Won Spa Day with Virgin trains -NOT

LindaS

got a second email from Virgin:
So sorry, we’ve sent you an email by mistake.

The email you have just received about a Virgin Trains event at The Grove was a test email and was not supposed to be sent to any of our customers.

We realise that we might have got you all excited about the prospect of a day at The Grove, and would like to offer you the chance to win one of three places at this event.

We’ve put your name into a prize draw for you and a guest to attend our event on the 28 May 2008. For full details of this prize draw please check the terms and conditions below.

We’ll be in touch on 12 May if you are one of the three lucky winners.

Yours sincerely,

Natalie Aitken
Traveller Manager

RocketMan

Same thing happened to me, there was an article in the Metro this morning about it as well, so it must have happened to rather a lot of people.

Fingers crossed now for the prize draw

QQuaver

Me too, when I clicked on the link, it was sent to details of the event and everything. To book, I needed my "Traveller" account number - which I don't have ofcourse:D
I thought it was junk mail right from the beginning though, don't remember entering this comp:p

hayleyw1

ohh thats so spitefull!

panchenlama

Hi all,

I'm new to this site so apologies if I miss protocol etc...

I too had an email saying I won the spa day and then found out that I didn't. I was not happy with this and looked into it. Now, before I go on to explain things here I should point out that I work in information management and have a good uinderstanding of the data protection act and its principles.

Virgin trains use (d) an outsourcer to manage its customer data to some extent and this company (so I was told) were setting up the system to manage the competition. To test if it worked some bright spark decided to send a test message to virgin staff but used the wrong data i.e. all of the client database (circa 79,000 user email addresses). there's abit more to it but that's the essesnce.

what has happened here is that they have used live data in a test environment and this is contrary to good data management practices and potentially contrary to the data protection act. the important thing here is that they have used my (our) data for purposes other than which it was intended for and contraray to my (our) wishes. Or to put it another way they have provided ineffective controls to my (our) data which has led to this error.

more significantly this highlights a poor segregation of data from test envrionments and Virgin and its suppleirs have benn, in my opinion, negligent in its controls and in its protection of my personal data.

I complianed about this to Virgin and explained that if I did not get satisfaction I would be complianing to the Information Comissioners Office (see here how to complain: http://www.ico.gov.uk/complaints.aspx ).

needless to say Virgin made a bad situation very much worse and did not call me back, did not handle my call well etc etc.

so to cut a long story short I have complained to thier head office and will be complaining to the info comissioners office to ask them to investigate how Virgin and its oursources manage my data and whether they have used my personal data without my permission. I feel that as good data management is becoming so important it is vital that errors such as this are exposed before they become more serious, after all they have my credit card details etc from ticket purchases and what happens if they happen to share taht info in error or use it to test ineffective processes.

I would encourage you all to complain and ask for either the spa day or permission to book one yourself and claim the cost back. I do not consider this unreasonable bearing in mind thier error. I have asked for this and it is being considered.

please let me know if you would like a pro forma complain letter and I'll post one.

A good contact in thier complaint centre is Nick on 01225354215. I have been dealing with him and he has been channelling into Virgin head office for me.

Good luck and don;t give up on this one.

brook_son

oh what a shame - that must be so annoying.