How far should you go to claim your rebate? How patient and careful should you be while submitting the forms and proofs for a rebate? How alert should you be about tracking your rebate? Do all of these things guarantee that you receive your rebate on time and that too in full? These questions surfaced in my mind when I had an unpleasant experience with T-Mobile regarding one of the rebates.
All these started a few months back when I decided to upgrade my 2 year old phone with a new Blackberry Pearl 8120. I was excited to see the features of the new phone on the T-Mobile website and decided to go for a 1 year contract with them. I called up T-Mobile customer service and they told me that the mail-in rebate on this phone was $100. I placed my order and received the phone in a week or so. I am a person who is very diligent when it comes to rebates. So the very next day I sent out the filled up rebate form along with the necessary proofs.
Weeks passed and I received a shocking letter in my mailbox saying that my rebate was disqualified since the submitted proof didn't contain a valid T-Mobile product SKU#. I was upset since I had read the rebate submission requirements in detail and was sure that I hadn't missed anything. I called up the rebate status center and explained them about the letter I received. The customer service person did some research on his end and told me that the rebate was valid and I had submitted all the proofs correctly. I felt vindicated. He gave me a tracking number and I religiously tracked my rebate.
Another few weeks passed by and I received a mail from T-Mobile. That mail contained a Visa Prepaid card worth $50. This was my rebate ‘check’ but only in the form of a Visa debit card. Well did you notice something wrong here? The amount was $50 but I was promised a rebate of $100. I was furious and called up T-Mobile. They confirmed that the rebate amount promised was $100 and they were not sure where the other $50 went. I was then connected to the ‘Rebate Center’. After holding the phone for 10 minutes, I could speak with a customer representative. I explained the whole story to her and she did some research on her end. She found out that my rebate was processed for some other promotion and that’s the reason I got only $50. She was not apologetic about it and she told me that she will put in a request to reprocess my rebate. I was curious to know when I would receive my rebate but she had no clue. I asked her to expedite the process since it was their fault; she told me that she couldn't do anything about it. Finally I received a tracking number from her and the onus was on me to check the status of the rebate periodically.
Some more weeks passed and my patience was wearing out. Finally I received another Visa Prepaid card worth $50. I heaved a sigh of relief. Even though I had sent all the necessary rebate documents well on time, it took me around 3 months to receive the rebate. Another amazing fact is that, if I had not enquired about the other $50 then I would have lost my money for no fault of mine. This is not the kind of service the customers expect from a company like T-Mobile. My question is why do you want to promise a rebate when you are not very keen in honoring its terms and conditions? I believe that patience, follow up and good luck are the important elements for receiving your rebate on time. Among the three, ‘Good Luck’ is the uttermost factor in some exceptional cases :)
