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Proflowers.com Complaint - Deceptive Advertising - EasySave Rewards and Shipping Charges
EasySave Rewards and Shipping Charges - Complaint
My husband and I were long time customers of Proflower.com until recently. In May we went on their website to order flowers for my Mother in Law for Mother's Day and there was, what we thought was a great promotion "free shipping". "Wow" we thought this is fantastic, must be a stimulus plan to boost the ecommerce market.
After we ordered the flowers online with our Visa Card, there was a link on the page to get $15 off your next order, this to us did not constitute fee shipping, But my husband clicked it anyhow, hey $15 credit is at least something, and a new window came up and asked him for my e-mail address and zip code, since this was my account. He checked it out and found out that if you clicked the "I want my $15 gift code now" button the detail said it would charge our credit card or Paypal account "for just a $1.95 activation fee billed by EasySaver Rewards to the credit card or PayPal account you just entered during your ProFlowers purchase."
It also stated, "To continue after the introductory trial period, do nothing and all the great benefits and savings will automatically continue for just $14.95 per month, billed by EasySaver Rewards to the same credit card or PayPal account where applicable." This was hidden and not something you would see easily if you didn’t read the fine print.
This is by far the most deceptive marketing that I have seen.
The button (I want my $15 gift code now) does not indicate in any way that you are purchasing anything.
This advertisement implies that the $15 gift code is not part of any kind of purchase, or associated with any other partner. It asks for your e-mail and zip code which they already had for several years with my existing Proflowers.com account. I too couldn't understand why they would ask for it again so we never filled that information out and we were not signed up for EasySaver Rewards.
We opted to pay the shipping and handling charges. These charges came out to $19.97, equaling more than half the total cost of the flowers we ordered which were $29.98 plus $6.99 for a vase that was worth $1, plus tax totaling $60.36 for what we thought would be $36.97 plus tax. And to add insult to injury they also tacked on a charge of $4.99 for guaranteed May 8 Delivery which we never asked for since this order was placed in plenty of time.
If this isn't deceptive I don't know what is. We are pursuing this with our State Attorney Generals office.
Just so you know, I contacted customer service on May 6th to lodge a formal complaint and gave my contact information to the Representative on the phone. I told her to have them call my cell number and on May 8th I received a call from A Special Program Associate on my home number. I never give my home number to the Representative but it was listed on my Proflowers.com account. I returned his call that evening and one more time two weeks later but never received a return call.
So today I stumbled across this site which listed page after page of complaints for the same reason I lodged mine and decided to once again to respond to the original May 8th email from the Special Program Associate, this time I cc’d another Associate who's email address I discovered at the bottom of the original email.
I received a call from the 2nd person who tried to tell me that they were very sorry for the confusion and that she was going to refund my account for any of the debits for the EasySave Rewards but we didn’t have any account. If either of them actually read my emails they would have seen that I had already stated that.
After many minutes of caned statements I was offered a credit for the extra shipping charges of $4.99 and a free flower order which I declined.
I’m not interested in receiving a refund; she didn’t get the principal behind my lodging the complaint. THIS IS FALSE ADVERTISING, plain and simple and they need to be investigated for it.
After we ordered the flowers online with our Visa Card, there was a link on the page to get $15 off your next order, this to us did not constitute fee shipping, But my husband clicked it anyhow, hey $15 credit is at least something, and a new window came up and asked him for my e-mail address and zip code, since this was my account. He checked it out and found out that if you clicked the "I want my $15 gift code now" button the detail said it would charge our credit card or Paypal account "for just a $1.95 activation fee billed by EasySaver Rewards to the credit card or PayPal account you just entered during your ProFlowers purchase."
It also stated, "To continue after the introductory trial period, do nothing and all the great benefits and savings will automatically continue for just $14.95 per month, billed by EasySaver Rewards to the same credit card or PayPal account where applicable." This was hidden and not something you would see easily if you didn’t read the fine print.
This is by far the most deceptive marketing that I have seen.
