Letters | Sunday, 01 February 2009

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Ripped off by retailers

Some days ago, GRTU Director General Vince Farrugia complained that sales during the Christmas period dropped drastically. He mentioned various reasons to support his thesis, but in my opinion he failed to mention the most important one. Quite a handful of retailers and businessmen treat their clients like being stupid beings. This happened to me recently when I received some ‘One 4 All’ gift vouchers as a Christmas present.
As soon as the January sales began, I decided to go and use these vouchers to buy a gift for myself. I went to the Urban Jungle outlet in Valletta. After choosing some items from there, I informed the salesgirl that instead of paying cash, I was going to use these vouchers. At this point the salesgirl informed me that I can use these vouchers during the sale, but with the condition that I lose 10% of the discount (for example if an item was displayed with a 20% discount, I would have had only a 10% discount).
Obviously I did not make use of these vouchers at the aforementioned outlet or other outlets related to the same company. Instead I called the company issuing these vouchers to ask further details. The person responsible insisted that this was against the agreement between the two companies and that I was definitely right. But the only alternative I was given, was that of not using these vouchers during this sale.
I am of the opinion that the Maltese consumer will increasingly decide to buy directly online from foreign companies to avoid being ripped off by Maltese retailers.

L Sammut
Dingli

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