Free £15 Boots voucher and Lovefilm DVD rental trial

thriftymiss_2

Well, my experience has been just as harrowing. I did a free trial (nothing to do with a boots voucher) for 1 month in the autumn and phoned to cancel, but they took some money out anyway. I asked for this to be refunded as I have cancelled, they said if I wanted to stay on thier books for another 3 months free. I succumber and was told the taken £14.99 would carry me over til 14th January when my next billing date would be. I sent the discs back over xmas and they received them on 4th Jan (meanwhile I had been online to cancel the account) and my account was closed down on 4th Jan 07. However I notice from my last bank statement that the f%&$kers have taken £14.99 on 19th DECEMBER!!! I have emailed Customer Services (splutter) who are also a bunch of w$%£kers and seem not to read properly the information and just keep telling me my discs were not received until after billing date (which is obviously bulls£$% as December falls before January). Hacked off or what. What do I do? Go to bank and tell them that it is an unauthorised transaction, can I also include the original £14.99 too??

codger

Purple: everybody in the entire world is on Lovefilm's database. That's why they retain the credit records of everyone who ever signed up for anything, ever. 'Course, what the Data Protection people in Wilmslow make of that is another matter.

Sorry for thinking you had your voucher. . . On the sample so far then, and extrapolating the figures nationwide, it seems that 10 people will have received £150sworth of vouchers out of 3,700,000 who signed up.

Thrifty: until my own encounter with Lovefilm, I had not realised how useful the characters $%^ are in MSE posts. Your accomplishment puts mine to shame. I did use the word !!!!!!!!!!!!!! here once in reference to Lovefilm but all that appeared after posting was !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! so !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! that then. So yes, I guess it's best to have a word with your bank about the 'transaction'. Then after that you like the rest of us can deal with the !!!!! at this !!!!!! awful !!!!!!!!!! outfit that has taken up so much !!!!! time of so many here.

Meantime, as I patiently await my voucher, the thought occurs that maybe not being on Lovefilm's database may be A Good Thing. And, possibly, even worth the fifteen quid.;)

* Just noticed: this thread has been viewed 83,666 times. At this rate it may soon be more than the number of people who have viewed Lovefilm DVDs.

slarge

MSE_Archna wrote:

Hi everyone,

Just to let you know we're monitoring the Lovefilm situation and, having spoken to Martin, we've decided as some people have started receiving their vouchers we're going to holdfire for a few days. We'd rather wait and see before going in with the hobnail boots!

What about the folks who have had unauthorised charges made out of their accounts? Are they now left to fight it out with Lovefilm? Associating with this bunch of disreputable scammers does MSE no favours at all and I hope it is the last time we see their sting-in-the-tail offers plugged on here.

codger

slarge wrote:

What about the folks who have had unauthorised charges made out of their accounts? Are they now left to fight it out with Lovefilm? Associating with this bunch of disreputable scammers does MSE no favours at all and I hope it is the last time we see their sting-in-the-tail offers plugged on here.

slarge -- I'm taking it as read that MSE itself will never again publicise anything involving Lovefilm, though obviously it can't be responsible for what individuals may post on the board.

The experience of too many here and elsewhere would appear to validate the belief that at best, this company is dysfunctional; at worst, it's, well, it's a lot worse than that.

Today I'm setting in motion the recovery of the £15 Boots voucher Lovefilm promised to despatch within 30 days of my registration on November 29th last.

Smackey

You may as well add me to the list. I registered with them, although didn't immediately add 10 titles but certainly did so the next time I logged in with them.

Watched a few DVD's, emailed them to cancel and surprise surprise the last DVD took a week for them to receive back so they charged for one month's use.

They are now refusing me my voucher on the basis that I did not add 10 titles to my account whilst registering. Have sent them an email with the original ad attached and will shortly be following this up with an email to boots to see if that helps.

Hopefully, one way or another, the vouchers will arrive.

Not likely though.

