Fed up with Flybuys [issues rectified]

[Jurahn]

Sorry, bit of a rant following … Have been a Flybuys member - and Coles shopper - for years, but if it weren’t for the VA SC earn through the program, I'd cut up both cards and dump the scheme altogether.


I’ve been trying to find out for over 18 months why I don’t receive any Coles-related FB offers. I (very) occasionally get bonus points offers for Target, Kmart and Coles Express and have been receiving my FB statement via email for several years. I also constantly receive offers for just about every other FB "partner", including Medibank, Adidas, Coles Insurance etc, not to mention FB Travel and FB E-store, so there’s obviously no problem with their system recognising my account and email address and sending those offers.

However for the past 3-4 years, I’ve received practically NOTHING in the way of Coles offers. No paper vouchers/coupons for at least 4 years, the last bonus points “docket deal” was probably about 2 years ago, and have NEVER received a “spend this much each week to receive this many bonus points” offer, or double/triple bonus points offers either. I think there’s been one “swipe your card and get this product free" offer (banana bread I think) which would have been 2-3 years ago. As far as I can recall, there's been two “buy this product for 100/200 bonus points” offers in the same period.

I’ve tried the so-called “tricks” of swiping/not swiping the card on small/big occasional/all shops (for quite some period each time), including the card not being used for weeks at a time when we’ve been away OS, as well as on several occasions de-selecting my communication preferences, then re-selecting them a few days later, and anything else that has been suggested on various threads I've read. Contacting FB via email and phone on numerous occasions has been a waste of time, I just get brushed off with the standard “because of the number of Flybuys members, not all members receive all offers”. Yes, I KNOW that, I’ve been told that over and over and OVER again, but why can’t (or won’t) anyone tell me why I don’t receive ANY Coles offers at all?


Another AFFer (Rainbowgirl, I think it might have been) suggested closing the account and opening another one, although I don’t know whether that comes with any issues of it’s own ( i.e. trying to open an account with identical details to one that has just been closed). Anyway, before trying that, as a last ditch effort I spent quite some time writing a detailed and polite letter to Flybuys - yes, that's right, by snail mail! - asking if someone could look into these issues with my account. After all, it could be something similar to the problem that occurred with my Velocity account - suddenly stopped receiving any emails at all for about 9 months, contacted Velocity who escalated to IT and I suddenly started receiving emails again. Not sure what they did, whether they “re-set” something on the account but it worked.


I looked back at the copy of the letter today, and realised it was posted on 12th July … a month ago now and and not even the courtesy of a reply from FB, which is extremely poor customer service on their part - or a total LACK of customer service, I guess I should say!


It’s enormously frustrating to see threads on this and other forums listing the countless offers that other FB members receive on a regular basis, and the amount of points that result from those offers. Very little of our shopping $ is going through Coles these days anyway, as neither of us need SCs for at least several more months, and I’m pretty peeved with the whole experience, so may have to look at whether it's even worth “starting over” with a new account.


Ok, rant over (for the moment at least LOL).

 

[flybuys]

We're so sorry to hear of your frustrating time with flybuys, and we're especially disappointed to hear that your letter to us has remained without acknowledgement or response - this simply isn't good enough on our part. We appreciate you've already rung us about this, but if you're able to send your member number in a private message, we undertake to get to the bottom of this for you. Again, our sincere apologies for your experience to date.

 

[Jurahn]

We're so sorry to hear of your frustrating time with flybuys, and we're especially disappointed to hear that your letter to us has remained without acknowledgement or response - this simply isn't good enough on our part. We appreciate you've already rung us about this, but if you're able to send your member number in a private message, we undertake to get to the bottom of this for you. Again, our sincere apologies for your experience to date.

Thank you for your response to my post - it is very much appreciated, and I have PM'd you with the requested details. Yes, it has been a very frustrating (and prolonged) experience, and I would be immensely grateful if someone can look into this issue with my account.

 

[perthjay85]

It's impressive that flybuys has a rep on here.

Good work.

 

[Pleb Status]

I would have cancelled and opened a new account....

 

[Strategic Aviation]

I’ve been trying to find out for over 18 months why I don’t receive any Coles-related FB offers.

