The GrubHub promo problems

[Dogempire]

GrubHub did not honor its terms and conditions. The emotes were not distributed on a first come, first serve basis due to technical difficulties on GrubHub's end. Y'all shouldn't have a problem with the chargeback on this basis. Personally, I wouldn't have ordered from GrubHub if I was entering a lottery for the emote because it cost me $30. Mogstation emotes are $7.

We need an official statement about this situation.

https://lp.grubhub.com/game-awards-p...nd-conditions/


It's literally in their terms and conditions and any half-decent dispute analyst can just pull that page up, read the first 2 sentences, and then deny the claim under said terms and conditions, and even if they did go the chargeback route all Grubhub has to do is copy and paste that little exerpt I cut out and they'll be able to deny the claim for the same reason.

It sucks but it's something that SE needs to deal with, and something that needs to be brought up to them

[Yahallo]

https://lp.grubhub.com/game-awards-p...nd-conditions/


It's literally in their terms and conditions and any half-decent dispute analyst can just pull that page up, read the first 2 sentences, and then deny the claim under said terms and conditions, and even if they did go the chargeback route all Grubhub has to do is copy and paste that little exerpt I cut out and they'll be able to deny the claim for the same reason.

It sucks but it's something that SE needs to deal with, and something that needs to be brought up to them

Except, those first two sentences are being contradicted by Grubhub. They responded to people about it being a lottery and not first come first serve. People who ordered before me did not get the emote while I did. They can't deny the chargeback claim under with the first two sentences of the terms and conditions because they violated those two sentences. Furthermore, since it won't be considered a false chargeback/fraud, if people are getting a response from Grubhub CS that they can't give a refund, then people should be responding with a chargeback thread, citing that Grubhub did violated the first come first serve policy in the promo's terms and conditions. Even if people would lose the chargeback dispute, Grubhub will lose favor with the banks if they receive a large number of chargebacks for the same reason, and a large number of chargeback claims for the same reason would add credence to those claims.

The moment someone gets an unsatisfactory response (e.g. being told that it is via a lottery) from Grubhub CS, they can file the chargeback without any risk to themselves.

It's doesn't seem like SE will do anything either as people are already being told to go to Grubhub by SE, as the codes are sent from a Grubhub e-mail. So the only option left is to hit Grubhub with the threat of Chargebacks en masse.

[Dogempire]

Except, those first two sentences are being contradicted by Grubhub. They responded to people about it being a lottery and not first come first serve. People who ordered before me did not get the emote while I did. They can't deny the chargeback claim under with the first two sentences of the terms and conditions because they violated those two sentences.

Nice try, but no, companies aren't bound to anything their reps say, especially considering that there's the possibility that they misinterpreted something or were given the wrong information

The moment someone gets an unsatisfactory response (e.g. being told that it is via a lottery) from Grubhub CS, they can file the chargeback without any risk to themselves.

Yes and no, if you file a chargeback you won't get in any legal trouble, but it's the bank's right if they want to close your card and/or revoke your debit card priviledges for wasting their time with a claim

It's doesn't seem like SE will do anything either as people are already being either as people are already being told to go to Grubhub by SE, as the codes are sent from a Grubhub e-mail. So the only option left is to hit Grubhub with the threat of Chargebacks en masse.

Yeah no, chargebacks don't go directly to the merchant in most cases, they go to the bank, the bank decides if it's worth submitting a chargeback (Probably not since you can just do a simple google search after reading the affidavit) and then only then will they submit a chargeback. Chargebacks don't take money from the merchant, it's a claim entailing what the situation is and whatever information the bank can provide regarding the nature of the dispute, any evidence, any written statements from the customer, etc.

From there the merchant decides whether to just reimburse, or to continue to dispute the charges, in the former case you can simply take a snip of the terms and conditions and reply with that, staying that the promo falls under terms and conditions and that you were never guaranteed the emote, they can also take a snapshot of your order and show that you never applied the promo code and send that back as well.

