To think that a company advertising on MN should honour its offer?

[Fillybuster]

Help me out here....I'm feeling really cross about this!

The Luxury Family Hotels Group has got the following offer on MN at the moment:

"Mumsnet partner Luxury Family Hotels is offering Mumsnetters a discount of 20% on the best available rate on bookings made between 16 September and 23 December. "

So we got really excited and tried to make a booking for a weekend in november. Except the hotel is refusing to apply the discount....they say that we can either have the "Buy 2 get one night cheap" offer they are promoting on their website directly, OR 20% of standard rates.

AIBU to believe "20% on best available rate", then that 'available' rate includes the rates the hotel is promoting directly to all customers?

What am I missing?

FWIW I reported this to MNHQ last Wednesday morning, but haven't heard anything back....does this mean they don't care?!

You're missing the sentence at the bottom of the offer which says "this offer is not available on promotional rates or in conjunction with any other offer" (or something along those lines. Pretty standard I'm afraid.

it clearly says this at the bottom of the offer:

This offer is not available on promotional rates and cannot be used in conjunction with any other offer.

In that case, why are they promoting the offer as a discount on best available rate?

That is pretty unambiguous, and simply contradicts the small print. As I understand it, the small print is intended to clarify the wording of an offer, not to correct it.

Surely the legal definition of "Best Available Rate" would be the best rate available from the hotel for the dates in question?

Best Available Rate normally indicated just that: the best available "rate". It doesn't normally include promotions unless stated.

I fail to see where there's any confusion in the wording of the advert.

Sorry but YABU. A rate is a different thing from an offer. They haven't done anything wrong. You can't expect them to give you two offers in one go, the discount would be massive and it really wouldn't be worth their while.

Bit of a crap offer then!

Well, that's the thing - it is a crap offer, then, and I (VUably!) feel like they are piggy-backing the appearance of it being a genuine deal for advertising purposes. There doesn't seem to be a single date between now and the end of the offer period, in any of the hotels, when the 20% offer available is better, or even equal to, the other offers available one the hotel website.

So this is just an unashamed attempt to draw traffic? Fair enough.

I still understand 'available rate' to mean a rate-which-is-available, offer or otherwise, and feel they are being quite norty about this.

Since the consensus is that IABU (fair enough ) I shall flounce off....but will be reporting to the ASA, as I still don't think this is quite right....