyou for my letter, (the one they have already acknowledged but done nothing about), and two lines saying that their "investigations" are taking longer than anticipated and that they will issue a response by 2 February '09.

It is signed by Gail Powell who is some sort of Vice President.

So that 28 days they promised has gone out of the window.

I am so glad that some of you guys have managed some successful progress. Unfortunately, they are still dismissing me and I'm not happy.

I have sent the copy of my letter to MBNA to Sony Card in response to their post on this site - we'll see what happens now.

Shanker

A statement of when and how many points are due to expire.

Hi fellow Sony Card victims!

I am reporting a result!

At last I have had an email from Sony Card.

They are reinstating my points and they will be valid for 3 years.

They are also revisiting their flawed system for invalidating 3 year old points and the manner in which they give notice to the customer of their intention to carry out this invalidation.

The only thing is that just like Wildfireuk, I have redeemed 10,200 points for a MP4 player just to ensure they didn't take anymore points away. So I've ended up with something I didn't really want and it will take me another 3 years to accumulate the points I need to be well on the way to getting what I really wanted. So at the end of the day what they have given me back is almost the same as what I've redeemed. Still I suppose I've got an MP4 player, I expect I'll end up chucking it in the drawer with my other MP3 players!

But I expect everyone else is in the same boat - Que Sera Sera - (is that how you spell it?)

So it seems we are getting somewhere - it does feel better doesn't it or does it?

But just goes to show, they wouldn't listen to us as individuals, but when we all started shouting we made them listen.

Power to the people! (Sorry - I mean "customer" !)