Wowcher - Lack of ethical responsibility

bondieboy

I purchased an Unlimited Sushi dining experience from Wowcher as a gift for my son and his wife in December 2021. My son actually made a reservation a couple of weeks ago for the restaurant on the link sent. As it was an extra special occasion which they had to travel to they also booked accommodation. They arrived at the restaurant to be told the Sushi did not exist anymore and had not for quite some time, and that the venue was a bar only now. On approaching Wowcher for a refund, initially they just said prove it doesn't exist! Which for a start I find totally unacceptable. The onus of proof should not be placed on the dissatisfied customer. But I did contact the location, they said it was not their product and it had been done through a third party. I again contacted Wowcher to see how I could progress this. I was again told to provide proof from the 'merchant'.
As an aside if you have redeemed your voucher as my son did to make the reservation, you can not use the on line form to request a refund, even if in this case the reservation form existed, but product did not! Which obviously added to the disappointment of failure of service. If you call Wowchers customer service telephone number you cannot talk to a person. 
I requested the contact details via email of the 'merchant' from Wowcher, which as a 'reputable' company offering products on their behalf you would hope they would have correct?! I emailed the advised 'merchant' but no response. The company is listed as 'dissolved via compulsory strike-off', since November 2020 on Companies House records! So either the company was operating illegally and Wowcher are not aware because they have not bothered to check the credentials of companies they are advertising and selling vouchers for, or are Wowcher the scam? Either way it is not only immoral, but surely illegal?
I welcome comments and advice?

bondieboy

I find it interesting that Wowchers representative on this forum has not responded to anything since 2013! Have they given up on culpability altogether as inundated?
As the voucher I was sold recently was for a long since 'dissolved via compulsory strike-off' company, a historic relevant response to an issue from 2013 was I quote as follows;

• Good Morning We cannot comment on individual cases on a public forum however we do check all merchants carefully before we run a deal with them to ensure that they can honour the deal they advertise. On occasion situations arise which alter their ability to carry out the deal and as soon as we are notified we inform all…
  in Warning about vouchers for oven cleaning company Comment by Wowcher_representative 25 March 2013 at 9:59AM
  
  

born_again

You can understand Wowchers point that they want more proof than someone saying "It's no longer there" It's also not their job to check that any retailer is still trading.

Like many companies they may have been struck off, but just reopened under a slightly different name, but still used the same "trading name"

At best as you bought a Voucher. All you would get is a credit on your Wowcher acc. You will not get a refund in cash.

Aylesbury_Duck

The lesson is not to buy vouchers, gift cards or the like.  They are restrictive and as you've discovered, they can break the link between purchaser and retailer, meaning your consumer rights are harder or impossible to enforce.

Just buy things with proper methods, instead of falling for the marketing hype that you're getting some sort of deal.  

bondieboy

born_again said:

You can understand Wowchers point that they want more proof than someone saying "It's no longer there" It's also not their job to check that any retailer is still trading.

Like many companies they may have been struck off, but just reopened under a slightly different name, but still used the same "trading name"

At best as you bought a Voucher. All you would get is a credit on your Wowcher acc. You will not get a refund in cash.

Are you employed by wowcher? How defensive, of such a crock of poo!
So lets clarify! In your opinion a company that sold me a voucher for something that does not exist ie wowcher is ok? How do you photograph sushi that is not there?
Since investigating further, I have seen loads of appalling comments on wowchers customer service. It 'Is' also a legal/ethical responsibility for wowcher to check that a retailer that they are trading with is legal and responsible.
Again I quote :

• Good Morning We cannot comment on individual cases on a public forum however we do check all merchants carefully before we run a deal with them to ensure that they can honour the deal they advertise. On occasion situations arise which alter their ability to carry out the deal and as soon as we are notified we inform all…
  in Warning about vouchers for oven cleaning company Comment by Wowcher_representative 25 March 2013 at

It is the job, and 'legal' responsibility for wowcher to check that the products that they are promoting for sale do actually exist. As in my case, the fact that the company providing the service had long since been struck off should have prevented their advert on
Wowcher. It is wowchers ethical  responsibility to check that companies are legally trading and providing goods, as advertised on wowcher. They can not legally sell a voucher for something that does not exist!

Aylesbury_Duck

bondieboy said:

born_again said:

You can understand Wowchers point that they want more proof than someone saying "It's no longer there" It's also not their job to check that any retailer is still trading.

Like many companies they may have been struck off, but just reopened under a slightly different name, but still used the same "trading name"

At best as you bought a Voucher. All you would get is a credit on your Wowcher acc. You will not get a refund in cash.

