To ask if you've ever had compensation for complaining..?

[thinkingoutloud4]

So I was in Tesco last week getting our weekly food shopping with my DP, when a member of staff came out of the warehouse section with a large trolley filled to the brim with produce to fill the shelves with.
The staff member didn't check behind him before moving out onto the shop floor, and pushed the trolley into my ankle causing a nasty gash, and quite a lot of blood 🥴
He was lovely and really very apologetic, I was hurt but not extremely and although he offered an ambulance 😆 I politely declined.

The store asked to take my details to make note of the accident, which I complied with and left my name and address etc for their accident log.

Anyway.. fast forward to today, and I've received a lovely letter in the post from the store manager, and a store voucher for £150. I'm completely blown away!

it got me thinking, as i remember once a friend of mine once said her sister complains as a hobby to companies and receives large amounts of free items, vouchers etc...

have you ever been sent something from a company following a complaint?

I have just sent a thank you letter back to Tesco, as I am completely shocked and so grateful for their lovely gesture!! 💖

I'd imagine the OP was at increased risk of contracting covid, if the virus was present around the wound which also made tesco panic.

...at such a horrible time in my life

I got a £20 supermarket voucher once as a child as I posted them the dead fly that I'd found on my chocolate (inside the wrapper) - actually attached it with sellotape. As an adult I got hundreds in compensation from a well known kitchen company who completely fucked up. I wrote a 17 page long complaint letter full of photographic evidence.

At the moment DH is wrangling with Vodafone after they've continued to charge us for broadband every month for four months since we cancelled. He's rung every time it happened, spending hours on hold, and they've apologised and told him this time it's definitely cancelled, but each month the money has gone out again. They've not offered anything.

Why on earth didn't he cancel the direct debit with the bank the first month it happened?

We got a free family weekend break at a hotel after a lamp fell down and cut our toddlers forehead. DH was raging at the time so we called to complain and manager sent ice-cream to the room at 10pm. On checkout no-one checked how toddler was and they said we could return with room upgrade, subject to availability! I wrote to CEO of the region saying I was upset no-one had asked after our child and he then offered me the voucher. He also greeted me on checkin when we went for our lovely free break. Toddler was fine.

Super expensive meal at Italian restaurant was riddled with errors - sat too close to other diners; no offer of crackers for cheese course; dessert sat on a table for half an hour while we waited for it; meals delivered at separate times etc so I wrote and detailed the issues and we were offered a meal with wine pairing and I got flowers on arrival. Restored our faith in this restaurant.

Afternoon tea offered after I tried to book a table in a hotel lounge and was fobbed off so rudely by receptionist that I wrote to manager.

Awful anniversary dinner where waiter kept sneering at us and had to go to bar to place order and ask for bill. DH refused to pay and they offered us a return free meal but we never returned.

Dinner at Bluebird and ordered a curry. It tasted so bland it was awful so my friend and I complained. Free glass of wine and it was removed from bill.

Sounds like I moan constantly but if you’re going out and paying a lot it’s such a shame to have it ruined. I also praise a lot where it’s worth it.

I once tweeted Bill's to complain that their Shrove Tuesday menu wasn't available on Shrove Tuesday. They gave us a free meal of any value at any of their restaurants. I wasn't expecting it tbh.
The daft thing was we'd actually eated pancakes in the restaurant on Shrove Tuesday, just not from the special menu.

@NerrSnerr

I got a £10 co-op voucher because I tweeted that the own brand liquorice allsorts I bought didn't have any pink or blue bobbly ones in the pack!

Pmsl at this

I had massive McDonald’s cravings when I was pregnant, so we’d go through the drive-thru. Without fail they’d forget to put my sweet chilli sauce in - I wouldn’t have cared about free sauces I’d asked for but you pay for sweet chilli!

My husband tweeted them to ask them to be more vigilant as his pregnant wife was about to kill him. They asked us to come back to store, to sort it out, but I was in labour by then. So they said come back when we were settled, but please let them know in advance and they’d replace our whole order.

Post pregnancy my tastes had changed so they let me swap my meal, cooed over the baby and produced a massive bunch of flowers and a mothercare voucher to say sorry! I promptly burst into tears. All over about a quids worth of missing sweet chilli sauce!

My Nan got compensation from Sainsbury’s when the automatic doors shut on her and knocked her over and broke her hip. It was a fair amount (can’t remember what it was) and they also gave her home deliveries until she was ready/able to go back to store. She was told she could have got more if she sued them and took them to court but she didn’t want that.

The poster who got the refund from Thomas Cook . I think that is the standard compensation for delay under EU legislation. One Christmas I pre ordered a turkey from M and S . When I arrived to collect there had been a cock up with the order and it was not there . They gave me a free gammon and asked if I could come back at the end of the day when all orders had been collected. I ended up with a top of the range gold turkey and free side orders .

This week. I ordered some coffee online and got sent the wrong thing. I drank it anyway and I did say I'd drank it when I let them know they'd sent the wrong thing. They gave me a free voucher code for a pack of the coffee they were meant to send so I ordered another two.

We complained to McDonald’s as twice now they haven’t added the extra bacon DH ordered, sent us the wrong sauce and didn’t put gherkins in my burger (I love gherkins). Never heard a thing.

I was given flowers, £200 voucher and half price phone package for 6 months after an absolute nightmare with EE when upgrading my phone.

First they sent me out a used phone rather than a new one. Then the courier delivering the second phone stole it. It was a saga and a half with the manager of the courier company coming to my door and calling me a thief and threatening to get the police onto me for trying to say I hadn’t had the phone when I hadn’t.

