Last year the vehicle tyre supplier BlackCircles.com was running the offer of an MOT for £5 (via rebate) for anyone who bought particular types of tyre from them. As a result of this offer I felt it was worth giving them a shot as a supplier, as the offer seemed pretty good. I bought two tyres for a total cost of £416.86 (Yes that really is a reasonable price for what they were!) for fitting at a local centre.
All good so far. I had the tyres fitted and then booked the MOT expecting to receive the appropriate documentation for the MOT voucher immediately afterwards. Unfortunately this didn't happen.
SXA> I had my tyres fited on Wednesday., According to your page at
SXA> the MOT voucher code will "be sent 1 working day after your fitting
SXA> has been completed or delivery has been received"
SXA> Given that it is now Friday, and I've got the MOT booked for Monday
SXA> (based on the timescales in those T&Cs), can you clarify when I
SXA> can get my code please?
BC> Thank you for your email.
BC> Please confirm your Blackcircles Order number and we will look into this for you.
I gave them the number, and ultimately I ended up having a phone conversation with them where it became apparent that the order had gone through without the MOT offer being applied. Not a good start, and I had definately selected that open when putting the order in - I remember it being on the web form and given that this is why I was choosing to use them I was careful about applying it, so my attempt to take advantage of the MOT offer had got mysteriously lost.. They then put it through the system again with a different order number (same as my original with an 'A' suffix) and my offer voucher came through. Fortunately despite the assistant on the phone being unable to give any assurances that it would or that they'd be able to help if it got delayed, it did come through in time for the MOT.
Not the best start to my first dealings with BlackCircles, but we're back on track. It's worth pointing out that during the time between me getting the MOT done and sending in the documentation I recommended BlackCircles to a colleague and they also had exactly the same problem as I had above with the order not going through correctly with the MOT offer and had to make the same phone call I did. So something in their system seemed already keen to catch you out... Plus the initial requirement to register the voucher before the MOT also appears to have caught some people out too:
£600 spent on tyres at http://t.co/XKbA8xOWaS. Won't honour my MOT for a fiver as I didn't read small print to "register". #tyres
— Charlie Lambert (@charlielambert7) July 18, 2013
I got the MOT done, and then made the mistake for a number of reasons of delaying before I sent in the documentation. I thought it was within four weeks but on submission it appears not.
BC> Thank you for your claim in our MOT for £5 promotion.
BC> Unfortunately we are unable to process it for the following reason:
BC> Unfortunately we are unable to process it for the following reason:
BC> - Your claim was received later than 28 days from the MOT date.
BC> May we take this opportunity to thank you for your interest in our offer.BC> For further information or questions regarding this promotion please email motoffer@blackcircles.com.
Now I have to believe that they did receive it later, but let's bear something in mind here. This was my first order with BlackCircles. The offer was valid for an MOT up to a year after the promotion started and therefore the money for the offer would have been pre-allocated for those who took advantage of it (subject to anyone who didn't object to their order not going through properly in the first place as I described above). This experience defines my view of the company, and logically that artificial limitation didn't make a lot of sense. On that basis I tried to reason with them with a bit of common sense.
SXA> I think this is a very disappointing response to have received. I made the decision
SXA> to try BlackCircles over the other providers in part because of the MOT offer (and
SXA> from some other recommendations) and a decision to enforce an entirely arbitrary
SXA> 28-day limit (I thought I had sent it back within that timeframe, but perhaps not)
SXA> appears to be purely for the purpose of trying to give any excuse not to honour the
SXA> offer. This feeling is backed up by the fact that the MOT offer got missed from my
SXA> original order. I definitely selected it, and a colleague subsequently had EXACTLY
SXA> the same problem when placing an order after I recommended you to them - both of
SXA> us had the order resubmitted with an 'A' suffix on the number after calling up to
SXA> complain. As mentioned this feels like it is an attempt to avoid honouring the offer
SXA> because it required both of us to call to complain about it. I almost missed getting
SXA> the email with the redemption details before my MOT was due because of this
SXA> delay - fortunately it came through on the day the MOT was booked for.
SXA>
SXA> Regardless of whether this offer was administered by BlackCircles or (as it seems)
SXA> a third party, this decision to use various unnecessary tactics in order to provide
SXA> reasons not to fulfil an offer reflects badly on BlackCircles as a service provider.