It's not worth submitting chargebacks in most cases because they cost money and they normally exhaust all available steps considering that they cost money for each transaction they want to submit a chargeback on (Like I said in a previous post, typically somewhere around $25-35 if it's being submitted through Visa)

You're free to file your dispute with your bank, but I really doubt it'll get anywhere unless they take pity on you and just refund you themselves to save time and money

[Yahallo]

Nice try, but no, companies aren't bound to anything their reps say, especially considering that there's the possibility that they misinterpreted something or were given the wrong information

Chargebacks are supposed to be used when you made a good faith attempt to try to resolve it with the company, but are unable to. The customer representative making that mistake counts as the company failing to resolve the issue in a satisfying manner. This qualifies as a legitimate reason to file the chargeback.

Yes and no, if you file a chargeback you won't get in any legal trouble, but it's the bank's right if they want to close your card and/or revoke your debit card priviledges for wasting their time with a claim

There is no reason why the bank would cancel your card for submitting a chargeback when the merchant fails to resolve an issue in a satisfying manner after you made a good faith attempt to do so; it's literally what it is for. Furthermore, the bank would probably make more money from you keeping the card than closing your card. I know mine definitely does from how much I use it.

Yeah no, chargebacks don't go directly to the merchant in most cases, they go to the bank, the bank decides if it's worth submitting a chargeback (Probably not since you can just do a simple google search after reading the affidavit) and then only then will they submit a chargeback. Chargebacks don't take money from the merchant, it's a claim entailing what the situation is and whatever information the bank can provide regarding the nature of the dispute, any evidence, any written statements from the customer, etc.

From there the merchant decides whether to just reimburse, or to continue to dispute the charges, in the former case you can simply take a snip of the terms and conditions and reply with that, staying that the promo falls under terms and conditions and that you were never guaranteed the emote, they can also take a snapshot of your order and show that you never applied the promo code and send that back as well.

It's not worth submitting chargebacks in most cases because they cost money and they normally exhaust all available steps considering that they cost money for each transaction they want to submit a chargeback on (Like I said in a previous post, typically somewhere around $25-35 if it's being submitted through Visa)

You're free to file your dispute with your bank, but I really doubt it'll get anywhere unless they take pity on you and just refund you themselves to save time and money

It doesn't cost the costumer any money to file; the fees are paid by the merchant, in this case Grubhub. Whenever a chargeback is filed, the merchant (Grubhub) has to pay a chargeback fee, typically ranging from $20 to $100. So already getting chargeback claims is a bad thing for grubhub, and they would likely want to avoid getting them in the first place; thus if you mention to Grubhub that you are considering a chargeback, it could increase the chance of Grubhub just refunding you rather than dealing with the chargeback, especially if multiple people are suggesting that they are considering filing a chargeback at the same time.

Furthermore, I would not be so sure that the bank would quickly dismiss this chargeback reason; it is clear that Grubhub violated its own terms and condition for the promo as it was clearly not first come first serve as stated in their terms and conditions. Again people who ordered before me did not get the code while I did.

So I do recommend that anyone who got an unsatisfactory response from Grubhub, such as refusing to refund you when you ask for it, to respond to Grubhub that you are considering filing a chargeback. The cost of just dealing with the chargeback can be more than just refunding you.

[Dogempire]

Chargebacks are supposed to be used when you made a good faith attempt to try to resolve it with the company, but are unable to. The customer representative making that mistake counts as the company failing to resolve the issue in a satisfying manner. This qualifies as a legitimate reason to file the chargeback.

You don't submit a chargeback, all you do is start the dispute process, chargebacks are initiated by the bank and it's obvious you don't know this

It doesn't cost the costumer any money to file; the fees are paid by the merchant, in this case Grubhub. Whenever a chargeback is filed, the merchant (Grubhub) has to pay a chargeback fee, typically ranging from $20 to $100. So already getting chargeback claims is a bad thing for grubhub, and they would likely want to avoid getting them in the first place; thus if you mention to Grubhub that you are considering a chargeback, it could increase the chance of Grubhub just refunding you rather than dealing with the chargeback, especially if multiple people are suggesting that they are considering filing a chargeback at the same time.

