Cashrewards should be renamed Norewards

[QF WP]

Be wary or steer clear of this business. This is Day 1 of my social media campaign (have Tweeted as well as posted on their Facebook page and here), in order to get them to move on actually crediting my account with transactions that have been pending/overdue since 13 April 2017.

Allow me some latitude to explain. I joined on 4 January 2017 from recommendations here on AFF (mainly alcohol purchases). I expected the delays in crediting but thought they would honour their time frame commitments.

Transaction as shown below:



Started with my first emails (in their terms "ticket") on 1 February for the missing Crack Wines purchased 13 Jan and 23 Jan. Got the standard response both times:

Thanks for getting in touch with us regarding your untracked purchase.

Don’t worry we are on the case! These kinds of things can take a little bit of time so please be patient with us. Our goal is to have this purchase in your account as pending within 21 days. We will reach out to you should we need further information regarding your purchase for inquiry <number>

In the meantime, put your feet up and let us do the hard work!

The Cashrewards Team

On 6 February, received emails about both tickets, with different (expected) approval dates:

This is your Cashrewards tracking receipt for your recent purchase at Cracka Wines.
This sale now appears in your account as ‘pending’. When the store confirms the transaction, your cashback will be approved & available for transfer to your bank account.

All looked like it was going well.

 

[theblank]

What did they say to you when asked why the payments are not being made?
and what does the exclamation mark mean?

 

[QF WP]

On 16 February, I put in another enquiry ("ticket") about the Expedia purchase (had not seen or read anything about the 63 days until that showed up on account).

Got a quick response (same day):

To assist our investigation could you please email through a document displaying the date this purchase was made, unfortunately the document provided in your original query appears to have this information not displayed.

Thank you for your understanding and we look forward to resolving this ASAP. Thank you for using Cashrewards when you shop online.

Kind Regards,

<name>

Customer Service

Thought "this is good CS, why wasn't it like that on the Cracka purchases". Maybe a change (upgrade) in process. Awesome...

so I emailed back the next day (as we hadn't received anything from Expedia other than the confirmation email when we booked it):

From my credit card summary:

Date:: 03 February 2017

Description: TRAVEL RESERVATION AU SYDNEY Travel Agencies and Tour Operators Transaction date 01/02/2017

Card used: <last 4 digits of personal CC>

Credit ($AUD): $280.00

 

[QF WP]

What did they say to you when asked why the payments are not being made?
and what does the exclamation mark mean?

Exclamation mark has drop down box saying:

 

[Daver6]

Ok, I'm curious to see where this goes. I've had issues with some Hilton stays not posting but after chasing it up, I've got what's been owing to me.

 

[QF WP]

Alas, the CS girl came back (granted, same day service, so positive) with standard response email with Expedia Australia inserted:

Thank you for your response.

My apologies but could you send us a screenshot or a copy of the email confirmation sent by Expedia Australia showing the date and the itinerary number? That would be perfect.

Thank you for your understanding and cooperation.

Kind Regards,

<name>

Customer Service

I was onto it like a rat up a drainpipe - shot back a copy of the Expedia email confirmation within 15 minutes

 

[QF WP]

Ok, I'm curious to see where this goes. I've had issues with some Hilton stays not posting but after chasing it up, I've got what's been owing to me.

Come along for the ride Daver6. I will never give them my Hilton bookings...or as somebody once said "it will be a cold day in hell..."

 

[QF WP]

90 minutes later (7pm, so kudos for CS girl still on shift), I received the now expected email:

This is your Cashrewards tracking receipt for your recent purchase at Expedia Australia.
This sale now appears in your account as ‘pending’. When the store confirms the transaction, your cashback will be approved & available for transfer to your bank account.

Great, so now 3 of my purchases are at least to that stage. They are on my account...and she followed up with another stock standard email that night:

Thanks for getting in touch and sending us your invoice.

As we unfortunately have not received any information regarding your transaction from the store we will now follow this up for you.

We have just submitted an enquiry with Expedia Australia in relation to your cashback and in the meantime we have added this transaction into your Cashrewards account as pending.

Any transaction that we query with the store can take between 30-90 days to resolve. Typically stores review these queries monthly. The store needs to ensure the cooling off period has elapsed, and that the item has not been returned and that their analytics attribute the sale to Cashrewards. This is a fairly complex process hence why it can take so long however, it varies significantly from store to store.

In the meantime, please continue shopping with Cashrewards and let us know if you encounter any more issues.

Kind Regards,

<name>

Customer Service

 

[QF WP]

Whether by coincidence or just I fell into the right marketing box, the Founder and CEO (Andrew Clarke) happened to email me that same night:

Hi QF WP

I had a look through our cashback system and I noticed you recently made a purchase through Expedia Australia.

It's a big decision and I'm glad you trusted us to help you with your purchase. I'd like to personally reach out and wish you safe travels.

Any queries or help you may need, feel free to reply directly to this email and I'll do whatever I can to assist.

All the best,

Andrew Clarke


CEO & Founder of Cashrewards
LinkedIn

Sent from my iPhone.

Can you see what I am thinking and where this is going???

 

[alieninperth]

I've used cashrewards for a few years and I've found them to be fairly good. I was mainly using them for Dan Murphys which was pretty straightforward though.

I did have an issue with Vodafone a few year ago. I should have had $120 credited to the account but it never showed up. A few months of following up and the message I got was the Vodafone refused to credit as they were no longer affiliated with CR, even though they were at the time of purchase. CR paid me the missing $120 that day.

