Unfortunately, this discussion is no longer valid
Since September I have made several orders every 2 weeks with the colleague discount applied. The discount is applied not when you place the online order, but when it arrives from the store to you and will be shown on the receipt it comes with. I have used my colleague discount for several online orders since September but it has been applied to none of them. The first time it happened I contacted customer service by email with that and another problem with the order, they ignored the problem with the colleague discount and instead only addressed the other problem with my order.
I decided to contact customer service again specifically about this, and they have redirected me to HR, telling me there must be some problem with my card. HR then redirected me to customer service. So I told customer service that HR told me there's nothing they can do, there shouldn't be any problem with my card if it has been successfully linked to my account. Customer service then gave me a voucher for my most recent order and wrote "Thanks for responding to our email. I'm afraid we would only be able to apply the discount for the last order as this is the first we've been notified regarding the issue."
So they've acknowledged their error in failing to apply the colleague discount to all of my previous orders, but don't want to do anything about it because "this is the first we've been notified". I don't get how it being the first order they were notified of with this mistake should prevent them from doing anything about the past orders. What relevance does a successive order have on the problems of the last? Why is that important? It doesn't make sense. It seems to me they've just made up some arbitrary rule so they don't have to correct their mistake. You can't overcharge someone and play the "too late" card, that's not how consumer rights work, especially when those orders were placed in the last weeks/months not years.
As mentioned earlier, I did contact them the first time it happened and they did nothing about it, I will forward them that mail. But I have a feeling they'll mess me about even more by inventing another arbitrary rule like "we'll only compensate you for each time you contacted us about a problem before you placed a new order" just so they don't have to do anything about the rest of the orders.
The scummyness is bewildering, wherever they could fob me off they did. How do I best articulate/put into words a response that presents how unreasonable and unfair they're being and holds them to account in such a way that they have to correct their mistake and issue a refund for the overcharge on all the orders?
I decided to contact customer service again specifically about this, and they have redirected me to HR, telling me there must be some problem with my card. HR then redirected me to customer service. So I told customer service that HR told me there's nothing they can do, there shouldn't be any problem with my card if it has been successfully linked to my account. Customer service then gave me a voucher for my most recent order and wrote "Thanks for responding to our email. I'm afraid we would only be able to apply the discount for the last order as this is the first we've been notified regarding the issue."
So they've acknowledged their error in failing to apply the colleague discount to all of my previous orders, but don't want to do anything about it because "this is the first we've been notified". I don't get how it being the first order they were notified of with this mistake should prevent them from doing anything about the past orders. What relevance does a successive order have on the problems of the last? Why is that important? It doesn't make sense. It seems to me they've just made up some arbitrary rule so they don't have to correct their mistake. You can't overcharge someone and play the "too late" card, that's not how consumer rights work, especially when those orders were placed in the last weeks/months not years.
As mentioned earlier, I did contact them the first time it happened and they did nothing about it, I will forward them that mail. But I have a feeling they'll mess me about even more by inventing another arbitrary rule like "we'll only compensate you for each time you contacted us about a problem before you placed a new order" just so they don't have to do anything about the rest of the orders.
The scummyness is bewildering, wherever they could fob me off they did. How do I best articulate/put into words a response that presents how unreasonable and unfair they're being and holds them to account in such a way that they have to correct their mistake and issue a refund for the overcharge on all the orders?
Share with Messenger
12 Comments
sorted bySo, to summarise: User error!
This is something you need to take up with them, but unless you have been contacting them on every occasion and making it clear there is an issue with your discount applying then its really up to your employer and the rules they have in place regarding staff discounts.
Itemise every transaction since September where you should have received discount. Provide details of the amounts paid and how much you should have paid. Provide details of your first complaint and your recent one where they acknowledge they were in the wrong.
Establish whether the amount you are owed is worth fighting for. If so, present your case in a very cool manner.
Copy your case to your Line Manager and HR if you think appropriate.
I apologise for any offence caused but you need to take the emotion out of it and look at the actual issue.
What does your employee handbook say about discounts not appying to online orders, and how to resolve issues?
If the discount is not comming off automatically and does this on every order there is obviously an issue and it would be your employers issue to resolve this. Sainsburys customer service is outsourced (i dont know if it all is or part of it) and people working in an outsourcers don't know about staff discounts and will only work to what Sainsburys head office advices them.
In this case you need to find out what your employers rules are against discounts not applying to online orders, and if they can be backdated and to look into why your discount is not applying to your orders.
I work for Tesco , we have a limit a year for staff discount, worth checking if you have also working for sainbury . We also think there’s an error as some have use there allowance up already which is odd! But it’s easily done.
Shouldn’t matter though for online or instore for staff though