Can't obtain refund from LivingSocial

welshartnow

I bought coupons from Living Social for a deal in a local restaurant. They operate like Groupon you buy vouchers print them out and present them to the particular restaurant. We took the vouchers to the restaurant and they would not honour them saying they had fallen out with Living Social. We have raised a case with Living Social and tried to contact then on numerous occasions but to no avail. We have bought coupons from other sellers such as Groupon and KGB and they are always fair and responsive and issue refunds when there is a problem. These Living Social guys are a total nightmare and seem unwilling to honour their contract. My question is what can we do?

fluffnutter

Not a lot. Write them a letter giving them 14 days to refund your money or you'll take them to the small claims court. If you can be bothered that is. How much did you spend?

It can be complicated regarding who your contract's actually with. I know that *technically* Groupon have watertight(ish) T&Cs that state that your contract's with the supplier of the goods and not them. I also know that Groupon's own representatives are on record as saying that they will refund any unhappy customer.

This sort of thing might be an interesting test case for the small claims court as to who is actually liable for refunding you for this non-service. Take them both to court!

Quentin

Living social's ts + cs do make it clear that if you have any problems like this it's between you and the merchant.

They can (and seems they do) wash their hands over issues like this.

To be clear, LivingSocial markets the Deals and acts an as agent in selling the Vouchers on behalf of the Merchants. But the Merchant is the issuer of the Voucher. As issuer of the Voucher, the Merchant shall be fully responsible for any and all injuries, illnesses, damages, claims, liabilities and costs suffered by or in respect of a customer, caused in whole or in part by the Merchant or its products and services, as well as for any unclaimed property liability arising from unredeemed or partially redeemed Vouchers.

fluffnutter

Quentin wrote: »

Living social's ts + cs do make it clear that if you have any problems like this it's between you and the merchant.

They can (and seems they do) wash their hands over issues like this.

That's what I was expecting. And, to be fair, that's probably what Groupon's T&Cs say too.

I still think this whole concept of vouchers and suppliers is relatively new though (at least in terms of the popularity we see these days) and is yet to be fully tested as to whether contracts like these are wholly fair.

Quentin

fluffnutter wrote: »

That's what I was expecting. And, to be fair, that's probably what Groupon's T&Cs say too.....

No...

You get the "groupon promise" with groupon:

Nothing is more important to us than treating our customers well. If you ever feel like Groupon let you down, give us a call and we will refund your voucher – simple as that.

hcb42

It seems to be the restaurant not allowing you to book here.

Did you pre book or just show up. Normally you have to precook and state you want to use voucher. Have you tried more than once in case person at restaurant was misinformed? If they wonT honour the voucher get that from them on email ans push living social for refund

hcb42

Pre book. Not cook.....that's chef's job lol

custardy

what does the voucher offer?
is it a special deal,meal for £x, or a simple value of £X

lizevans55

Groupon and KGB have both been very fair when there's been a problem making a booking for their deals - either a refund or credit on account. However Living Social will not budge from their position that the merchant is responsible for refunding even though the merchant has told me that they haven't received any money from Living Social if I haven't redeemed my voucher. I tried a number of times to make a booking but they were not able to accommodate me when I was free to go. So they have not had my voucher or voucher number. Reluctant to use Living social again after this experience

DVardysShadow

I think that the strategy needed when it comes to court will require 2 claims to be made. It is longwinded.

Your choice is to sue the voucher provider or the outlet.

• If you sue the outlet, they will claim that your contract is with the voucher provider and they are not party to it
• If you sue the voucher provider they will claim that they are only the agent and your contract is with the agent

Now the outlet is the wild card here, because their claim that they are not party to the voucher deal could well be true. The website may be offering a deal without the authority of the outlet or there could be other breaches, such as the website is selling too many of the deal.

So sue the outlet first. And they will very likely give a defence which points at the voucher company. At this, get proceedings stayed and sue the voucher company, using the evidence of the statement in the claim against the outlet as evidence that the voucher company is at fault.

By this time, they will all be running around like headless chickens, but provided the 2 cases are linked, one of them will produce a result in your favour. Or if they don't, it will be legal news which will entirely discredit the voucher industry, which will be a result in itself.

Becles

I bought a voucher to have my oven professionally cleaned for £19.

When I got the voucher, the only contact details for the company are a hotmail email address. I've emailed them three times over the last three weeks and had no response.

I googled the hotmail address and found this amateur website:
http://www.ovenzclean.co.uk/

If I'd gone to the Ovenzclean website first, I'd never have bought as it looks very unprofessional and something a novice could knock up in five minutes! There are no other contact details or anything about the company.

Living Social are ignoring my emails asking for a refund.