Smackey

hollydays

hollydays wrote:

Ok.I have chosen my 10,and they have today sent me one.I have now cancelled all the other 9,so they cant send me any more.I will send that one back recorded delivery to be on the safe side.How do i cancell with lovefilm and do i need to cancell with my bank?
I also thought they would send me a returns evelope,but there isnt one,is there?

Posted the above the day after i was registered.

Emailed them recently asking when i would receive my voucher.
Got a reply saying .." generally a minimum of 28 working days" later emailed and them with a query to be told

"So long as you have followed the instructions in the promotion,the free Boots voucher will be received within 28 days from the period of registration"
A contradiction of my previous email from them and.. "However the offer requires you to fulfil certain criteria,filling in the required personal information,using the required promotional code,adding at least 10 items to your selection list.At the time of registration,and for a significant period after you did not have the required 10 items on your selection list (in this case only 6)This is unfortunately the reason you are not entitled to the voucher."

AaronAA

Hi,

I thought I should update my story on here - rather than quote my long post, here's a link to it:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=3801102&postcount=227

In summary, I signed up for a 3 month free LOVEFiLM trial (without Boots voucher), got a bit click happy in the control panel, and without warning, managed to cancel my free trial, and instantly incur charges of £22.09, and termination of my free trial!!

Anyway, my patience has been tested to the max by LOVEFiLM Customer Services, however, lots of perseverence, and bit of google searching, and a kind UK LOVEFiLM email contact I found has helped me to get my case penetrate the first level of Customer Services, and they have agreed to restart my original 3 month free trial, and whilst they still cannot refund my £22.09, they will credit that to my account for use after the 3 month trial.

Phew!!!!!!!

I'm happy with that outcome, but I honestly don't know why this wasn't suggested on my first contact, saving me hours of email typing & frustration reading replies that don't address any points you have made in earlier emails!!

So in the end, deep down in the body of LOVEFiLM Customer Services, they have a heart, and aren't as bad as they seem on the outside - it is just getting through that flippin' front line of support (read: "defence"!) that is the tricky bit!!

codger

Holly: what's happening to you is the same thing that happens on MSE, i.e., you sign up to this forum according to the terms & conditions that exist at the time, and then a month later Martin turns up on your doorstep demanding £10,000 in membership fees because that was also in the T&Cs.

Except they weren't actually printed out. But Martin says there were there because he's checked the text that only he has access to and which only he has read.

Yeah. Right.

Of course Martin wouldn't invent a small print ruse like that. Nor would any individual or corporate enterprise with a shred of self respect.

Yet this sustained abuse of the English language seems a fundamental characteristic of a company which in its own words promises:

a voucher "when you register", or. . .

a voucher which will be "despatched within 30 days of registration", or. . .

a voucher will will be despatched "within 30 working days of registration", or. . .

a voucher which will be "generally" despatched a minimum of 28 working days after registration.

Just that alone is evidence of an incompetence so great that no consumer in his / her right mind should be dealing with this company. But as threads on this board and elsewhere on the Net repeatedly show, Lovefilm's constantly revised despatch terms are as nought compared to other areas of its operations, including the serious business of levying unauthorised charges against customer cards at sign-up and then further unauthorised premature charges against those same cards in order to lock up renewal fees.

I'll be interested to hear what Martin learns from his pending encounter with Lovefilm -- though if he is treated with the same kind of contempt the company exhibits to so many others, I doubt he'll get very far, hobnail boots or no hobnail boots.

And haven't we moved beyond the relatively narrow question of 'why have so many MSE members had such an appalling experience at the hands of this company' anyway?

Just how much longer this company should be allowed to continue without being called to account by the appropriate authorities is the question that really needs addressing.

firework

i'm still waiting for my voucher...anyone heard anything? no posts on here at all yesterday - has this thread moved?

Kzlnd

firework wrote:

i'm still waiting for my voucher...anyone heard anything? no posts on here at all yesterday - has this thread moved?

Not received anything, I sent them an email yesterday morning but no reply so I shall forward the email again and again, like I had to previously in order to finally get a reply and refund :rolleyes: