Argos Gifting Platform

[john18]

Recently discovered that Sainsburys/Argos Gift cards expire from date of activation not most recent use

 

I have been posting value onto these cards as part of a customer reward scheme up to Dec 2021

 

Apart from the T&Cs (attached) I have had no reminders of imminent expiry - is this strictly legal?

 

Argos have effectively taken £3000+ from my customers cards

 

Any ideas how to challenge this?

Standard-Gift-Card-Terms(2).pdf

[dx100uk]

it is clearly in at least 2 parts of their T&C's when these expire.

 

can't see a way out or extension, but they do say they will refund minus a handling charges if these are not ecards in certain circumstances?

 

 

dx

 

[john18]

The pattern of use has been that the customer keeps the same card and has monthly deposits onto  it according to the rewards they have earned

The uploads are acknowledged by Argos but there is no reference to expiry being iminent (on a card by card basis) nor has there ever been!

 

 

[dx100uk]

yes but the cards themselves expire.

 

7.8 You shall encourage and ensure that the full value of the Gift Cards is used on or before the expiry date of the Gift
Card by the end customer. You shall have no claim against Us or any other business within Sainsbury’s or Argos
Limited for any Unused Value on Your Gift Cards.

[BankFodder]

I wouldn't mind having a very brief point by point explanation of what these gift cards are and how they work.

Also, what kind of value are you potentially going to lose?

When was the last time you posted some credit on to a card and how long before the expiry date of the card was that?

[dx100uk]

As far as i can see this is not like other consumer gift card issues we see.

 

this is an argos business account, whereby said business has, sometime previously  themselves, issued 'their customers'  these argos giftcards, then 'top them up' as each customer orders their 'products ' and collect incentives as a thank you.

 

the cards issued by the trader to his customers under his business contract with argos have an Initial expiry date, unlike ones joe public can buy themselves direct from argos. The trader as part of his contract with argos must manage this not argos. 

[john18]

Thanks for all the feedback - As I understand the T&Cs the cards expire 3 years from 1st being loaded with points. All cards were registered at one time but only activated when points issues to them. Therefore not all cards expire at the same time. It made sense to me for my customers to keep their cards in their wallet/purse and have them updated with points each month rather than sending new cards each time!

Argos stated that their card-checking online service warns of imminent expiry but I can't see that it does (I've re-checked) - They will have taken over £3200 in total

[BankFodder]

However you haven't given the point-by-point explanation of the cards for I asked for in my earlier post

[dx100uk]

regardless to when the cards were activated, it's part of your business contract with argos to manage the cards you distribute.

 

The T&C's do not appear to state you need to send a new card at each top-up, however you as their manager should check the cards you send top-ups too are not close to their expiry date, thus losing said top-ups and alert your customers same.....or send on a new card and send top-ups to that.

 

7.10 You shall ensure that Your end customer is advised of the Terms and Conditions applicable to the consumer use of Gift Cards and eGift Cards, including the provision of replacement Gift Cards and expiry dates. These Terms can be found at 

https://www.argos.co.uk/help/terms-and-conditions/ for Argos Gift Cards.

for Argos Gift Cards.

[BankFodder]

We still haven't received any explanation of the OP's position – but which I gather is probably as a business and how the cards really work.

However, I'm curious that a system could be operated where apparently a large company can walk away with a fair chunk of cash belonging to 1 of their customers and without providing anything in return.

Although it seems we are probably dealing with the business here – and for some reason or other – the OP apparently prefers not to answer my questions, the contract would still be affected by the Unfair Contract Terms Act which does render certain terms in a standard form contract as unfair and therefore unenforceable.

However, without the information I have been asking for and without a proper engagement in the thread from the OP it's difficult to understand the situation fully and to explore the possibility of taking the matter forward.

 

[john18]

Answer to your queries:

I wouldn't mind having a very brief point by point explanation of what these gift cards are and how they work. Argos issue 500 cards to a trader like me who is looking to build loyalty with customers. I have an excel sheet of numbers with customers names against them. I "reward" customers each month with a value of "points" ... This is expedited by logging onto the gifting platform and entering values against each card.

At any point after that the customer can present their card to Argos at the point of purchase and "cash-in" the value or if they have a lot of points they can cover the whole cost of an item. Typically a customer might get £5-£50 per month rewards! this system has been in place since 2019

Also, what kind of value are you potentially going to lose?  £3200 approx

When was the last time you posted some credit on to a card and how long before the expiry date of the card was that? The last time was in January - one of the cards failed at that time but I didn't notice - I assume it was already expired!

[BankFodder]

Thank you. So I understand that you even applied credit to an expired card and they still accepted it and later on it could be used – is that correct or have I misunderstood.

Also, how many cards were there and what kind of value was applied to each one?

If we decide to go ahead with this then I think it would be better to fragment the problem so that your risk factor is reduced and so one would think about challenging them on the basis of one card only with a small sum on it

[john18]

I've not explained it well probably but on the last upload  02 Feb 2022 - 13 cards accepted points - 1 failed (not noticed by me)  That card would have expired in Jan 2022 so it makes sense that it failed

 

The only legal argument I could think off would be that they do not appear to have the expiry date checker on their platform that they say they do:

Text from their email of 20-04-2019 - I am writing to you regards the response below, as much as I appreciate your disappointment the Gift cards supplied have an expiry longer than the market average and in terms of use and taking in to consideration of the COVID 19 pandemic both brands within the Sainsburys group (Argos & Sainsburys) have been open for business throughout to be able to redeem and shop as normally as possible.

Argos Gift cards have a dynamic balance checker that include the expiry and how long you have left to redeem them, plus can be validated on your Argos.co.uk profile/account, Sainsburys Gift cards can be checked via My account on the Sainsburys page also.

I appreciate expiry of funds not used is disappointing, but we do clearly advertise the Terms and conditions both on our physical and eGift cards as well as our dedicated Gift card web pages. Sadly, we shall not be able to extend your Gift cards as we do not have the functionality to facilitate this.

 

 

 

[BankFodder]

Please stand by for a reply later on .

However, you haven't fully answered my questions and I have many more to ask you .

 

 

 

[john18]

No more than 2 dozen cards - values ranging up to £1219 for a single card - some just a few pounds

 

[BankFodder]

I'm getting the hang of it I think, but I'm having to tease the information out of you .

I understand that you were running a business- what kind of business?

I understand that you use gift cards presumably to promote loyalty.

 

We may as well concentrate on the lower value gift cards because those are the ones that we will target if we decide to go ahead .

How many gift cards are there with about £100 credit on them ?

How many gift cards are there with about £500 credit on them ?

Do you have to purchase the gift cards before you start putting credit on them? Or are they given free of charge ?

You say that the time runs from the date of activation ?

How long is the life period Of these once they are activated?

If you have a particular gift card with about £200 still on it, then what was the expiry date of that?

And how long before the expiry date did you put the credit on ?

Looking At all the gift cards, how close to the expiry date did you put on any credit ?

 

You say that you keep a tally of everything and it should be easy for you to extract this information from some spreadsheet that you keep .

 

I don't want to see the whole spreadsheet and have to work it out for myself .

 

It would be really great if you could think carefully about the way you express all of this to somebody who doesn't understand any of it, but is trying their best to help you on his own volunteer time

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[The GodMother]

Interesting as l was under the impression that Argos was not open during lock down 1 as not essential. Neither of ours were. 

lockdown 2,November, one was open as a pre brought service only and you had to go to the door counter with your code. Also under the impression that these cards could not be used online As we had one saying INSTORE USE ONLY printed on back.