Red Letter Days Voucher Expired -- Lost all money!!

Caroline73_2

But RLD are middle men, your OH paid £150 for an experience. When you have your experience RLD then pay the spa. If they didn't have an expiry you could keep the voucher for 15 years and then use it. The spa day would then cost considerably more than the £150 your OH paid.

How is you not remembering unfair? Your husband must be really upset that he chose such a nice present and you forgot about it until August. He probably shouldn't bother this year.

LittleMissAspie

ceivegz wrote: »

With Red Letter Days £150 has been paid but no services or goods will now be provided...they are keeping £150 for what exactly??

For the voucher they gave you. It's not their fault you didn't use it.

ceivegz

Caroline73 wrote: »

But RLD are middle men, your OH paid £150 for an experience. When you have your experience RLD then pay the spa. If they didn't have an expiry you could keep the voucher for 15 years and then use it. The spa day would then cost considerably more than the £150 your OH paid.

How is you not remembering unfair? Your husband must be really upset that he chose such a nice present and you forgot about it until August. He probably shouldn't bother this year.

I don't believe that's the case, but even if it is, the terms state that bookings can be made for anytime before 31 December of the year after the gift experience is purchased (only the booking has to be made by the expiry date). Therefore, if that's correct, RLD has paid for me to go to the Spa at any time before 31 December 2009. This would be fine by me, but NO, they're just keeping my money and telling me to sod off.:T

ceivegz

LittleMissAspie wrote: »

For the voucher they gave you. It's not their fault you didn't use it.

I'm not saying it is their fault -- clearly it is mine.

However, these activity day businesses are reliant on a certain proportion of people not using them (probably around 25%) and then making 99.9% profit on such customers so it is fundamentally unfair to refuse to provide an activity to someone who's paid for one but simply forgotton to use it.

Caroline73_2

but you still didn't book it by the expiry date did you? Can't you accept that you are wrong?

ceivegz

Samba_Pa_Ti wrote: »

loads of gift vouchers have expiry dates, maybe they are longer than 7 months but ive noticed this many times.

i agree its unfair but this is why i never buy gift vouchers, cash is best

The whole issue of vouchers expiring is legally shakey, see the following article:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2006/apr/29/consumernews.moneysupplement

ceivegz

Caroline73 wrote: »

but you still didn't book it by the expiry date did you? Can't you accept that you are wrong?

I can, but I cannot accept that these vouchers can have an expiry date; especially such a short one. Please refer to the article in the Guardian linked above.

This is not like I booked a flight missed the plane and the seat went empty, nor is it like I have bought a turnip from Tescos and allowed it to go off. RLD have had our money and I have had nothing in return.

Maybe you just love giving money away to corporations, which is a shame given that I thought the whole point of this site was to prevent that.

Annabee

Caroline73 wrote: »

but you still didn't book it by the expiry date did you? Can't you accept that you are wrong?

She's not wrong.

I think the company have deliberately set such a short expiry date to catch people out and keep their money for nothing - fundamentally unfair, whether its in their terms and conditions or not.

OP - have you tried Consumer Direct on 08454 040506. They're an official govenment body and usually very helpful.

Chester85

Annabee wrote: »

She's not wrong.

I think the company have deliberately set such a short expiry date to catch people out and keep their money for nothing - fundamentally unfair, whether its in their terms and conditions or not.

OP - have you tried Consumer Direct on 08454 040506. They're an official govenment body and usually very helpful.

Consumer Direct won't do anything.

I've had RLD voucher before and the expiry date couldn't be more obvious. The people who booked them for me even left a little note reminding me to book up as soon as possible as I only had a limited time.

It's printed on the vouchers that you can buy in the shops, clearly stated on the website. I don't know how they can be clearer

It's no different to booking a flight then missing it, nobody has ripped anyone off

Rockporkchop

I have noticed that when RLD and lastminute.com have sales on spa days and such like, the vouchers are always for 7 months and clearly state this. On full priced experiences they are usually valid for 12 months. I would assume that the OP's DH bought the spa day at a reduced price but forgot to tell the OP that it was only valid for a shorter time.

It's such a shame and a criminal waste of money but unfortunately nothing you can do about it.