The Adversarial Consumer Society In Practice - Who's side are you on? Blog Discussion

martinpike

RufusA wrote:

Which "his email" Martin's or Mr Carvell's.

AFAIK Mr Carvell was referring to abuse aimed at staff over the phone. Martin was referring to positive feedback in relation to Viking that can be found on various threads over the months on the MSE forums.

HTH - Rufus.

Sorry - should have been clearer - Mr Carvells.

Poppy9

The first thing that struck me about Vikings email was the aggressive tone and use of swear word. While e-mails are a more informal way of corresponding you should always remember that they create an impression of a sender, are easily mass distributed and can remain in existence for ever.

Is Richard Carvell right to be annoyed with MSE's? I think not. It's his business, his customers and his responsibility.

He has built a sucessful company. He will have done this by knowing his market and how to target them. If he chooses to have generous introductory offers he should have weighed up the potential cost against the potential gains.

He does not have to accept any new customers at all. As frequently mentioned on this site (especially on the Argos 49p threads) an advert on a site is an invitation to treat. If he does not wish to accept an order then he is under no obligation to do so. If he refuses an offer, then he refuses to supply free bonus items. If he has not properly developed his systems/staff to recognise non new customers that is his look out.

His only valid point, if true, is that it's not acceptable to be overly rude to his call centre staff. However, as we all know it can be extremely frustrating dealing with impotent call centre staff who repeat from a script and have no authority to resolve geniune complaints.

With regard to MSE members who buy up excessive amounts of bargains to flog on ebay, it disappoints me but they are only doing what all potential business people do - exploiting an opportunity. I have more of an issue with them not paying income tax on their 'extra income' while most people have to hand over a quarter of all their income to the tax man. Getting one over on the tax man is fraud.

martinpike

Poppy9 wrote:

The first thing that struck me about Vikings email was the aggressive tone and use of swear word.

I thought he sounded a little sad actually.

Blimeytrousers_2

As someone who has to look after a number of staff, I applaud Mr. Carvell's attitude toward his staff. Anyone who has used an aggressive stance with a call centre operative may well be guilty of being a bully (personal opinion). I understand the frustration with dealing call centres and have to bite my tongue when forced to communicate with them but being abusive as the claim is here is just not on.

The jist of his email as someone has earlier stated is - there will always be people on the look out for a bargain and well done but you have cost me enough money now and I'm tightening up my policy.

The sad thing about this is that the more people take advantage of offers like Vikings and then extract the urine with muliple buys of misprices and multiple request for freebees then the more likely it is that people like Mr. Carvell will change their previous lax attitude of oh well it may gain me a few customers even if I lose out a bit.

Spotting and exploiting an opportunity is a sign of a successful man but it does not make it the right thing to do in my opinion. The greedier someone gets on things like this then the more it spoils it for someone who really could use a good bargain every now and again.

People should recognisse when they are getting a bargain and getting upset or even abusive with customer service people because they are making it difficult to get your bargain is wrong. If bargains were easy to get where would all the fun be?

I'm only new to MSE and there are some lovely people on the forums and it would be a shame if that reputation was to change.

Getting off soapbox now and prepared to have tomatoes thrown at me.

stratford_2

Have to say I agree with Mr Carvell - there's nothing wrong with the punter getting one over the large corporations, who can withstand it. But, there have been a number of threads where people who are clearly extremely greedy who get on their high horse when they don't get a high value product for virtually nothing, especially when the terms they agreed to before 'purchase' cover the seller from a misprice - the 49p argos telly is the most recent example.

I've also seen people try to exploit small businesses who made a mistake on their website (e.g. a small company who printed t-shirts) and get shirty (pun intended) when they don't get the dozens of almost freebies. Work with your own moral code, but don't be surprised if others thing you are greedy, selfish and potentially occaisionally depriving some people of their livelyhood.

Stumpy

In this case, the consumer. This offer wasn't a mistake, and Viking quite often have special offers on so they should know how to manage them. The only mistake made was not being clearer, and stricter, with the requirements of the offer, ie, only being allowed the paper if it was your second purchase, etc.

Obviously, there is no excuse for being rude to the customer service people, however, I had noted a few times in the Viking thread that the customer services people had accused potential customers of "abusing the system" and indeed the lady that I spoke to was a tadge stroppy as well - it works both ways. It didn't help that every CS rep seemed to have a different story and some people were getting the products with no problem and others were refused point blank.

There has been similar problems in other companies I have dealt with - Tesco to name one - every member of staff seems to have their own idea what the rules are, instead of there being an overall "standard" being set.

So in my opinion, it is down to the company concerned to (a) look at the broad picture of exactly what they're offering and what restrictions they're placing on the offer, and (b) ensure the staff are fully appraised of these restrictions/conditions.