Yes, IF they submit a chargeback, most banks will do some preliminary investigation, and considering all you need to do is just google the terms of service for the promo to get the evidence you need to deny it, it's really doubtful they'll submit a chargeback, chargebacks only get submitted when there's sufficient reason to and usually the dispute analyst assigned to the case makes an attempt to resolve the issue with the merchant before paying the fee and initiating one, which is another way they can get the terms of service agreement. Chargebacks cost money for both the bank and the merchant, but the cost of it means that a bank won't want to submit one unless there's not really any other choice

Furthermore, I would not be so sure that the bank would quickly dismiss this chargeback reason; it is clear that Grubhub violated its own terms and condition for the promo as it was clearly not first come first serve as stated in their terms and conditions. Again people who ordered before me did not get the code while I did.

So I do recommend that anyone who got an unsatisfactory response from Grubhub, such as refusing to refund you when you ask for it, to respond to Grubhub that you are considering filing a chargeback. The cost of just dealing with the chargeback can be more than just refunding you.

Sure, I'll give you that, some banks might not mind footing the cost because they don't really deal with a lot of disputes, but I really doubt there's many people here who are a member of those high-end banks that are concerned about getting $30 back.

Anyways, I'll leave you to it, I know how these angry forum mobs are

[Yahallo]

You don't submit a chargeback, all you do is start the dispute process, chargebacks are initiated by the bank and it's obvious you don't know this

You are arguing semantics with this. I call it submitting the charge back because you are the one that starts it. The bank won't do anything unless you submit the chargeback, thus you are the initiator as you are where the chargeback begins (as without you, there would be no chargeback). Also, I did say in a previous post that the bank will first determine whether the reason is valid for a chargeback and whether fraud is being attempted, which based on the fact that Grubhub violated their own terms and conditions, would be more likely to be in the favor of the customer.

Yes, IF they submit a chargeback, most banks will do some preliminary investigation, and considering all you need to do is just google the terms of service for the promo to get the evidence you need to deny it, it's really doubtful they'll submit a chargeback, chargebacks only get submitted when there's sufficient reason to and usually the dispute analyst assigned to the case makes an attempt to resolve the issue with the merchant before paying the fee and initiating one, which is another way they can get the terms of service agreement. Chargebacks cost money for both the bank and the merchant, but the cost of it means that a bank won't want to submit one unless there's not really any other choice

You are wrong about the terms and conditions for the promo being used as evidence to deny it; the terms and conditions are evidence to approve it because Grubhub VIOLATED their own terms and conditions. It's because they violated their terms and conditions by not doing first come first serve that it can actually be used in the customer's favor. The terms and conditions state that the promo is FIRST COME FIRST SERVE but they instead did it RANDOMLY. Random is not first come first serve. It does not seem like you are really reading my posts at all because you somehow keep getting this part wrong.

Sure, I'll give you that, some banks might not mind footing the cost because they don't really deal with a lot of disputes, but I really doubt there's many people here who are a member of those high-end banks that are concerned about getting $30 back.

Anyways, I'll leave you to it, I know how these angry forum mobs are

The bank does not foot the cost, the merchant does. This means Grubhub pays the Chargeback fee because they are the merchant in this case. Furthermore, a large number of chargebacks can cause things like transaction fees to rise. Hence why, telling Grubhub Customer Service that you are considering a chargeback can potentially have them just refund you outright because they would rather do that than deal with a chargeback, even if they would win the dispute as it can potentially cost them more money than to refund you.

It honestly feels like you are either not fully reading my posts as your responses always interprets them in an incorrect way, and does not acknowledge certain facts like how Grubhub violated the promo's terms and conditions as you keep saying that the first two sentences in the terms and conditions somehow assists them when it is the part that would bite them if a chargeback did happen.

[ConcernedPerson]

update: spouse & I still have not received our emote codes for our 2 separate orders.

I've been thinking about accountability. How do you hold companies accountable when they exploit or con so many customers in a campaign like this?

Some ideas, for after the 2-week mark from Grubhub... A full-page crowd sourced ad run in major newspapers, like the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, LA Times, that basically says "Shame on you Grubhub & Square Enix. You told players that if they ordered $15 worth of food from Grubhub before fees between these dates, you would deliver an in-game item code. You did not do that. You screwed over hundreds/thousands of players.

Considering the number of people scammed by this, it actually would probably be easy to crowd-source.

Another idea. I'm going to assume that a lot of the players who were screwed over are college students, many of whom may live or commute to college campuses and who are part of various clubs/organizations/etc. College students could go around campus to bulletin boards, etc., posting flyers saying basically the same as above.

