[TEXT DELETED BY FORUM TEAM] "Shopper Discount & Rewards"

NonGeographicalMan

CFI wrote: »

If you run into any problems, please contact us at Consumer Focus on [EMAIL="investigations@consumerfocus.org.uk"]investigations@consumerfocus.org.uk[/EMAIL].

Consumer Focus (see https://www.consumerfocus.org.uk for those not aware who Consumer Focus are or what they are meant to be doing with government money on the consumer's behalf along with their even more useless New Labour created sidekicks Consumer Direct, who removed the public's right to directly contact the far more effecting trading standards departments run by local councils) it is simply not good enough that you and the OFT allow SD & R and Adaptive Affinity to continue to run this lonstanding scam when their methods quite clearly involve a large number of violations of trading standards law and ASA advertising regulations. There is clearly massive consumer detriment given both the hundreds of thousands of consumers involved, the amount of money being lost per consumer and the most basic point that the services that these people claim to offer essentially don't exist and are worthless. So sleepy are the ASA, Consumer Focus and the OFT collective over this issue that Adaptive Affinity even managed to start running television advertisements for their fellow scam brand Credit Rating Matters on UK daytime television for several months (especially on the more minor Freeview and Freesat channels where the cost per ad is much cheaper).

The basic method used by Adaptive Affinity of saying "don't miss out on £15 cashback off this purchase" on the website of an apparently reputable company (Ryanair clearly excepted since surely nobody now believes they trade fairly or honestly or that Michael O'Leary would not stoop to almost any despicable trading practice to increase his profits) and then these websites (not Adaptive Affinity itself) sending further emails to customers who don't sign up on the website when they make the initial purchase saying don't miss your £15 back on your last purchase are truly shocking and basically totally dishonest. If you do give in to their blandishments to sign up and they grab your card details you never hear from Rewards First (the main Adapative Affinity scam brand) again. In particular no welcome email with your membership number which you are required to have in order to meet the terms and conditions of the £15 cashback where you have to send in proof of your purchased within 30 days. Indeed no further communication ever again from them while they silently taking your money (no monthly email before each payment etc is sent) for something you are supposed to be a member of and that is allegedly providing a service!

There is something very wrong with the OFT and Consumer Focus if they spend most of their time worrying about cartels on high fashion designer sunglasses prices or private school fees paid by the relatively well off but they don't aggressively deal with old fashioned basic confidence trickery of this kind. Adapative Affinity and S D & R are completely shameless and incorrigible and will only desist at the point of criminal charges or a major civil group action but the ASA, OFT and Consumer Focus should be able to stop the scam by targeting their mainly more reputable business partners running large well known and apparently reputable websites where they manage to harvest most of their victims.

Consumer Focus it is not good enough for you to make a minor effort here (only three years too late) to help more rights aware customers go through all the hassle of getting their money back. Instead you, the OFT and the ASA should be taking active and aggressive steps to stop this major consumer detriment from happening.

The total consumer harm of this scam to legitimate internet businesses cannot be overestimated. For instance I learned more recently that my mother also fell victim to this scam some while ago as a result of which she will not believe me that sites such as www.topcashback.co.uk and www.quidco.com are reputable and do offer the service that they claim to offer. So the business of other reputable cashback firms is being actively harmed by these deliberately unscrupulous toerags who would undoubtedly quite happily be selling cocaine and heroine instead to earn a living if it was not currently a serious criminal offence. :eek::mad::mad::mad:

wary

Alas it is true that the regulatory bodies set up to protect us consumers are very weak, and I've often got the impression that key to their decision making is the fact that taking the do-nothing option usually makes their job easier.

Twig_the_wonderkid

Just clicked on a "save £20 on your next order at Ebuyer". I entered no details while I looked up Rewards First and found this thread. Closed their page and now hoping they can't get to me through Paypal.

richie2837

Discovered last night a debit to SHopperDisc on our bank account. Neither my wife or I had the faintest clue what it was, so looked back through statements, and there it was every month - more fool us for not being more vigilant checking our account. Even more fool us when Googling led us to this forum (and many more sites) all warning of the obvious and blatant scam. I emailed them last night ordering them to immediately cancel "subscription" and refund all money owed - this morning they have confirmed the membership has been cancelled and will refund £30 membership charges (whatever they are) but that I will need to complete an online form to request the rest of my money - which it turns out has been taken from our account since January 2010! As a result of buying something from MyMemory and thinking the pop-up box at the end of the transaction would reduce the immediate cost of my purchase. So they have had close to £250 from us, we have had nothing from them (including any email mentioning membership), and now we have to go cap-in-hand to ask them to be kind and refund our money? What an insane world we live in.

I've emailed MyMemory informing them they have permanently lost my custom, but why in the name of all that's sane are legitimate businesses affiliating themselves with this bunch of confidence tricksters?

