Free CD-Wow £8.75 voucher loophole

Pete2001

What confuses me is how the 3 x £3 vouchers have been distributed. It seems obvious that most people who got an £8.75 voucher were those who e-mailed early on the Friday afternoon (3rd March?) and got in quick - suddenly an avalanche of e-mails must have arrived at cd-wow HQ and they put a hold on all other applications. But the 3 x £3 vouchers just seem to have been randomly distributed. Maybe it was an attempt at divide and rule.

littlemissmoney

Has anyone got an email addresss for Time Out? Thanks

heyho_3

http://www.timeout.com/contact/index.php?action=mag_form

distribution@timeout.com.

Rogerb_2

Sammie Squire
E-mail Address(es):
sammiesquire@timeout.com

who replied to my complaint

Thank you for your email and please accept my sincere apologies for what has happened regarding the free CD promotion that we featured in conjunction with CD Wow.

This exclusive offer was set up, as all Time Out promotions and competitions are, in totally good faith, and for the benefit of our readers. The offer is not a hoax, or a marketing ploy to expand CD Wow's database, but a genuine offer to reward genuine readers of Time Out magazine with a free CD.

Unfortunately, the details of this exclusive offer were posted on a website, and therefore the number of respondents has gone through the roof. CD Wow are in the process of identifying the non-Time Out readers, hence the slight delay in sending out the 'e' coupons. These were originally scheduled to be emailed out on Friday 3 March (10 days after the closing date of 21 February). I have forwarded your email to CD Wow, and if you haven't now received your coupon, then it is on its way. I wanted to touch base myself to apologise and explain.

I would also like to say that we carefully select third parties who we wish to work with and who we know take the interests of our readers as seriously as we do, and 99.9% of the time our promotions run smoothly. Very, very occasionally problems do occur, and like this one, we are endeavouring to resolve it, and will ensure that all genuine Time Out readers will receive their free CD. Please bear with us. Unfortunately for our real readers, others may have spoilt the chance for future great deals like this.

If you would like to speak to me further about any of this, then you can call me on the number below. In the meantime, I hope you understand that we are doing all that we can to rectify this situation. So please don't let this put you off reading Time Out in the future or indeed taking up our offers.

Best wishes
Sammie


Sammie Squire
Brand Manager
Time Out
251 Tottenham Court Road
London W1T 7AB
020 7813 6134 (tel)
020 7813 6153 (fax)

heyho_3

Well it was sammie that sort of helped me but now sure I should have printed her email as now I am sure she is going to be flooded lol...

RANDY_3

Just emailed Time Out distrubution, see what happens next.
I said that i often subscribe to Time Out.
Did not mention its only when the 99p offers come out and then cancel.
But hey ho, see if i can get my hands on a voucher.
Cheers all

rubytwilight

MSE_Martin wrote:

At the moment CD wow has shut up shop talking to me. There is no legal recourse here as there is an opt-out in its terms and conditions this is an 'invitation to treat' not a contract, therefore there is no legal right to enforce this.

As argued all along this applies to 'Time out readers', without any definition of what a reader of Time Out is. The legal advice is this is a perfectly legitimate application for people to make but CD-Wow is legitimate in rebutting and not honouring it.

That leaves us with a reputational issue. It is up to you to decide what your views are on CD-Wow and whether you choose to use the company again - or whether this was a 'loophole' and it 'got out of the loophole' - all part of the 'adversarial consumer society' game. Most of the time 'loopholes' work, sometimes they don't - that's life

I still suggest you individually e-mail CD-Wow and try with your claim.

However what i would be interested to hear, is if CD-Wow add anyone onto its 'CD-Wow club' mailing list who wasn't given the free CD voucher, thus it not holding up its side of the incentive.

martin


PS I didnt move it to Gone but not forgotten, that was the board guides (perfectly reasonably) taking a judgement. However, perhaps sadly it needs to stay here.

I was added to the mailing list, quite a few emails since but no voucher either for 8.75 or 3 pound discount.
I also "won" a fab 50p discount!

competitionscafe

I was also added to the mailing list, but no voucher. (Used a seperate, new email address to the one registered with CD Wow, so can verify this). I also used a £5 voucher from Tombola last year and because I clicked on an MSE link which gave me an extra 50p off they cancelled the order and I lost my £5 voucher.

Not happy with CD Wow - not just because of this, but also because I ordered a dvd box set as a Christmas present for someone last December. It never arrived and every time I have emailed them since then they just ignore me and don't reply.

Any savings I may have made by using CD Wow over the past couple of years have been wiped out by losing £25 (£20 on the box set and £5 voucher) and other companies (amazon, etc) are now similar in price to CD Wow (even HMV has reduced prices and offers free delivery!) so while it''s great that CD Wow may have helped drive down prices maybe they should take a bit more care over their customers, as their competitors (who do reply to emails) are only a click away.

magoogy

just received this message;-

Hi


Thanks for your email. The voucher giveaway email is completely separate from the Time Out promotion and Mirror promotion.


If you have applied and qualified for Time Out and/or Mirror, you will receive your £8.75 voucher on the 15th March and your £5.00 voucher on the 16th March.


I do hope this info helps.


Regards



Tammy

CD WOW!

wonder if i will receive the voucher then? anyone who does please post....

caroline1973lefty

email received today from sammie squire at timeout (i am a timeout subscriber):

"Apologies for not replying to you at the end of last week. I have been endeavouring to sort this situation out. I received your email and contacted CD Wow about it immediately.

Anyway, I have now heard back from CD Wow, and you will indeed be receiving your £8.75 voucher today. The redemption date will, of course, be extended.

I am truly sorry that this promotion has left you thinking ill of Time Out; this really was not the intention to annoy our readers. As I explained in my previous email, CD Wow were inundated due to the offer getting posted on a (non-Time Out) forum. Therefore the process of sending out the coupons has taken longer than expected, due to CD Wow having to identify the real readers. I have asked everyone to bear with us on this matter, as everyone who is entitled to it, will get their voucher!

All I can do is apologise on behalf of Time Out for how this has been handled. I know that readers were willing to bear with us because they understood the problem we were encountering. However, I am very aware that the manner that this has been handled by CD Wow has been inappropriate and rude. Unfortunately, I was left out of the loop with a lot of what went on, and would not have agreed to the tone of the emails that they were sending out last week.

Thank you for your understanding"

haven't actually HAD the voucher yet, mind!!!

EDIT - got the voucher yesterday Hooray!