Wasn’t until I pointed out to him that his courier was meant to pick up the almost-new phone at the same time as delivering the new-new one. If I had in my possession two months phones and, as he was insisting, his driver’s paperwork was all “signed and in order” why would I have complained?

Then someone else from the courier company came and demanded I return the almost-new phone and I had to threaten the police to make them leave.

In the end I had to go to the EE store and swap the almost-new phone for a new-new one and then someone from EE came with the flowers and voucher. I got flowers and chocolates from the courier company in the end as well.

Sounds like Tesco are being generous to fend off a compensation claim - that could have been really nasty

Took out Halifax home insurance in May. I'm Mrs primary customer. Dh is mr secondary customer. Received paper work in post addressed to Mrs primary customer and Mr secondary customer. All good.

About a couple of weeks later a letter arrived addressed to dh, and dh only. I could've coped if I'd been given my own separate one but none.arrived.

I complained in writing, in my name and mine alone. I received an acknowledgement, addressed to mr and Mrs secondary customer.

I complained again. Eventually they dealt with the complaint, and they agreed with me, and sent a cheque for £25. Its not about the money though, its about treating customers respectfully.

Tesco offered you compensation which you accepted. Saves them the risk of you going to an ambulance chasing lawyer.

I got £50 voucher from Tesco car insurance because they messed me around following a car accident. Wrote to head office and they sorted my claim and sent the voucher within 2 days.
Also got £5 Cadbury voucher after buying a multi pack with two empty wrappers in.

DD wrote to Caffe Nero that they no longer stocked her favourite cake so asked them for the recipe so she could make it herself. They sent her a lovely letter and £5 voucher but no recipe.

I ordered a washing machine from John Lewis and paid them to plumb it in. When they delivered it, the 2 idiots that turned up were unable to disconnect or move the old one, so we told them to credit us and we'd do it. We opened the new one's packaging and found the plug almost severed and the machine had huge dents in it. We rang them and rejected it. Then apparently there were "no more of that model" in the country, so I tweeted the manufacturer who was brilliant. Suddenly JL came back to me and had sourced one and would plumb it in for free, an offer we declined. The new one came, was checked & was fine. I plumbed it in, which took all of 2 minutes and it has been wonderful ever since. For my trouble I got a £25 voucher, which I thought was pathetic given the 12 phone calls, emails and endless lies I had been told.

On the other hand, 13 years ago DH was taken very ill in the USA on a family holiday. After a week in ICU on a ventilator and a further week in hospital, he was signed off as able to fly. Our original flights had long since departed and so the medical team at the hospital liaised with our insurers to repatriate us. Because we were so far from where we were meant to be, the best option was a BA flight from Phoenix to Heathrow then BA back to Manchester. BA were absolutely amazing. DH had to go business class so he could lie down. The insurers refused to pay for the DC to go business class, so I sat in economy with them. The crew knew this and were really kind, popping in every hour or so from business to tell me he was ok. When we got to Manchester, there was no wheelchair or person to help. The captain invited us onto the flight deck, chatted to the DC whilst the First Officer went into the terminal to get a wheelchair. After we got home and DH was on the mend, I wrote to the Chief Executive to say how well we had been treated and the care and compassion showed by everyone we had dealt with from BA. He sent me a massive hamper and said that his people were tracing all the staff that we had been in contact with so they could be personally thanked.

OMG it seems everywhere I go to eat or drink I have reason to complain. I don't seek it out, honestly! But there is always enough reason to complain. Last time was 2 weeks ago. Our local pub was advertising an 'Early Christmas Celebration Day'. There was supposed to be crackers, Christmas music, mince pies, Christmas menu and a present for anyone wearing a Christmas jumper (ok, might be some people's worst nightmare but I thought the kids might like it!). Turned up, all of the above were non-existent apart from crackers and a very below-par Christmas menu. I asked where the other stuff was, the waitress had no clue what I was talking about. I then asked the manageress who apologised and said they were short staffed (!). She gave me a box of biscuits instead. I found the whole thing quite funny until one of the waitresses dropped the F bomb, loudly, right next to my 11 year old DD!

But honestly, I've had to complain more times than I care to remember lately. Makes up for all the times I was too scared to before!

Lots and lots - got my ex £16k for a leaking council house roof, just got my sister in law £150 from John Lewis, had £47k knocked off a mortgage due to a huge error. It's all about knowing who to contact and keeping records. I've actually written a book on how to complain!

Oh and my friend a free holiday!

Ah and another friend a free gearbox replacement hah

We had a new path fitted outside our house and the clowns that dug it up cut through our virgin cable wire causing us to lose TV, phone and internet. It took 3 long months of complaining to get it fixed by virgin, eventually had to threaten legal action.
Their T&Cs state "automatic" loss of of service compensation will be credited to our account of £8 a day. Bollocks is it automatic, again another 3 months and ombudsman involvement we eventually got our £750.

@Bluewavescrashing oh god I didn't even think of that! 😟

The thing is if you complain constantly you end up being the type of person that is never quite satisfied and looking for a fault. That makes you a less happy person than those that shrug stuff off and don't let it ruin their day. I think Tesco did the right thing and because op wasn't expecting anything she is now really happy!!

I’ve just had to complain about an insurance claim. I just wanted them to get a move on with sorting it out. I emailed 3 times and rand 3 times though before I complained about lack of progress.

Turns out they’d incorrectly transposed my mobile number.

All eventually sorted and my claim was paid 2 1/2 months after the initial claim was made. They upheld my claim and gave me £150 which I was very happy about. I just wanted them to sort it sooner than they did though.