Are you employed by wowcher? How defensive, of such a crock of poo!
So lets clarify! In your opinion a company that sold me a voucher for something that does not exist ie wowcher is ok? How do you photograph sushi that is not there?
Since investigating further, I have seen loads of appalling comments on wowchers customer service. It 'Is' also a legal/ethical responsibility for wowcher to check that a retailer that they are trading with is legal and responsible.
Again I quote :

• Good Morning We cannot comment on individual cases on a public forum however we do check all merchants carefully before we run a deal with them to ensure that they can honour the deal they advertise. On occasion situations arise which alter their ability to carry out the deal and as soon as we are notified we inform all…
  in Warning about vouchers for oven cleaning company Comment by Wowcher_representative 25 March 2013 at

It is the job, and 'legal' responsibility for wowcher to check that the products that they are promoting for sale do actually exist. As in my case, the fact that the company providing the service had long since been struck off should have prevented their advert on
Wowcher. It is wowchers ethical  responsibility to check that companies are legally trading and providing goods, as advertised on wowcher. They can not legally sell a voucher for something that does not exist!

And there we are: the stock response of someone getting correct advice they don't want to hear is to accuse the advisor of a vested interest.  Never gets old.

If you're so sure of the legal position and your rights, why are you here?

Sandtree

bondieboy said:

born_again said:

You can understand Wowchers point that they want more proof than someone saying "It's no longer there" It's also not their job to check that any retailer is still trading.

Like many companies they may have been struck off, but just reopened under a slightly different name, but still used the same "trading name"

At best as you bought a Voucher. All you would get is a credit on your Wowcher acc. You will not get a refund in cash.

Are you employed by wowcher? How defensive, of such a crock of poo!
So lets clarify! In your opinion a company that sold me a voucher for something that does not exist ie wowcher is ok? How do you photograph sushi that is not there?
Since investigating further, I have seen loads of appalling comments on wowchers customer service. It 'Is' also a legal/ethical responsibility for wowcher to check that a retailer that they are trading with is legal and responsible.
Again I quote :

• Good Morning We cannot comment on individual cases on a public forum however we do check all merchants carefully before we run a deal with them to ensure that they can honour the deal they advertise. On occasion situations arise which alter their ability to carry out the deal and as soon as we are notified we inform all…
  in Warning about vouchers for oven cleaning company Comment by Wowcher_representative 25 March 2013 at

It is the job, and 'legal' responsibility for wowcher to check that the products that they are promoting for sale do actually exist. As in my case, the fact that the company providing the service had long since been struck off should have prevented their advert on
Wowcher. It is wowchers ethical  responsibility to check that companies are legally trading and providing goods, as advertised on wowcher. They can not legally sell a voucher for something that does not exist!

You are mistaking someone saying that vouchers are fundamentally a bad idea as someone saying Wowcher are a good company?

The problem is that what Wowcher is selling is not unlimited sushi but a voucher, you received a voucher and it appears the voucher worked. The problem is that what you got from using the voucher didnt meet expectation rather than the voucher itself and this is what muddies the water and why people consistently advise against vouchers (if they dont work for Wowcher).

Without knowing the name of the company in question its not possible to do any desktop research, it is however possible that the listing was created before the company became insolvent (assume thats the reason for striking off) and that their servers, which these days are highly unlikely to have been in their own premises, havent been turned off. Eventually they go dark for non-payment or such but I have seen cases before where microsites etc which were hosted separate from the main site were still running 2 years after the company had gone.

Or as already suggested your looking at a trading name not the company name or a new company exists with an almost identical name 

user1977

If the merchant had ceased to exist before the voucher was bought, presumably they can't have redeemed the voucher and Wowcher still has the funds? But are you sure that Wowcher was specific about exactly which limited company they're talking about?

bondieboy

The company in question that Wowcher are selling vouchers for was 'dissolved via compulsory strike-off' in November 2020. I bought the voucher from Wowcher in December 2021. Wowcher claim that they check companies out, obviously not! It took a minute for me to look at Companies House. Why do Wowcher falsely claim to check out companies if they do not need to, and actually do not? I am going to pursue this with Trading standards etc.

MarvinDay

How did you pay for the voucher? as you might be able to get a refund by way of a chargeback (if paid by card).

The problem is that what Wowcher is selling is not unlimited sushi but a voucher, you received a voucher and it appears the voucher worked. The problem is that what you got from using the voucher didnt meet expectation rather than the voucher itself and this is what muddies the water and why people consistently advise against vouchers (if they dont work for Wowcher).

But that's the thing. The voucher didn't work as the company named on the voucher wasn't in business any longer but more importantly, wasn't in business when the voucher was sold.
In reality, the OP was sold a worthless voucher that could never have been redeemed.

Sandtree

bondieboy said:

The company in question that Wowcher are selling vouchers for was 'dissolved via compulsory strike-off' in November 2020. I bought the voucher from Wowcher in December 2021. Wowcher claim that they check companies out, obviously not! It took a minute for me to look at Companies House. Why do Wowcher falsely claim to check out companies if they do not need to, and actually do not? I am going to pursue this with Trading standards etc.

What is the company?

Wowcher havent said anything meaningful to you... they very possibly did check the company out in 2015 when they signed up with them... they havent claimed that they do monitoring every X months. This company presumably wasnt one of their largest suppliers and so it would be fairly normal for "monitoring" to be an absolute minimum assuming they dont owe Wowcher any monies and Wowcher arent receiving customer complaints.

I'm not going to ask for an annual attestation from the company that supplies our photocopier paper... if the paper keeps turning up each month and the bills arent escalating then I'll just let it keep running until the 5 year contract is coming near to an end.