 

[QF WP]

I thought mine would similarly be easy @alieninperth - how wrong I was

 

[QF WP]

So, Andrew, thank you for your VERY timely email. But I am over your tin-foil hat business and I'll vote with my feet, silently, without an electronic trail...

But they tried to entice me back with this email on 20 March:

It wasn't long ago that your savings journey started. How good was that feeling of not only receiving your goods from Expedia Australia, but also getting $15.40 in cashback?

Pretty good, right?

But wait, what went wrong? It looks like you haven't been back to Cashrewards in a month or so.


Our cashback opportunities are great, with over 1,000 retailers to earn cashback from, the choice is yours. See the full list here.


If there is anything we can do to do make your Cashrewards experience even better, let us know by contacting us here

I remember yelling at the laptop: "But you haven't given me my $15.40 yet, you tossers.

Pretty bad actually.

"What went wrong - more like nothing went right! You haven't worked out why I am not using your platform anymore - easy, look at my contact with you and tell me why I'd want to (if you were in my shoes)??"

 

[QF WP]

So for 5 long months, no purchases where I utilised the Cashrewards banner which was silently telling me "I could get x% discount". Easy, you don't deserve it Cashrewards. Then as it had been a while, in a pique of uncertainty, I clicked on it when buying from Cracka again. Gave them some crumbs, because they would hate to know what revenue they missed out on in that time...

Lo and behold, automated email came through:

This is your Cashrewards tracking receipt for your recent purchase at Cracka Wines.
This sale now appears in your account as ‘pending’. When the store confirms the transaction, your cashback will be approved & available for transfer to your bank account.

and just to prove that their system actually DOES WORK ocassionally, they credited my account for THE FIRST TIME - but I wan't hanging by the neck waiting as I wasn't expecting it, so I didn't actually see it happen.

 

[QF WP]

So that purchase and their email prompted me to follow up with an email of my own:

From: QF WP
Sent: Monday, 14 August 2017 12:35 PM
To: 'Andrew Clarke' <[email protected]>
Cc: '<name> at Cashrewards' <[email protected]>
Subject: Cashrewards drops the ball


Hi Andrew & Support,

Whilst I appreciated Andrew reaching out to me in February around my purchase from Expedia (unbeknown that I was at that stage, already having an issue); I now find (after a further 5 months) the need to contact you directly and advise of what appears (to me) as a failure in your systems. I know it’s disappointing when that happens and there are always learnings from any mistake (we learn more from our failures than our successes). It’s not the amount of money that is the concern, it is the principle.

My biggest concern is the lack of follow up on the Expedia purchase (which still hasn’t been resolved – but I’ve copied you into all of my previous email trail below), as well as why all of my purchases in early (January, February and May) 2017 from Cracka Wines are still showing “overdue”. If I was a cynical person, I’d be thinking that you were being purposely slow in paying so that you could make additional return on those funds from your bank . Now I hope that isn’t the case, because I’m sure that there are Government instrumentalities who would love a good consumer case…or I could use my position in social media to alert others to this apparent concerning trend.

This is what I expect from Cashrewards (and I don’t believe they are unreasonable demands):

1. An explanation of why this one (Expedia) fell through the cracks – I’ll be reasonable and give you 7 days for the reply, which in the context of electronic/digital age, is probably more than you should need to clarify the situation.

2. An explanation of why the Cracka purchases in January, February and May 2017 are still showing “overdue”. I’m sure you agree that the same timeframe as in point 1 is appropriate.

3. Confirmation that they have all been moved from “My Awards Balance” to “My Available Rewards”. I’m happy to give you a little longer on this, so I expect notification within 14 days.

Today I’ve given you another chance to right the poor first impression (as I’ve made another small purchase through Cracks Wines). You won’t be getting another chance to continue to be my aggregator of choice for my future purchases. The clocks ticking - at the same time my patience with Cashrewards is waning. You have the opportunity to turn it around – over to you.


Regards
QF WP

I'm not an unreasonable person, so didn't want to set unrealistic timeframes for their responses. I'm in a CS-centric business myself...

I'll be back with more...work beckons

 

[Cynicor]

How intriguing. I had a large outstanding cashback once, but I kept submitting a ticket and it got paid. Wasn't even meant to be that large but that's how their system tracked it...

 

[lovetravellingoz]

Cashrewards has been good for me. All have been paid.

However I do not buy wine via it in the main, though have purchased some Dan Murphys.

 

[n7of9]

I've had a similar experience to you, though only contacted them once. Receiving an automated reply is not my idea of good CS. I also received a 'have a good trip' email, that too is automated

My conclusion is that they credit the first x amount of purchases to makes you think it works, then after a predetermined amount of time everything stays in the 'overdue' list. My oldest overdue purchase is from April 2017, and I fully expect that not a single cent more will ever be credited to my account

Now that they have my email address, my shopping habits, and have successfully sold my details to anyone willing to purchase them, they've well and truly wiped their hands of me...I have fulfilled my purpose

 

[Dr Ralph]

I've usually had good experiences with cashrewards. Although there have been problems when transactions have failed to track. In all but one instance the money was eventually credited. I certainly acknowledge they are very slow to pay out.

 

[Jeffrey O'Neill]

maybe give qwibble or pricepal a go, though not sure if they have cracka wines on them too.

i mainly use CR for the 5% off woolworths egift cards. i get founder level with pricepal which seems to generally give me the best % back.

 

[oz_mark]

I've had things stay in pending for 18 months.

And after getting it dealt with, ended up with very similar automated emails as above,,,