Beware 'Cashback' offers from 3mobileshop and Mobile Rainbow

troyisperry

Has anyone else taken out a mobile phone 'cashback' contract with https://www.3mobileshop.co.uk or https://www.mobilerainbow.co.uk [all part of the same group MSols Ltd]?

Under certain contracts, they promise that if you send them your month six bill within 30 days of receipt and month 12 bill within 30 days of receipt they will credit all of your line rental back into your account.

Having complied with their rules for cashback, I sent them my month six bill only a couple of days after I had received it. I chased them a few weeks later, and conveniently they claimed they had never received it. I then sent them the bill again [by both fax and recorded delivery this time, having learned my lesson], and they sent me an e-mail advising I would recevie my money by 5th May. It duly never arrived.

The call centre [a wonderful 0870 number!] is based overseas, and I have had incredible difficulty trying to get my point across, and even understand the people on the other end of the phoneline.

Fifteen e-mails later [and two letters], about thirteen of which e-mails they ignored, they are now claiming I sent them the bill too late, this being 31 days after the bill date. Their own rules say they need to receive the bill within 30 days of you, the customer, receiving the bill, not the bill date, so yet again they are contradicting themselves.

It is clear they are trying everything possible not to pay out. I feel I may not be alone in this experience, and was wondering if anyone else has experienced difficulties, and also if anyone is aware of anywhere I can take this complaint further? I will keep on going for them with an e-mail/letter a day until they acknowlege their mistakes.

I had previosuly used https://www.e2save.com for a similar contract, and the cashback process worked smoothly, so if anyone is considering cashback contracts I would advise this company as a much better choice.

tomS_4

Also, for mobilerainbow, if you move house at all in the course of the offer you can't get any more cashback. So if you moved in the first 6 months you'd get NO cashback at all.

I don't think any of these cashback deals go smoothly.. i sure wouldn't describe e2save as making it easy.. but at least they paid up in the end without too much hassle. I'd guess that the smaller the company the bigger the risk.