The button (I want my $15 gift code now) does not indicate in any way that you are purchasing anything.
This advertisement implies that the $15 gift code is not part of any kind of purchase, or associated with any other partner. It asks for your e-mail and zip code which they already had for several years with my existing Proflowers.com account. I too couldn't understand why they would ask for it again so we never filled that information out and we were not signed up for EasySaver Rewards.
We opted to pay the shipping and handling charges. These charges came out to $19.97, equaling more than half the total cost of the flowers we ordered which were $29.98 plus $6.99 for a vase that was worth $1, plus tax totaling $60.36 for what we thought would be $36.97 plus tax. And to add insult to injury they also tacked on a charge of $4.99 for guaranteed May 8 Delivery which we never asked for since this order was placed in plenty of time.
If this isn't deceptive I don't know what is. We are pursuing this with our State Attorney Generals office.
Just so you know, I contacted customer service on May 6th to lodge a formal complaint and gave my contact information to the Representative on the phone. I told her to have them call my cell number and on May 8th I received a call from A Special Program Associate on my home number. I never give my home number to the Representative but it was listed on my Proflowers.com account. I returned his call that evening and one more time two weeks later but never received a return call.
So today I stumbled across this site which listed page after page of complaints for the same reason I lodged mine and decided to once again to respond to the original May 8th email from the Special Program Associate, this time I cc’d another Associate who's email address I discovered at the bottom of the original email.
I received a call from the 2nd person who tried to tell me that they were very sorry for the confusion and that she was going to refund my account for any of the debits for the EasySave Rewards but we didn’t have any account. If either of them actually read my emails they would have seen that I had already stated that.
After many minutes of caned statements I was offered a credit for the extra shipping charges of $4.99 and a free flower order which I declined.
I’m not interested in receiving a refund; she didn’t get the principal behind my lodging the complaint. THIS IS FALSE ADVERTISING, plain and simple and they need to be investigated for it.
Comments:
Posted by GreatLakeDweller on 2009-06-05:
It sounds like they could not satisfy you no matter what. They are not going to change their advertising method, as it is apparently making them money. When you were not satisfied in the beginning, it would have been better to cancel your order and go elsewhere. There are florists EVERYWHERE.
Also, before you purchase online it may be beneficial to read the reviews in various places such as this. This company appears to have many complaints.
Also, before you purchase online it may be beneficial to read the reviews in various places such as this. This company appears to have many complaints.
Posted by WLJ0803 on 2009-06-06:
Actually that's not true I have been a long standing customer of proflowers.com for many years, for personal and business reasons and this is new with them. All I want is for them to change business practices. BTW – did you know that EasySaved Rewards is owned but the same corporation that owns Proflower.com, Provide Commerce, Inc.? So no wonder they posted the ad that way. It’s a win, win situation for them.
Do you have any idea of how many people are taken in by deceptive advertising? This is an epidemic in this country. I have elderly parents who are constantly taken advantage of because they are too trusting. And this I find so despicable. People who work all their lives, save a small amount of money and some shoddy business take advantage of them.
Does this make it right for companies like Proflowers.com to continue their deceptive practices? I think not.
Also, I've read some of your replies to other comments and figure you must be one of the people who promote these business practices. Am I right?
Do you have any idea of how many people are taken in by deceptive advertising? This is an epidemic in this country. I have elderly parents who are constantly taken advantage of because they are too trusting. And this I find so despicable. People who work all their lives, save a small amount of money and some shoddy business take advantage of them.
Does this make it right for companies like Proflowers.com to continue their deceptive practices? I think not.
Also, I've read some of your replies to other comments and figure you must be one of the people who promote these business practices. Am I right?
Posted by madconsumer on 2009-06-06:
"This was hidden and not something you would see easily if you didn’t read the fine print."
this is why it is a MUST to read everything before clicking. it was not deceptive, after all you read it before clicking. deceptive would be they did not give you the details.
this is why it is a MUST to read everything before clicking. it was not deceptive, after all you read it before clicking. deceptive would be they did not give you the details.
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