And why haven't Shopper Discounts and Rewards been taken to court yet for this blatant rip-off??!

jfk_2

Just found out by accident that I've been hit by these scammers too. 8 months worth of £10/month, just enough to keep under the radar. I note that their parent company, webloyalty inc in the USA has featured in a number of TV consumer programmes there - several can be seen on youtube.

I've had £30 back from them today within literally minutes of emailing them. Had to send a ***** FAX in to request the rest. Who uses fax these days for heaven's sake?

!!!!!! are the OFT and TSA doing? Outrageous.

I've also sent a long complaint to Williams and Brown, who hosted the site which contained the offending SDR popup.

Steve_xx

richie2837 wrote: »

Discovered last night a debit to SHopperDisc on our bank account. Neither my wife or I had the faintest clue what it was, so looked back through statements, and there it was every month - more fool us for not being more vigilant checking our account. Even more fool us when Googling led us to this forum (and many more sites) all warning of the obvious and blatant scam. I emailed them last night ordering them to immediately cancel "subscription" and refund all money owed - this morning they have confirmed the membership has been cancelled and will refund £30 membership charges (whatever they are) but that I will need to complete an online form to request the rest of my money - which it turns out has been taken from our account since January 2010! As a result of buying something from MyMemory and thinking the pop-up box at the end of the transaction would reduce the immediate cost of my purchase. So they have had close to £250 from us, we have had nothing from them (including any email mentioning membership), and now we have to go cap-in-hand to ask them to be kind and refund our money? What an insane world we live in.

I've emailed MyMemory informing them they have permanently lost my custom, but why in the name of all that's sane are legitimate businesses affiliating themselves with this bunch of confidence tricksters?

And why haven't Shopper Discounts and Rewards been taken to court yet for this blatant rip-off??!

Fill in the form they asked you to, regarding the remaining payments and they seem to refund without fuss.

It is truly frightening that this sort of thing is happening and even more worrying that it is to date, allowed to continue.

Steve_xx

jfk wrote: »

Just found out by accident that I've been hit by these scammers too. 8 months worth of £10/month, just enough to keep under the radar. I note that their parent company, webloyalty inc in the USA has featured in a number of TV consumer programmes there - several can be seen on youtube.

I've had £30 back from them today within literally minutes of emailing them. Had to send a ***** FAX in to request the rest. Who uses fax these days for heaven's sake?

!!!!!! are the OFT and TSA doing? Outrageous.

I've also sent a long complaint to Williams and Brown, who hosted the site which contained the offending SDR popup.

You can send the request by post or fax it. For my sister I faxed it and the whole thing was sorted out within a couple of days. So, if possible I would advise you to fax if you possibly can.

jrme

Dear All,

We too have been caught out by these rogues to the tune of £70. I contacted them yesterday and thanks to this forum I demanded my money back. They are going to refund the £30 and then I've filled in their poxy form for the rest......the form doesn't even have space for you to give a reason for them to consider why they should give you a refund,so they better not say no! I have looked at this forum and several others online and am shocked that this company is still operating and nothing has been done. I have just contacted Watchdog because at the very least I think the wider public should be aware, especially in this current economic situation where people are after discounts and bargains. Hopefully they will run a story!!

kriptich

Dear MSE people

With horror I am rapidly finding out about the world of adaptive affinity and to my cost I have not noticed that they have over £700 of my money since June 2010. I am most embarrassed at not noticing this but these were small sums in a very busy bank account.

With the help from MSE forums we are on a quest to reclaim my funds. There are plenty of posts showing how they have refunded people and we will not be deterred.

Does anyone have a failsafe method of wording their letters to these sharks to achieve maximum results with least effort. I really feel like making them feel most pain possible but I also want my refund.

Any simple advice out there?

Will keep the form posted as we go along

kriptich

Steve_xx

kriptich wrote: »

Dear MSE people

With horror I am rapidly finding out about the world of adaptive affinity and to my cost I have not noticed that they have over £700 of my money since June 2010. I am most embarrassed at not noticing this but these were small sums in a very busy bank account.

With the help from MSE forums we are on a quest to reclaim my funds. There are plenty of posts showing how they have refunded people and we will not be deterred.

Does anyone have a failsafe method of wording their letters to these sharks to achieve maximum results with least effort. I really feel like making them feel most pain possible but I also want my refund.


Any simple advice out there?

Will keep the form posted as we go along

kriptich

When you complain they will offer to refund 3 months worth. You then tell them that you want more. They point you in the direction of their online "additional refund" form which they ask you to complete and send or fax. I faxed my sisters, and they made refunds of all of the monies paid.

It actually isn't that difficult to get them to refund. However, I did attach a letter thanking them for their 3 months worth of refunds and telling them that it was totally unacceptable and that I required them to refund the lot.