Select Fashion credit note, please help

Bamco

Hello all,

I need some help regarding an expired credit note. This was issued to me on the 16th Dec and I had 6 months to use it. I have a condition called M.E and as well as mobility issues I have problems with processing information. So I set up a reminder in order to not loose out on the note itself. The reminder I set was for the 16th June and went to the store to redeem the credit note on the 15th June, once I got to the till I was told the credit note had expired two days prior, as I was confused by this I said that I was sure it expired on the 16th, the store manager said as it was within days she was willing to honour the note and attempted to put it through the system. She then found this was impossible as the till wouldn't let her authorise it, the only thing they could do was to refer me to customer services. At that point in time I was made aware of the second date on the note itself which was the 13th of June, so I asked the manager and assistant why when it was issued on the 16th did it run out on the 13th, and they were at a loss as to why this was.
I went home and contacted customer services via email as their phone lines were closed, I was told by them that the credit note expires 180 days after the issue date. So I emailed them back explaining that it states on the note that it is valid for 6 months:

Dear Kay,

I do not accept this the credit note states that it is valid for 6 months. I understand that 180 days is half of 360 but still it doesn't matter how many days there are in that month it is a named period of time e.g 16th of Dec to 16th of Jan. Even if you were working on a month as a four week period of 28 days that doesn't add up to 180 days. If it is supposed to be valid for an amount of days which your company refers to as months it should clearly state that on the credit note, as this is not the case and it states months rather than days I want a gift card to the value of the credit note or the funds returned to my account (I will send these details once agreed).

The reply I got was that the company doesn't expand expired credit notes and have offered me £5 as a gesture of good will. I will ask for this to be escelated to a manager but I was wondering if anyone on here had any advice and if I should continue to pursue this?
Thanks in advance

tomtontom

What exactly does the credit note say?

daytona0

For someone with M.E. (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome for those who do not know what random abbreviations mean) you've made a coherent post here and have evidenced that you have processed the information given to you (you remembered the timeframe of 180 days and the 13th June expiry date). Plus you were very proactive in contacting customer services!

I don't want to be nasty but it just doesn't really seem like M.E. was the reason why the note wasn't spent within the time frame (you set a reminder as well! Obviously planning ahead!). Unless it has cleared up in the last few days?

You aren't entitled to anything I'm afraid. They might be more sympathetic if you were on your deathbed, and maybe you can use M.E. to leverage a more favourable result. But I'm looking at your post and wondering how you were able to do xyz but couldn't spend a voucher in time? Doesn't make sense.

But ultimately it is worth trying if you have the spare time. No harm in that. But you may have to accept the £5 goodwill.

Bamco

Hi,

The credit note has two dates on it, the issue date is the 16th Dec then under that and close together is the expiry date of 13th June. It does state at the bottom of the note that it is valid for 6 months. Hope this helps as I tried to attach a photo but can't work out how 😄

unholyangel

Tbh its a tough call.

Rather than get into the complexities, I'm going to try outside the box.....why was the credit note initially owed to you?

I'm wondering if perhaps you might have a legal right to a refund. The law gives 6 years to chase/take legal action for it and I very much doubt that you signed you were accepting the credit note in full and final settlement as in my experience, they only do this for actual claims rather than every day transactions. Even if you had, you could perhaps argue that they were trying to restrict or remove your statutory rights but it would really come down to a judge agreeing that issuing a credit note when the law states you're due a refund and/or giving you a credit note for 6 months was effectively limiting their liability and in breach of your consumer rights.

But its probably going to be easier than arguing that 6 months and 13th june contradict each other rather than providing an indication (if not stating outright) that month means 30 days. Because then you're reliant on a judge thinking that the average person wouldn't understand month = 30 days when presented with both terms - unless one term is given more prominence than the other. If the 6 month term is given more prominence than 13th june, then it would help your claim of misleading/conflicting.

Not sure what you're saying doesn't add up to 180 days?

Bamco

You obviously have no idea what it is like having M.E, there is no such thing as CFS. I have put as much detail in my post in the hopes of getting some help. As is not evident I had check what I had done and also had help in writing this post. I hadn't been able to get to the store due to a combination of mobility issues and fatigue. I was hoping to get help and not criticism about my illness which you clearly have no concept of.

daytona0

Bamco wrote: »

You obviously have no idea what it is like having M.E, there is no such thing as CFS. I have put as much detail in my post in the hopes of getting some help. As is not evident I had check what I had done and also had help in writing this post. I hadn't been able to get to the store due to a combination of mobility issues and fatigue. I was hoping to get help and not criticism about my illness which you clearly have no concept of.

According to the NHS (National Health Service):

http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/Chronic-fatigue-syndrome/Pages/Introduction.aspx

"CFS is also known as ME, which stands for myalgic encephalomyelitis."

But if you want to reduce errors in replies then it may help to define what M.E. means


Aside from that.... you've managed to get to the store a few days before you believed it expired, rung customer services, remembered dates and details they specified and you also have people to help you! I'm not saying its not hard for you to do things, far from it, but I just think you've been like any other human being and been a bit careless. And that's me not defining you by your illness..

That's not even a big issue because the routes you need to take are either;

1. What unholyangel said

2. Pushing a bit more for compensation, possibly mentioning ME, and eventually accepting £5 if they don't budge.

JJ_Egan

Six months is a long long time to sit on a credit note .Many credit notes do not last that long You tried to use it many months after it was issued and your last day to use it was wrong .
Basically it was valid for any of the other days and could have been used .

All you can really do is write a nice letter to head office explaining your predicament .
You would be dependant upon the goodwill of the vendor .

meer53

You set your reminder for the wrong date if it said the expiry was 13th June on the credit note. Thats not the stores fault, it's yours. You can hardly argue the point if you didn't use it before it expired.