SXA> As someone who works on a site with around 3000 people I was hoping to
SXA> recommend BlackCircles and the local fitter to send more business your way but I
SXA> can no longer do that, and will have no reasonable choice but to returning to an
SXA> alternative supplier for my subsequent tyre needs based on the service I have
SXA> received regarding this offer.
That email sent to their address at diss.net bounced:
> This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.
>
> Delivery to the following recipients failed.
>
> blackcirclespromotions@diss.
>
> Delivery to the following recipients failed.
>
> blackcirclespromotions@diss.
I forwarded it to another address, let them know it had bounced and got this reply:
BC> Thank you for your email regarding the ‘MOT For a Fiver’ promotion.
BC>
BC> While we understand your frustration the terms and conditions are set out so
BC> that the promotion is fair to everyone. There has to be a cut off date so that
BC> the promotion doesn’t run indefinitely, we believe that 28 days is sufficient
BC> time for a consumer to send in the documents requested.
BC> As you your MOT receipt is dated 22/04/2013 you would have had until
BC> 20/05/2013 to make your claim.
BC> Unfortunately we didn’t receive your claim 29/05/2013 and as such the claim
BC> has been deemed invalid.
BC>
BC> We apologise for any inconvenience caused.
So they're sticking to the T&Cs although their assertion that "There has to be a cut off date" makes little sense - there is a one year cut off date for the offer already so this restriction is artificial other than to catch people out.
SXA> Your logic surprises me. While I completely understand the need to have an end date
SXA> on the promotion "to ensure that it does not run indefinitely", the same doesn't really
SXA> apply to the date from the MOT taking place. It should make no difference to you when
SXA> the MOT takes place, only that it is redeemed within a year (Or a year + 28 days). In
SXA> fact since the redemption money has presumable been reserved in advance, it is
SXA> actually better for you if people delay the claim as you can sit on the interest in the
SXA> time before redemption.
SXA>
SXA> By enforcing this seemingly pointless clause within your agreement with BlackCircles,
SXA> as well as failing to put the offer on the original order despite it being selected, you
SXA> have damaged the company's reputation in my eyes and ensured I will not deal with
SXA> BlackCircles again.
So there you have it - unmoving adherence to a pointless condition and trying to "miss out" on including the offer on the initial order for both myself and the first (and last) friend I recommended them to earns BlackCircles a place in my customer experience hall of shame. I'm sure there are people who would say "It's your own fault for not sticking to the T&C" and that's technically true. But I object to T&Cs which service no real purpose other than to catch their customers out - how does that help the company? Are they really getting more benefit from new customers who come in and manage to use the offer than the negativity from people who have my experience? Has it been positive for their business overall?
During the above exchange I received an email outside the thread acknowledging the initial problems with the offer:
Summary: I had to push for them to honour the offer initially, and I took advantage of it within the year - a reasonable condition. But trying to pretend that the 28 day condition is something that "There has to be" is nonsense, so they've lost any future business from me. It doesn't matter if the promotion is "administered by a third party" - I made the order through BlackCircles, and any problems with it reflect badly on them, and no-one else, from a customer perspective. I wonder if BlackCirtcles will reveal how many people in total who tried to take advantage of the offer ultimately weren't able to because of all the trip wires in the process?
During the above exchange I received an email outside the thread acknowledging the initial problems with the offer:
BC> Dear Stewart
BC> Thank you for your e-mail –I am sorry to hear of your disappointment with our recent promotion.
BC> Whilst we did experience some teething problems with the offer being applied to some
BC> orders; there was never any intention not to honour the claims.
BC> You are correct in that the promotion was being run by an independent team and we did try
BC> to ensure that our customers were fully aware of the conditions under which the offer
BC> could be redeemed prior to placing their order (please see attached). As these conditions
BC> were set out as part of a business agreement between Blackcircles and the promotions
BC> company – I am afraid that I have no way to circumvent these.
BC> I would hope that you may feel able to consider us for your future needs despite this
BC> issue and I would ask that you let me know if I can offer any further help.
Summary: I had to push for them to honour the offer initially, and I took advantage of it within the year - a reasonable condition. But trying to pretend that the 28 day condition is something that "There has to be" is nonsense, so they've lost any future business from me. It doesn't matter if the promotion is "administered by a third party" - I made the order through BlackCircles, and any problems with it reflect badly on them, and no-one else, from a customer perspective. I wonder if BlackCirtcles will reveal how many people in total who tried to take advantage of the offer ultimately weren't able to because of all the trip wires in the process?
Coincidentally last week I received an email asking for customer feedback. I shall be replying to them with the address of this blog. I hope they take note.
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