Red Letter Days seem MORE expensive!

theoldcynic

Hi I just received a Red Letter Day Voucher and realised that many of the 'experiences' they are offering are substantially MORE expensive than when booking direct with the experience provider themselves!! This is even with some of their so called 'Special offers'!!! A lot of the experience providers seem to be offering a much BETTER experience with MORE flexibility for LESS money when booking direct!

You'd think that with their bulk purchasing power that RLD would be getting some sort of discount with the experience provider??!! If so why are they not discounting their days or at least offering them at the same price as you would get from booking direct? Making it MORE expensive I assume increases their profit margin substantially??!!

Plus I see that the vouchers have an expiry date!! What voucher has an expiry date on it?!! I had an Arcadia voucher and managed to use it last week when finding it five years after it got lost!! The same goes for some John Lewis vouchers I got as a wedding gift many years ago.

I can only assume that some people who have RLD vouchers have lost a substantial amount of money because of this! I have a physical condition and will be unable to use the voucher for the activities I would like to for some time. Also what happens when an experience is seasonal and is over your expiry date?

In my opinion what a rip off! Peter Jones and Theo Pathitis you have lost my respect and my future custom.

dacouch

I do my best to avoid giving money to Peter Jones, he loves himself too much, if could he would eat himself.

arcon5

You'd think that with their bulk purchasing power that RLD would be getting some sort of discount with the experience provider??!! If so why are they not discounting their days or at least offering them at the same price as you would get from booking direct? Making it MORE expensive I assume increases their profit margin substantially??!!

They probably are --but as long as people keep buying through them they have no reason to reduce their prices I guess

Many people will also go on their website for ideas and find something they may like - rather than knowing exactly what they are after and where. Although you could I suppose use them for ideas and then book direct.

Plus I see that the vouchers have an expiry date!! What voucher has an expiry date on it?!! I had an Arcadia voucher and managed to use it last week when finding it five years after it got lost!! The same goes for some John Lewis vouchers I got as a wedding gift many years ago.

Most vouchers do.

I have a BHS gift card in my wallet with an expiry date, along with a £5 Argos gift card.

Holding the money for 5 years would be a bit of an administrative nightmare tbh for many companies, particularly smaller ones.

stephen77

was the voucher a present? If no, why did you buy it? If yes, then should the person who got you it, thought more about the gift if your unable to use it?

I have found them quite flexable when I got the OH a present. The expereience we wanted was bucked up so we could have changed it to any other experience they offer on the web site of the same value etc.

Personally I think 6 months is long enough time to use.

you can always sell it on ebay?

There are often voucher codes on line for RLD. I used a 20% off before christmas. This was cheaper the other experience website for the event I was wanting for the present.

Gavin83

I've always found experiences to be cheaper or priced the same to book through the likes of RLD than booking direct and I do normally check. They will also exchange the voucher for a different experience should you need to and if you voucher is approaching the expiry date you can get an extension or a new voucher entirely. I've got one at home I've had over two years, it's not a problem to renew it.

I certainly think they've got their place but like anything you should shop around.

John_the_Beeman

Gavin, your post is incorrect.

RED LETTER DAYS WILL NOT EXTEND THE EXPIRY DATE, even to within their new 12-month

They absolutely refuse to extend the expiry date on £360 of vouchers which went over their arbitrary 10 month limit (and which has now been extended to 12 months from the end of 2011), despite the fact that they are still within 12 months.

So, given that is no more expensive to buy these treats directly, there can be no reason to use Red Letter Days, other than by using their site to get some ideas.

System

John_the_Beeman wrote: »

Gavin, your post is incorrect.

RED LETTER DAYS WILL NOT EXTEND THE EXPIRY DATE, even to within their new 12-month

They absolutely refuse to extend the expiry date on £360 of vouchers which went over their arbitrary 10 month limit (and which has now been extended to 12 months from the end of 2011), despite the fact that they are still within 12 months.

So, given that is no more expensive to buy these treats directly, there can be no reason to use Red Letter Days, other than by using their site to get some ideas.

Perhaps it was the way you asked? If Gavin has managed to extend his voucher then it must be possible to do

Azari

John_the_Beeman wrote: »

Gavin, your post is incorrect.

RED LETTER DAYS WILL NOT EXTEND THE EXPIRY DATE, even to within their new 12-month

They absolutely refuse to extend the expiry date on £360 of vouchers which went over their arbitrary 10 month limit (and which has now been extended to 12 months from the end of 2011), despite the fact that they are still within 12 months.

So, given that is no more expensive to buy these treats directly, there can be no reason to use Red Letter Days, other than by using their site to get some ideas.

It's surprising what a company will do if you can just get them to focus their minds.

A very good way of doing this is to mention that you will be taking them to the small claims court if they remain recalcitrant.

It's surprising how often they will decide to make 'an exception' when this happens.

Richard_Atkins

John_the_Beeman wrote: »

Gavin, your post is incorrect.

I'm not at all sure it is as I think your situation and Gavins may be rather different. If I read you right, you were trying to get an extension of vouchers that were issued less than 12 months before-hand but which had printed on them an expiry date 10 months after the issue date (their old terms) which had already passed. So were you trying to get an extension on vouchers that you had already allowed to expire?

If your vouchers are still within date then in my experience (and I know a bit about this as I run http://www.findexperiencedays.com) all the experience day companies allow you to extend the expiry date although this is at their discretion and there may be an administrative fee in some cases. However this is ONLY true if you contact them before the vouchers expire. Once they've been allowed to expire then they are gone.

Having said that, I have known of cases where companies have extended expired vouchers even where they were within their rights to not do so, but only where there was a strong and sympathetic case. The two that come to mind involved a tragid bereavement and an extended period of hospitalisation following an accident. I mention this not to encourage anyone to 'try it on' but to indicate that on the whole, I think the companies concerned are actually pretty human about this sort of thing with the one proviso that if you forget to do anything and are then angry that they have expired, that's not their problem.

pmduk

theoldcynic wrote: »

I see that the vouchers have an expiry date!! What voucher has an expiry date on it?!!

Very many gift vouchers and tokens are time limited. Some display the expiry date clearer than others.