Cashback - is it a con?

2pinkgiraffes

Hi I am looking at getting a new mobile contract - currently on pay as you go.

The best deals seem to be the cashback ones - where you have to send the bills back - are these really all they are cracked up to be - do you actually get your money back??

I have seen a few threads complaining about a few companies with regards to cashback - the company with the deal I like is buymobilephones.net -has anybody had any dealings with this company and if so did you get your cashback?

can anybody recommend a company that is proven when it comes to cashback?

Any advice appreciated, thanks.

Count_Dante

I use Phonebox Direct, and have had no trouble. The following tips are useful:

1. Use quidco and get more cashback there.
2. Always send the claims special delivery, not recorded delivery. It's pricey, but Quidco cashback more than covers the cost.
3. When buying the phone, always remember to keep a record of the t&cs, both phone company and retailer.
4. Always know when you are to send the bills back.
5. Do everything by the book. All cashback retailers, no matter how reliable, will look for an excuse not to pay you, and so rely on people forgetting to send their claims back on time or messing something up on a form. Hence point #2 - it stops them claiming that they never received the claim.

All being well, you should get a free phone with free calls for a year. Hope that helps.

Coupon_Queen_3

This link may help

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=140359

2pinkgiraffes

Count_Dante wrote:

I use Phonebox Direct, and have had no trouble. The following tips are useful:

1. Use quidco and get more cashback there.
2. Always send the claims special delivery, not recorded delivery. It's pricey, but Quidco cashback more than covers the cost.
3. When buying the phone, always remember to keep a record of the t&cs, both phone company and retailer.
4. Always know when you are to send the bills back.
5. Do everything by the book. All cashback retailers, no matter how reliable, will look for an excuse not to pay you, and so rely on people forgetting to send their claims back on time or messing something up on a form. Hence point #2 - it stops them claiming that they never received the claim.

All being well, you should get a free phone with free calls for a year. Hope that helps.

Thanks for the tips - they are really useful. I have never heard of quidco before, just been looking at the site - its great!

soluce

Count_Dante wrote:

1. Use quidco and get more cashback there.

Interesting...

So if i buy a contract from say e2save i would get £36.50 from quidco as well as the cashback from e2save?

I wish i had known about it before, i bought my partner a contract phone from e2save in december, i didnt know i could have got more money back.

You

The first thing I would say is take your time, do your homework and don't rush.

An extra word of warning. buymobilephones.net only allow 14 days from the date on the relevant bill for you to send it in with the appropriate voucher. As a lot of networks don't send out the bills for maybe even a week/ 10 days after the date printed on them, this could leave you with as few as 2-3 days from receiving your bill to get all the relevant paperwork to buymobilephones.net. And this would be 3 times, to claim all 3 installments.
They don't state the 14 days time limit anywhere on their website as well.

Bottom line, the easier it is to claim the cashback, the lower the cashback amount. Look through the many threads on here for other people's experiences.

2pinkgiraffes

You wrote:

An extra word of warning. buymobilephones.net only allow 14 days from the date on the relevant bill for you to send it in with the appropriate voucher. As a lot of networks don't send out the bills for maybe even a week/ 10 days after the date printed on them, this could leave you with as few as 2-3 days from receiving your bill to get all the relevant paperwork to buymobilephones.net.

Right thanks for that! I won't buy from this site then, as determined as I am to be on the ball and organised about this - if theres only a couple of days turnaround I can't see me getting it sorted in time to claim the cashback.

deanos

if you dont like the thought of cashbacks, Three have some good half price deals and £100 Quidco, so no need to worry about sending bills etc as its automatically discounted

Jay22_2

hi guys,

i lost my bill is lost in the post which means i did'nt get it on the way from the network its lost.

wat do i do about my cashback for which i needed to send this bill to get my cashback ?

Jay22_2

Hi 2pink,

i was with Car phone warehouse, and
i did managed to get my cashback all of it BUT,
there was little problem,
when my cheque went missing in the post, i was told to wait to it for about 1 to 2 months to be cosided as lost.

and i did then i rang them about the matter and 1 of their colleague very polite as i asked him to speed up the process of my payment somhow as he in the first hand told me it would take another 30 to 60 days , SO

he said ok i will make a CARD Refund payment which is quicker than cheque and the money would go to my account straight away it cheered me up (it could take from7 to 14 days for the moeny to get to my account)

BUT

it didn't tang again after 2 weeks or so then they say their colleague made a mistake we can't make a cashback payment by CARD REfund, and they said they would make a request for a new cheque issue which would take another 60 to 90 days.
i said "why so long it's already been over 3 months for my cashback"
anyway after a couple of months i did get the money as promissed.

i personally would go back to them as a customer

these telephone customer care ...........//

david7m

I've recently been shafted by buymobilephones.net The paperwork does say original bills only, but I didn't have the paperwork to hand, so I rang them for my first claim. They advised photocopies were ok.

I had my first claim refused because of the copies, which has subsequently made all claims after void! I am currently following the complaints procedure, but if this fails, I've just thrown away £300

Check the rules carefully!

If you only have a small window of time, ie 14 days, you have to be quick and plan holidays around this etc.!

Dave