Would you give the money back, be honest?

[Queenlivi]

I recently had a really bad experience with an online shop. It’s a long and complicated story but ordered something, I got an order confirmation and they took payment. It was quite a lot of money around £150.

I never heard anything, no dispatch notification and eventually I contacted customer services and they had no record of the order. They said it would be automatically refunded but it wasn’t. So I had to contact to them again, this time they said that the order had been delivered. Well it hadn’t.

I eventually managed to get a refund about 4 weeks later after contacting the head office, I spent a considerable amount of time chasing it up and spent hours on the phone as when you ring up you’re placed in a queue. Live chat is just an ai bot.

It was very stressful and on one occasion on I was more or less called a liar and that the order had been delivered. It turned out to be a ghost order that had never gone through due to a glitch.

About 3 weeks later again over randomly had an email saying that they are processing my refund and the money has arrived back in my bank account So now I’ve essentially been refunded twice.

Be honest, would you bother letting them know? It’s a large company, I know technically the right thing to do is let them know, but part of me thinks sod th, why should I spend another hour on the phone trying to get through they’ve messed me around enough.

Why should you waste your time on their incompetence? They won’t pay for your time. So unless it’s a 3 minute job (which it won’t be), do nothing. It’s not theft if they gave you the money!! If they realise and ask for it back, fair enough, but they won’t.

Considering the effort you had to go through to get the first refund sorted, I’d think of it as payment of my time and wouldn’t feel guilty about it.
if it were a small business and they’d been helpful about the situation I absolutely would sort it out, but in this scenario, no.

Surely it’s only theft if they ask for it back and I refuse.

Was it theft when they took my money and failed to sort my refund for weeks?

Similar with me. Goods never arrived & after chasing over and over was told there was an error in the warehouse and never sent out. They sent them out again, then a week later the first lot arrived. Rang them again and they said they could see I'd only been sent one lot out but would investigate and get back to me. Never heard from them again and that was well over a year ago. It was less than £50 and so I left them to it!!!

The problem is that if you tell them you’ll probably become embroiled in even more palaver to help them get the money back that they gave you in error. I’d probably email them to tell them. If it were Amazon and it were a tenner there’s no way I’d been going to any trouble. But £150 is quite a lot of money to keep when you know you’re not entitled to it (even though I don’t disagree with pp who called it an ‘idiot tax’).

There’d be no way I’d be talking stuff to the post office or waiting in for a collection just so they could get back something they sent out in error. Perhaps that’s why they hardly ever bother to chase it: the loss doesn’t justify the admin involved. I guess with cash it’s easier to get back, though.

No, I wouldn't let them know, and I'd feel no guilt.
Live by the sword, die by the sword.

Personally I would email them as chances are something will be out of balance in their finances and it will eventually come to light during year end reconciliations.

I would then set the funds aside for at least 18 months if I don't hear back from them.

No i wouldn't in all honesty. As someone upthread said, it's the idiot tax. If it was a small business or someone I had personal dealings with (like my son's music teacher for example) I absolutely would, but in this case and after all that faff no.

As PPs say, I'd send a quick email to let them know but I absolutely wouldn't make any more effort than that.

No,.I'd treat it as a reward for all the aggro they've caused

I would let them know.

I once had three identical pairs of shoes arrive, I had obviously only ordered one pair and only paid for one. When I contacted them they said to keep them. (Ended up giving the other two pairs away).

No. Them being useless is not your problem. I had similar with an online order that according to the seller had "gone missing" for weeks. I got a refund. Then the thing arrived.

I'd bet money that they're not that stringent about their finances.

I wouldn't spend it any time soon but I wouldn't bother telling them either.

If they realise and chase you for it, it'll be there but I wouldn't be doing their admin work for them.

It would be different if it was a small business or all my previous dealings with them had been positive but, in this case, sucks to be them 🤷🏻‍♀️

Nope and I wouldn't feel guilty about it either, pain and suffering money

No. Let them jog on with their inefficiently.

I’ve had this happen to me, I did let the company know but never heard a word about it, their customer service sounds awful so serves them right if you don’t.

Nope. Customers are frequently reminded to check orders/change, etc…. as sometimes they can’t be refunded afterwards. Well, same goes for this company, they should have checked their refund processes and picked up that it already being done.

Different story if they hadn’t been such arses or a small company.

No and I wouldn’t feel guilty at all. At least twice a year something along these lines happens to me…sent two or not charged for something or some other corporate mistake freebie. I never return it and I never feel guilty. Customer service is literally almost nonexistent in companies. They can sell you something with one click but they sure can’t return it in the same way.

Absolutely no chance would I be spending more time chasing those idiots up. If they asked.for it back I'd comply.

No I wouldn't tell them and I'd keep the money. They've mucked you about endlessly and it's their mistake. Also, no one will know what to bloody do their end anyway!

Had a similar kind of thing recently. Ordered 2 items from a company. They sent 2 of the same (more expensive) item, but didn't send me the other thing. Only took delivery of one item and sent the other back. Tried dealing with it straight away. They didn't answer the phone and actually switched it off after trying a few times! So had to do a slow drawn out conversation via email (wouldn't respond for a day). They essentially said that duplicate was for someone else and our second item was coming separately. Then the duplicate got back to them and was refunded to us. They then started saying we needed to pay them the refund before they would send the second item (that all along they told us had already been sent). But we didn't actually have the money- it would take up to 10 days. We were also on a bit of deadline for needing the second item by this point. And nothing about our interactions with this company made us believe it would arrive in time. So we had to order from somewhere else (that was more expensive).
They have not contacted us again.

I wouldn’t but you don’t need to exaggerate lol.

This is a good idea but I’d probably just keep it.

I wouldn't and I wouldn't feel guilty either!