A fair few people have this problem with one or the other (hopefully not both!). I have it with Woolworths Rewards and tried the same things to fix it with no luck (but I can easily ignore WW).

why can’t (or won’t) anyone tell me why I don’t receive ANY Coles offers at all?

Simplest explanation is that they don't know. Presumably it's not intentional despite the standard spiel.

Hopefully the flybuys rep has already resolved it for you.

It's impressive that flybuys has a rep on here.

The flybuys rep seems to be the most helpful corporate account on AFF. (Sadly however, the others haven't set a high bar by any means.)

 

[Jurahn]

A fair few people have this problem with one or the other (hopefully not both!). I have it with Woolworths Rewards and tried the same things to fix it with no luck (but I can easily ignore WW). Simplest explanation is that they don't know. Presumably it's not intentional despite the standard spiel.

I agree, they probably didn't know, however as I was just "brushed off" each time with the standard spiel and no one at Flybuys ever bothered to actually look into my account (despite my requests to do so), as it's turned out, if someone HAD checked into it, the issue would probably have been resolved long ago.

Hopefully the flybuys rep has already resolved it for you.
The flybuys rep seems to be the most helpful corporate account on AFF. (Sadly however, the others haven't set a high bar by any means.)

I have been quite amazed, and extremely pleased, not only at the speed of the Flybuys rep's initial response but also the rapid follow-up which has taken place. First thing Friday morning, I received a PM which advised a technical issue had been identified with the account which was affecting the offers, so a new Flybuys membership would need to be set up. A couple of PMs back and forth, and an hour later one of the service centre managers rang me and set up a new account for myself and Mr Jurahn over the phone. She advised it would be best for me to unlink Velocity and my Coles MC from the old FB number and relink them to the new one before she closed the old account, to avoid any issues, especially with the MC, and said she would ring back later in the day to see how that was going.

The Velocity process went without a hitch, but unfortunately ran into a glitch with the Coles MC - when I contacted their customer service team, they advised I needed to update the FB number through the Coles MC online portal and got me to log on so they could guide me through the process. Unfortunately, the "Flybuys - Manage Details" section just would not work (although everything else on the online portal was fine) and just kept returning a message of "System Unavailable - try again later". I think there may have been other Flybuys IT issues on that day, so maybe that was the cause? Anyway, I kept trying for a couple of hours but still got nowhere so rang them back and they will try to do a manual workaround, which could take up to 3 working days to go through. True to her word, the Flybuys service centre manager rang back, and when I advised of the Coles MC problem, she advised she would keep checking my Flybuys account (to save me having to do so) and when the MC link came through, she would let me know and then would proceed with transferring points over and finalising/closing the old account.

So a big thumbs up for the Flybuys rep and his/her team, as well as the wonderfully proactive, efficient and helpful Flybuys service centre manager (unfortunately I didn't catch her name, so will have to remember to check that when she contacts me next week!). Great to see reps responding on this board and actually achieving a positive outcome for members.

 

[Jurahn]

Thought I might as well tack this on to the end of this thread, as it seems to be an issue with my newly set up account (which has been working well - once the Coles MC link thing was sorted out - and have finally been receiving offers). When the new account was set up a month ago, I selected my local Coles here in WA, and that is still what's displaying under my account details. However, I've noticed the last few emails I've received from Flybuys have referred to Batemans Bay NSW as my local store!! About a week after the new account was up and running, I did one shop at the Batemans Bay store whilst I was visiting Dad in NSW - have never shopped there before or since. I logged into my account today and on the offers page it says: "You can save $87.05 at your local Coles store (Coles Batemans Bay)"! I checked the account details and yep, my local WA store is still listed, so I deleted that, re-entered it and clicked "Update" and hope that might fix the problem. I've also contacted Flybuys via the website feedback option to ask them to have a look at it.

So not sure what's going on there, but the Flybuys system certainly seems to be a bit "glitchy" at times. Has anyone else had this happen?

 

[mannej]

The Flybuys system is a bit glitchy currently.

 

[TerryW]

A couple of months ago i had missing bonus points from purchase at Kmart,kept all receipts and offers,when they did not come after the stated waiting period i rang the call center and explained the situation. they looked at the information at their end and aplogized for a fault error and added the points immediately.This is the only problem i have with since being a member when it started.

