Should I report Uber Eats to trading standards / my bank?

hungry_hippo

Last Saturday night I placed an order for 12 bottles of Corona using Uber Eats.  Shortly after placing the order, I received an email saying "your order has been cancelled, here's your receipt, alcohol 247 had already started your order so you were charged for the food, £33.97.  It also said at the bottom of the email "a temporary hold of £33.97 was placed on your payment method....this is not a charge and will be removed from your bank statement shortly"

I looked up Uber eats website support 
https://help.uber.com/ubereats/restaurants/article/my-order-was-canceled-faq?nodeId=f1f17a0b-33bd-4e99-94ce-016de5bea7a9&fbclid=IwAR1p1_aEjZ3N1jpK--jjxi5fcfJBu2I9kNxscY-c6krkUhFqfoLyWFWV9mA

and it says clearly "you won't be charged if the merchant cancels your order"

So I was fairly satisfied the charge would be removed as how could it not really.  I went on to buy from another retailer on Uber Eats with no issues.

On Wed after the bank holiday, instead of disappearing, the £33.97 payment settled and no longer showed as pending. I assumed this must be wrong so contacted Uber.  After about 8 messages via FAcebook, Twitter, the app etc, I finally got through to someone.  Their response was

"We’re sorry to hear about this experience. Unfortunately, we are unable to provide a refund for your order as it was placed more than 48 hours ago. This is in line with our refund policy. If you experience any similar issues with a future order, please notify us within this time frame and we would be happy to help."

I kept trying to explain to them that this was appalling, that I only waited a few days because that's what I understood their website to be telling me to do re the pending hold to be removed,  and it says all over their site that if a retailer cancels a non perishable order it will be refunded.  I don't understand what 48 hours means either?  If it was wrong, it's still wrong after 48hrs 72, hrs 114.5 hours....

I know it's only £33 but just think it's appalling that you can buy something, it immediately gets canceled by the retailer for unknown reasons, then they get to keep your money as well as not send you the order.  Like if I made a purchase from Amazon and then got a response shortly after purchasing saying your order has been cancelled,sorry, oh by the way, we're also keeping your money, bye.  Surely what Uber have said can't be legal in the UK?

I don't actually care about the money, just want to report this type of activity as it seems totally wrong/ fradulent?

Not sure what anyone else thinks?

Thanks
Pete

eskbanker

I'd start by getting hold of their refund policy and seeing if it corresponds with what you were told by their rep, before deciding if any follow-up action is necessary on its (apparent il-)legality.

In the mean time, issue a 'goods not received' chargeback via your bank to recover your money....

hungry_hippo

thanks, I've created a claim with Natwest, have got plenty of evidence at my end i.e. chat conversations with uber etc, not sure if they want screenshots and so on, will see what Natwest say

RobM99

Get as much evidence as possible!

hungry_hippo

I've got the cancellation email that I received that shows the order was cancelled, it doesn't say by who but it was deffo them.  Also the chat records are in Facebook mainly, and the app.  You try and explain things to them and you just get a copy paste email reply that totally ignores what you said, it may as well be a bot you're talking to (probably is...)

hungry_hippo

eskbanker said:

I'd start by getting hold of their refund policy and seeing if it corresponds with what you were told by their rep, before deciding if any follow-up action is necessary on its (apparent il-)legality.

In the mean time, issue a 'goods not received' chargeback via your bank to recover your money....

Hi, I got a charge back from my bank and the amount was refunded. Uber eats response was  to post the amount back onto my uber account as unpaid and owing.  If I log in, it shows a message saying I can't order from them until I pay the £33. I am totally fine with this as I would never order anything from them again anyway. Can I just close my account and forget about them? I'm bothered they might contact a collections agency and it will show up as an unpaid amount and affect my credit file / mortgage application etc thanks.

marcia_

hungry_hippo said:

eskbanker said:

I'd start by getting hold of their refund policy and seeing if it corresponds with what you were told by their rep, before deciding if any follow-up action is necessary on its (apparent il-)legality.

In the mean time, issue a 'goods not received' chargeback via your bank to recover your money....

Hi, I got a charge back from my bank and the amount was refunded. Uber eats response was  to post the amount back onto my uber account as unpaid and owing.  If I log in, it shows a message saying I can't order from them until I pay the £33. I am totally fine with this as I would never order anything from them again anyway. Can I just close my account and forget about them? I'm bothered they might contact a collections agency and it will show up as an unpaid amount and affect my credit file / mortgage application etc thanks.

 Check that your card details are not saved or they'll just take it. 

hungry_hippo

marcia_ said:

hungry_hippo said:

eskbanker said:

I'd start by getting hold of their refund policy and seeing if it corresponds with what you were told by their rep, before deciding if any follow-up action is necessary on its (apparent il-)legality.

In the mean time, issue a 'goods not received' chargeback via your bank to recover your money....

Hi, I got a charge back from my bank and the amount was refunded. Uber eats response was  to post the amount back onto my uber account as unpaid and owing.  If I log in, it shows a message saying I can't order from them until I pay the £33. I am totally fine with this as I would never order anything from them again anyway. Can I just close my account and forget about them? I'm bothered they might contact a collections agency and it will show up as an unpaid amount and affect my credit file / mortgage application etc thanks.