JasonLVC

I've no issue with Mr Carvell's use of language in the email, he comes across as a straight, ordinary guy telling as he sees it. I'd be saying the exact same thing myself to be honest. I see the content as just trying to be straight about the whole thing, rather than the usual corporate mumbo jumbo 'not our responsibility, blah, blah, legal rights, blah blah' so fair play to him.

I guess the problem with some MSE's are that they just don't know the law or understand business and so sit there and judge without truly knowing the score. As if Argos were going to sell TV's for 49p, nice try if you can get it but legally not a leg to stand on. If you're going to shout at call centre staff, at least understand the legal and business implications first. B&Q is a different matter altogether, as was the original Kodak mis-price many years ago.

I've not posted many bargains on this forum, primarily as someone usually get's there before me and I've posted a few on another web forum and I'll continue to do so.

I don't agree with people ebaying stuff to be honest. If you want to be in business then set up as one and be legitimate. Ebay is over-rated in my book and it is now mostly populated by people running entire businesses (power sellers, etc) from it (probably while still holding down a job or claiming benefits) where you have even less rights as a buyer.

So you have the situation where someone exploits a legitimate business which has legal obligations to uphold and the extra costs that incurs, who then sells it on ebay to some fool who probably pays over the normal anyway to someone who receives the cash into their PayPal account and the worst that can happen is that you get a bad comment against you and the whole problem of emailing Paypall, disputing with ebay, etc.

And then some poeple have the cheek to say a company is being immoral by not selling them something at below cost (and are only annoyed as they themselves were going to rip-off some unsuspecting person on ebay). Like they'd buy 50 DVD's and sell them for just a a few pounds more than they bought them for - I dont' think so.

bs7

Sure I know some people will take the !!!!!! and cherry pick the very cheapest items

I’m very trusting and don’t put restrictive conditions on the offers.

Actually one could argue that it is common sense and purely an economic decision. Furthermore, Mr Carvell is slightly economical with the truth Viking Direct have the ability to place restrictions on such "freebies". In the past they have included a maximum of 2 promotional items per order, minimum order values, being required to phone to order a promotional item, or other such conditions - such as the 9p per ream of paper promotion which it would seem should only be available as one's second order.

Far from no 'restrictive conditions' Viking Direct have used them when it's suited them. They can, of course, place these conditions on the 'freebies' whenever they want. They've chosen not to make such conditions more restrictive and that's their choice - but in making that choice they cannot complain about people 'cherry picking' as they have the system set up to stop it.

Clearly, Viking Direct are profiting from it (even with the 'p!ss takers') or would have stopped such offers. Therefore, any complaints about 'greed' are misplaced and serve only to increase Viking Direct's profits.

If Mr Carvell's staff are in "tears" perhaps the staff should receive better training on how to deal with agressive customers or policies should be put in place to better protect them. I'm not for a second suggesting such phone calls are acceptable but i think most companies will accept they are common place and simply one of these things. It might also be advisable to have clear terms and conditions governing these offers and have a coherent policy.

Furthermore, no matter what is said Viking Direct have had an incredible amount of free advertising and custom as a direct result of this site. Although some will potentially result in a loss, other customers will result in a massive profit for them (and lets be honest their prices are seldom groundbreaking). HOWEVER, because of Martin's policy on no affiliated links in the forum Viking Direct have saved themselves between 5 - 8.5% of net sales - the commission that would have been paid and is paid to affiliates (through TradeDoubler, for example).

elvis_bloggs

When I ordered my 9 pence a ream paper and free radio I never once mentioned MSE......so.......I'm not to blame for that e-mail, not guilty m'lud.

Cat72

I think it is nice to hear from him and is good that he wrote, I dont mind his language thatis common day usage and heck good on him he sounds genuine.
Personally I did take advantage of the viking offer and have now became a viking customer throught them.By ordering the free cd and paper i was VERY impressed by their speedy service and have now decided, and have done so, order my stationary from them.
I agree their are VERY greedy people who totally misuse the systems and I hate to see someone ordering 80 CDs , tvs etc as it shows litle regard for others being able to take advantage of the offer.It also highlights their selfishness, which to me goes against what these boards are about.To me these boards are about a community spirit .People come together helping to get bargains,save money and offer advice. I think its brilliant to have that in this fast paced world were we hardly know our neighbours and shows what great people we are.
As for abuse that is never deserved ,but i agree with the other op who stated that a lot of time staff have different views of what offers actually are. Companies should take the time to have a 30 minute discussion time ( over tea and biscuits ) with staff to inform them of the offers and how they are to be applied. If people become abusive hang up - no one deserves abuse from anyone and just feel sorry for the sad git on the other end of the phone who feels thay have to get all wound up for cheap paper. :eek: