Poundstretcher rip off ?

35har1old

Barrie99999 said:

With the gardening season soon to get going again I need to stock up on plant food, I usually use Miracle Grow All purpose so looked to see if anyone had it of offer. I looked at the offers page on the Poundstretcher web site and 1kg Miracle Grow plant food advertised in their sale listing for Now £9.50 , The R.R.P for this product is £7.99 and being sold for £6.99 at B&M £6.99 at The Range and £7.65 at B&Q.. Stretching £7.99 to £9.50 and claiming it was discounted is quite a stretch. I emailed them for an explanation and received a response.............................

" You have 1kg Miracle Grow plant food advertised in your sale listing for Now £9.50 , what was it before the claimed reduction ? The R.R.P for this product is £7.99 and being sold for £6.99 at B&M £6.99 at The Range and £7.65 at B&Q."
I received a reply........................

"Good morning,
Thank you for contacting customer service and we are very sorry to hear that you are unhappy with our prices.
Unfortunately, due to inflation and continually increasing prices from our suppliers and freight costs we are forced to increase costs on many of our products.
We do try to hold our prices and keep them as low as possible for our customers as we appreciate the disappointment in the change in prices, however on many occasions we are simply unable to hold our prices.
We apologise for any inconvenience and hope you can continue to enjoy visiting our stores.
Kind regards,
Emma|Customer Service"

The stench of  in that reply required a response.

"Thank you for the reply Emma but you failed to tell me what you were selling this product for before it was discounted let alone why even after the supposed discount it is still nearly 20% above R.R.P. The three companies I mentioned in my last e.mail are all also subject to the same inflation and rising costs as Poundstretcher but price this product below the R.R.P which has increased from last year."

They have not responded again. Have they grossly overpriced this product in order to later reduce it to R.R.P. and claim it is a great bargain? If you read this Martin maybe you can get a straight answer from them.

If you think that's a rip of check out Amazon

Barrie99999

35har1old said:

Barrie99999 said:

With the gardening season soon to get going again I need to stock up on plant food, I usually use Miracle Grow All purpose so looked to see if anyone had it of offer. I looked at the offers page on the Poundstretcher web site and 1kg Miracle Grow plant food advertised in their sale listing for Now £9.50 , The R.R.P for this product is £7.99 and being sold for £6.99 at B&M £6.99 at The Range and £7.65 at B&Q.. Stretching £7.99 to £9.50 and claiming it was discounted is quite a stretch. I emailed them for an explanation and received a response.............................

" You have 1kg Miracle Grow plant food advertised in your sale listing for Now £9.50 , what was it before the claimed reduction ? The R.R.P for this product is £7.99 and being sold for £6.99 at B&M £6.99 at The Range and £7.65 at B&Q."
I received a reply........................

"Good morning,
Thank you for contacting customer service and we are very sorry to hear that you are unhappy with our prices.
Unfortunately, due to inflation and continually increasing prices from our suppliers and freight costs we are forced to increase costs on many of our products.
We do try to hold our prices and keep them as low as possible for our customers as we appreciate the disappointment in the change in prices, however on many occasions we are simply unable to hold our prices.
We apologise for any inconvenience and hope you can continue to enjoy visiting our stores.
Kind regards,
Emma|Customer Service"

The stench of  in that reply required a response.

"Thank you for the reply Emma but you failed to tell me what you were selling this product for before it was discounted let alone why even after the supposed discount it is still nearly 20% above R.R.P. The three companies I mentioned in my last e.mail are all also subject to the same inflation and rising costs as Poundstretcher but price this product below the R.R.P which has increased from last year."

They have not responded again. Have they grossly overpriced this product in order to later reduce it to R.R.P. and claim it is a great bargain? If you read this Martin maybe you can get a straight answer from them.

If you think that's a rip of check out Amazon

The Miracle Grow website gives a buying link to Amazon and that was only £6.99. 

Marvel1

Service stops petrol prices and service stop prices altogether - what are you thoughts? Write to them and ask why?

35har1old

Barrie99999 said:

35har1old said:

Barrie99999 said:

With the gardening season soon to get going again I need to stock up on plant food, I usually use Miracle Grow All purpose so looked to see if anyone had it of offer. I looked at the offers page on the Poundstretcher web site and 1kg Miracle Grow plant food advertised in their sale listing for Now £9.50 , The R.R.P for this product is £7.99 and being sold for £6.99 at B&M £6.99 at The Range and £7.65 at B&Q.. Stretching £7.99 to £9.50 and claiming it was discounted is quite a stretch. I emailed them for an explanation and received a response.............................

" You have 1kg Miracle Grow plant food advertised in your sale listing for Now £9.50 , what was it before the claimed reduction ? The R.R.P for this product is £7.99 and being sold for £6.99 at B&M £6.99 at The Range and £7.65 at B&Q."
I received a reply........................

"Good morning,
Thank you for contacting customer service and we are very sorry to hear that you are unhappy with our prices.
Unfortunately, due to inflation and continually increasing prices from our suppliers and freight costs we are forced to increase costs on many of our products.
We do try to hold our prices and keep them as low as possible for our customers as we appreciate the disappointment in the change in prices, however on many occasions we are simply unable to hold our prices.
We apologise for any inconvenience and hope you can continue to enjoy visiting our stores.
Kind regards,
Emma|Customer Service"

The stench of  in that reply required a response.

"Thank you for the reply Emma but you failed to tell me what you were selling this product for before it was discounted let alone why even after the supposed discount it is still nearly 20% above R.R.P. The three companies I mentioned in my last e.mail are all also subject to the same inflation and rising costs as Poundstretcher but price this product below the R.R.P which has increased from last year."

They have not responded again. Have they grossly overpriced this product in order to later reduce it to R.R.P. and claim it is a great bargain? If you read this Martin maybe you can get a straight answer from them.

If you think that's a rip of check out Amazon

The Miracle Grow website gives a buying link to Amazon and that was only £6.99. 

If you type in Miracle Grow on the Amazon site first supplier states a price of £14.47 for 500g and there's only 14 left in stock

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

CliveOfIndia said:

Secondly, if the advert says "Now priced at £9.50" that a true statement - they are selling it now at that price.  

GrubbyGirl_2 said:

Now £9.50 doesn't mean it's discounted and checking the web site there is no mention at all that it's been discounted.  It could have been £6.99 before and it's NOW gone up to £9.50.  

This is where our old friend the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations (CPRs) comes in to play.

Omitted information can be misleading even if what is stated is factually correct. 

Actions can be misleading "if it or its overall presentation in any way deceives or is likely to deceive the average consumer in relation to any of the matters in that paragraph, even if the information is factually correct".

So, whilst probably being far more pedantic than Clive, if we look at the purpose of the word "Now", no retailers are telling their customers the price of stuff yesterday or tomorrow (unless making a comparison) and it's a given that the price on the shelf (or whatever) is what you are going to pay now so the use of the word "Now" here implies the price is positive and IMHO the average person would take the presentation to mean it was more than £9.50 in the past.

That may well not be what Poundstretcher mean but the CPRs are looking at the interpretation made by the average consumer, rather than what the trader meant (otherwise the regs would be mostly pointless). 

The odds of anything being done about it are next to none, in terms of the OP's time, we're here answering their post, that's pretty much of equal value to OP contacting Poundstretcher with their questions, life is relative