 Check that your card details are not saved or they'll just take it. 

I've removed them thanks. Annoying thing is i can't use Uber the driving app now which I did use for convenience, and there's no alternatives in my area.  Maybe I can delete my account and sign up with a different email and card

Manxman_in_exile

@hungry_hippo -  I've never used Uber, I know nothing about them, I know nothing about their T&Cs.

But are you sure that their T&Cs/returns policy says:

hungry_hippo said:

... and it says all over their site that if a retailer cancels a non perishable order it will be refunded.  I don't understand what 48 hours means either?  If it was wrong, it's still wrong after 48hrs 72, hrs 114.5 hours....

I ask because that seems an odd thing to say.  If a trader cancels an order (whether perishable or non-perishable), of course you are entitled to a refund - no question about it - and the length of time makes absolutely no difference.  The only problem would be if you tried to cancel a perishable order, because the law basically says you can't do that.

Have you actually spoken to a real live human being in all of this?  If you haven't I wonder if perhaps you haven't explained very accurately what has actually happened as I can't imagine why, in the circumstances you describe, Uber should be so insistent that you owe them.

Have you put anything to them in "proper" writing?  ie a letter or full email and not some app using a text box that limits you to 128 characters or something.

I sometimes wonder whether in this sort of situation Uber are breaking GDPR rules by processing your personal information in such a way as to wrongly show you owe them money.  I wonder whether you could make a complaint to the ICO.  I'm not sure whether your first step should be to make a SAR application to Uber.  Unfortunately I know as little about GDPR as I do about Uber.

If you are really desperate to sort this out, I'm not sure I see a quick way out...

NB  -  a problem with a chargeback is that it has no legal authority behind it, and the fact your bank found in your favour initially means absolutely nothing.  Uber can still claim that you owe them the money.  In fact I'm a bit surprised that they haven't already just taken the money off your card.  They can still do that, and I suspect they could still do that even if you tried to cancel the card.  If that happens you'll have (to threaten) to sue them.

oldagetraveller1

Must be getting old, Corona used to be a soft drink. How dare someone use their name! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corona_(soft_drink)

hungry_hippo

Manxman_in_exile said:

@hungry_hippo -  I've never used Uber, I know nothing about them, I know nothing about their T&Cs.

But are you sure that their T&Cs/returns policy says:

hungry_hippo said:

... and it says all over their site that if a retailer cancels a non perishable order it will be refunded.  I don't understand what 48 hours means either?  If it was wrong, it's still wrong after 48hrs 72, hrs 114.5 hours....

I ask because that seems an odd thing to say.  If a trader cancels an order (whether perishable or non-perishable), of course you are entitled to a refund - no question about it - and the length of time makes absolutely no difference.  The only problem would be if you tried to cancel a perishable order, because the law basically says you can't do that.

Have you actually spoken to a real live human being in all of this?  If you haven't I wonder if perhaps you haven't explained very accurately what has actually happened as I can't imagine why, in the circumstances you describe, Uber should be so insistent that you owe them.

Have you put anything to them in "proper" writing?  ie a letter or full email and not some app using a text box that limits you to 128 characters or something.

I sometimes wonder whether in this sort of situation Uber are breaking GDPR rules by processing your personal information in such a way as to wrongly show you owe them money.  I wonder whether you could make a complaint to the ICO.  I'm not sure whether your first step should be to make a SAR application to Uber.  Unfortunately I know as little about GDPR as I do about Uber.

If you are really desperate to sort this out, I'm not sure I see a quick way out...

NB  -  a problem with a chargeback is that it has no legal authority behind it, and the fact your bank found in your favour initially means absolutely nothing.  Uber can still claim that you owe them the money.  In fact I'm a bit surprised that they haven't already just taken the money off your card.  They can still do that, and I suspect they could still do that even if you tried to cancel the card.  If that happens you'll have (to threaten) to sue them.

Hi

thanks for the reply.  I guess maybe if they just kept taking it and I kept charging it back you'd end up in a perpetual cycle, and it probably hurts their bank account for each chargeback.  Do you know if they could harm my credit file / mortgage through the amount they claim I owe them?  If it's possible it could affect my mortgage, I would probably just pay it even though it's wrong and I absolutely should not owe them, purely because of the risk to me of much greater harm from a dispute over a small amount of money

I explained it to them in Facebook chat, on the app in various messages and twitter (although I got no reply to twitter).  I'd phone them if I could find a number, I think they only have that for rider support in the UK. 

On Facebook chat someone definitely checked my order, but they just completely ignored everything I said and just replied they can't issue refunds on orders made over 48 hours ago.  That then became a blanket response for any of my follow-up questions / comments.  I have no idea why 48 hours.  The only thing I can think of is if I somehow accidentially cancelled the order without realising but I'm sure I didn't.  And even then, it was clearly never attempted to be delivered or sent out.
If  I log into my account, I can see the disputed, cancelled order for bottles of alcohol!

Screenshot from order history:  https://ibb.co/DL1sW5h