 

[rainbowgirl]

"You can save $87.05 at your local Coles store (Coles Batemans Bay)"! I

I've seen this happen before. The Tuesday email system should reset itself in a few weeks once you do another couple of transactions at your regular Coles.

 

[Jurahn]

I've seen this happen before. The Tuesday email system should reset itself in a few weeks once you do another couple of transactions at your regular Coles.

I hope so - I've been using my card back here in Perth since 6th September, so I assume it will recognise that sooner or later!

 

[ozjuice]

I never get any Flybuy offers either except on the shopper dockets. Pretty disappointing really.

 

[Jurahn]

I never get any Flybuy offers either except on the shopper dockets. Pretty disappointing really.

As per the post at the start of this thread, I wasn't even getting shopper dockets, let alone any other offers, for several years. I only started receiving them when Flybuys closed my old account and started up the new one for me.

 

[flybuys]

Thought I might as well tack this on to the end of this thread, as it seems to be an issue with my newly set up account (which has been working well - once the Coles MC link thing was sorted out - and have finally been receiving offers). When the new account was set up a month ago, I selected my local Coles here in WA, and that is still what's displaying under my account details. However, I've noticed the last few emails I've received from Flybuys have referred to Batemans Bay NSW as my local store!! About a week after the new account was up and running, I did one shop at the Batemans Bay store whilst I was visiting Dad in NSW - have never shopped there before or since. I logged into my account today and on the offers page it says: "You can save $87.05 at your local Coles store (Coles Batemans Bay)"! I checked the account details and yep, my local WA store is still listed, so I deleted that, re-entered it and clicked "Update" and hope that might fix the problem. I've also contacted Flybuys via the website feedback option to ask them to have a look at it.

So not sure what's going on there, but the Flybuys system certainly seems to be a bit "glitchy" at times. Has anyone else had this happen?

Thanks for your feedback. We've had the odd issue reported similar to what you've described regarding home store or store of choice, as your experience clearly isn't what we would aim for. We have reported it to our technical team for investigation.

 

[Jurahn]

Thanks for your feedback. We've had the odd issue reported similar to what you've described regarding home store or store of choice, as your experience clearly isn't what we would aim for. We have reported it to our technical team for investigation.

Many thanks, much appreciated

 

[Jurahn]

I'm pleased to report my Flybuys account seems to have "re-set" and my local Coles is now showing as the correct store.

 

[samopp]

I was offered spend $x amount for for 4 weeks and get 10000 bonus points. I completed my week 1 shopping and into my 2nd week. All of sudden, the offer is expired. I called flybuys and CS told me that's normal. The offer expired after week 1 so I can't activate it again. I politely told him that from my past experiences, the offers always stayed active for 4 weeks, and i'm not going to spend a cent if it says expired. The CS insisted there's nothing wrong with their system. So I guess it's time to say goodbye to flybuys.

 

[Jurahn]

I was offered spend $x amount for for 4 weeks and get 10000 bonus points. I completed my week 1 shopping and into my 2nd week. All of sudden, the offer is expired. I called flybuys and CS told me that's normal. The offer expired after week 1 so I can't activate it again. I politely told him that from my past experiences, the offers always stayed active for 4 weeks, and i'm not going to spend a cent if it says expired. The CS insisted there's nothing wrong with their system. So I guess it's time to say goodbye to flybuys.

Wow, that's not good. I got a similar 4 week offer for 10,000 bonus points, met the Week 1 spend, did the Week 2 spend yesterday and received the "congratulations, only 2 weeks to go" message on the bottom of my docket. Today I noticed the offer is now not showing on my Flybuys account anywhere at all, not even under expired offers. I'm assuming it's still running, seeing as I received the message on my docket, but your post has me worried now!

 

[mannej]

I was offered spend $x amount for for 4 weeks and get 10000 bonus points. I completed my week 1 shopping and into my 2nd week. All of sudden, the offer is expired. I called flybuys and CS told me that's normal. The offer expired after week 1 so I can't activate it again. I politely told him that from my past experiences, the offers always stayed active for 4 weeks, and i'm not going to spend a cent if it says expired. The CS insisted there's nothing wrong with their system. So I guess it's time to say goodbye to flybuys.

The CS is correct, no need to leave FB over that.

Week 2 should appear in your list of offers shortly.