Bought A Wowcher For Hair, Didn't Get What Was Advertised

jahlboy

Hello!

This is what happened:

I ordered a Wowcher for a 'A 2-hour vintage-inspired one-to-one hair and nails styling session at Sculpt Hair Gallery, Nottingham (was £60)' in October. I used it yesterday, after booking with the merchant, however I have never had such a bad experience.

The nail polish was very messily applied and within 2 hours it starting coming off and was still the consistency of playdough (it had never set) - you could run your finger through it and it would scrape off, like a paste. I wonder if it had possibly reacted with the base coat she had applied (I have a video of me scraping it off if you require it). It was so gloopy that she even said 'I'm not going to apply a second coat to that' as it was congealing badly. The lady doing this shoved a tool up my nail which hurt a lot, and put it further than where it should have gone. My nailbed still hurts.

The main part of the Wowcher was the vintage hair styling. She showed me some photographs of hairstyles that they had printed off from the internet and a couple photographs of previous customers which actually looked okay, and asked me to describe what I wanted. The hairstyle that she did was nothing like the photo and she burnt my head three times whilst chatting to other clients and unfortunately within 3 minutes of me leaving the hairdressers all of the hairpins (which were really inferior quality) didn't hold the hair in place and my hair all started to unravel and fall down. By the time I reached Debenhams, 5 minutes later, to have my eyebrows tinted, I told that girls at the makeup counter that I had just had a makeover and showed them my nails and hair and they were horrified that I had paid for it. They asked me why I hadn't complained at the time and I told them I wasn't confident enough to do so in person, but urged me to complain online.

She asked me whether I wanted a drink and gave me a cup of tea, however the Wowcher description said it included 'tea and cakes' as well as a 'luxury aromatherapy arm & hand massage', neither of which I received or was offered. The whole makeover lasted for no more than 75 minutes, instead of the 2 hours I paid for.

The reason I booked this on this particular day was because I was due to go out in the evening to a concert and the result of this was that, unforunately, I was caused a lot of stress as I had to rush back home (1 hour journey each way) in order to quickly try to rectify both nails and hair.

I am incredibly unhappy with this experience and would like a full refund to my card, not Wowcher credits, as I no longer want to use a company who deal with these kind of merchants.

The response I got was

We will follow up on the comments below, however I think the customer must have got the deals confused.
The hair up and nails session is not a 'makeover', its a hair up and a mini manicure. We have ran an offer on a site called Living Social in the past for a manicure with a hand and arm massage but not with wowcher. Also a mini manicure does not involve having your cuticles pushed back so actually the customer received more in that respect and it is understood that this is not painful but can be uncomfortable (but is the clients responsibility to communicate the tension that like when asked) as its done using what we call an 'orange stick'.

The session also states 'up to 2 hours' in which, we try our best to inform customers that the session is actually 1 hour as Wowcher made an error on the timings of this product, confusing it with the Vintage Hair Workshop we also do.

We have not had any complaints about our one to one sessions so we are confident of our product. We can invite the customer back in but unfortunately cannot offer a refund.

After rechecking the Wowcher they have got it wrong and I was entitled to the makeover. I obviously don't want to go back because I'm a bit scared of how they'll treat a complainer and want a refund. Am I legally entitled to one?

dalesrider

You need to take it up with Wowcher..

I hope you have a copy of the add, that promoted the hair and nails.

jahlboy

I have taken it up with Wowcher who said they can only get a refund if the company agrees - they were the one who contacted the salon for me!

Fire_Fox

You should have complained at the time, IIRC the salon are within their rights to expect an opportunity to rectify the problem, and really it's only fair to allow them to 'inspect' given you claim it occurred so quickly after the service was done. You didn't have to rush home, you chose to rather than returning to the salon.

Read up on the Supply of Goods and Services Act. You actually have two separate linked complaints - firstly the failure to provide the full service you paid for, secondly the quality of the services you did receive. It does sound like the salon has effectively admitted not providing all the services you paid for, so you are only in dispute over the remainder.

caitieface

That is appaling. Obviously you are in the right here, forget all this rubbish about details being listed wrongly, no one should be expected to pay for terrible treatments. Also, I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to put my beauty therapist hat on and say that pushing back the cuticles should NEVER be painful or uncomfortable for that matter.

Yeah, it would have been better if you said at the time but imo you deserve your money back. Keep pushing them and make sure they know you're not going to keep quiet about your experience.

I never trust salons that offer deals on Wowcher, Groupon and the like, they're generally too good to be true. Good salons don't need to risk going broke (if they're fulfilling these 'deals' they are not making money) to get clients through the door.

Wowcher_representative

Good Morning,

We are sorry to hear that the salon is disputing your refund claim. So that we can investigate this matter and the claim that the wowcher terms are incorrect can you please email us again at [EMAIL="enquiries@wowcher.co.uk"]enquiries@wowcher.co.uk[/EMAIL] with MONEYSAVING in the subject we can then address you complaint fully.

Kind Regards

Wowcher

jahlboy

Wowcher_representative wrote: »

Good Morning,

We are sorry to hear that the salon is disputing your refund claim. So that we can investigate this matter and the claim that the wowcher terms are incorrect can you please email us again at [EMAIL="enquiries@wowcher.co.uk"]enquiries@wowcher.co.uk[/EMAIL] with MONEYSAVING in the subject we can then address you complaint fully.

Kind Regards

Wowcher

Thank you! I know the fault doesn't lie with Wowcher but the company, so thank you for being so helpful. I have just emailed you.

jahlboy

The company are refusing to refund, so Wowcher won't refund me.

I never received what I paid for - would it be worth taking it to a Small Claims Court? I know this may seem petty for £15 but the way they have treated me makes me not want to let this go.

cockaleekee

Is it this offer that you bought? If so, I would agree that you did not receive what you paid for.

You have two options - small claims, or leaving bad reviews everywhere you can. If you're not bothered about the money, it might be more fun to do the latter

jahlboy

cockaleekee wrote: »

Is it this offer that you bought? If so, I would agree that you did not receive what you paid for.

You have two options - small claims, or leaving bad reviews everywhere you can. If you're not bothered about the money, it might be more fun to do the latter

Yes it was!

Small claims costs £25 fees for a case under £300, and if I were to lose (it's me against them) then I'd have lost £40. Equally, if I were to win, would they have to pay the fees? Because there's no point in me going through Small Claims if I would still be in a loss (£25 fees + £15 refund is still a £10 loss).

I have already started to leave a few bad reviews!

pinkshoes

I think I'd be tempted to send Woucher a Letter Before Action, as you certainly did NOT get what you paid for!