Another idea. Go to popular game reviewers on YouTube who cover Final Fantasy, particularly any that mentioned the pizza emote (e.g. Meoni), and flood the comments section, identifying yourself as one of the players conned by Grubhub & Square Enix.

Another idea. The next time Square Enix does a livestream event where there's commenting, e.g. on YouTube, flood the comments, referencing how you never received the pizza emote that you properly paid for by participating in the campaign.

Obviously these things require time, energy, and sustained anger. Is it worth it? IDK. Do I have it in myself? IDK. Part of me just wants to say screw it and walk away. But, I also know that's what Square Enix and Grubhub want. The thing is, guys, they really have the upper hand. We fell for their false promotion & they have our cash already in hand. Screwing over hundreds or thousands of players ... it's a drop in a bucket. Even if every single one of us never participated in another crossover campaign again, there will still be thousands of others who will (and potentially get screwed over, too). But as long as there is money to be made, what do they care?

I actually made a macro in game so that any time someone uses their pizza emote, I respond with a custom emote saying that I scowl, remembering how SE and Grubhub conned me with false advertising, and I reaffirm to myself my commitment to never take part in another crossover campaign for digital items again. I figure that at least this will warn other players who may not have heard about this rip-off and might make them think twice about participating in a future one. This may potentially be another way to hold Square Enix accountable for its end in this, particularly since they did not mention anywhere on the Lodestone that this was actually a raffle/lottery.

[Yahallo]

update: spouse & I still have not received our emote codes for our 2 separate orders.

I've been thinking about accountability. How do you hold companies accountable when they exploit or con so many customers in a campaign like this?

Some ideas, for after the 2-week mark from Grubhub... A full-page crowd sourced ad run in major newspapers, like the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, LA Times, that basically says "Shame on you Grubhub & Square Enix. You told players that if they ordered $15 worth of food from Grubhub before fees between these dates, you would deliver an in-game item code. You did not do that. You screwed over hundreds/thousands of players.

Considering the number of people scammed by this, it actually would probably be easy to crowd-source.

Another idea. I'm going to assume that a lot of the players who were screwed over are college students, many of whom may live or commute to college campuses and who are part of various clubs/organizations/etc. College students could go around campus to bulletin boards, etc., posting flyers saying basically the same as above.

Another idea. Go to popular game reviewers on YouTube who cover Final Fantasy, particularly any that mentioned the pizza emote (e.g. Meoni), and flood the comments section, identifying yourself as one of the players conned by Grubhub & Square Enix.

Another idea. The next time Square Enix does a livestream event where there's commenting, e.g. on YouTube, flood the comments, referencing how you never received the pizza emote that you properly paid for by participating in the campaign.

Obviously these things require time, energy, and sustained anger. Is it worth it? IDK. Do I have it in myself? IDK. Part of me just wants to say screw it and walk away. But, I also know that's what Square Enix and Grubhub want. The thing is, guys, they really have the upper hand. We fell for their false promotion & they have our cash already in hand. Screwing over hundreds or thousands of players ... it's a drop in a bucket. Even if every single one of us never participated in another crossover campaign again, there will still be thousands of others who will (and potentially get screwed over, too). But as long as there is money to be made, what do they care?

I actually made a macro in game so that any time someone uses their pizza emote, I respond with a custom emote saying that I scowl, remembering how SE and Grubhub conned me with false advertising, and I reaffirm to myself my commitment to never take part in another crossover campaign for digital items again. I figure that at least this will warn other players who may not have heard about this rip-off and might make them think twice about participating in a future one. This may potentially be another way to hold Square Enix accountable for its end in this, particularly since they did not mention anywhere on the Lodestone that this was actually a raffle/lottery.

I kind of wonder what would happen if those hundreds/thousands of players filed a chargeback against Grubhub. I feel like with that amount of people even just threatening Grubhub with a chargeback would put a lot of pressure on them and make them at the very least refund entire orders. They have a lot more to lose if a large number of chargebacks were submitted against them for the same reason.

[Anatha]

Nice try, but no, companies aren't bound to anything their reps say, especially considering that there's the possibility that they misinterpreted something or were given the wrong information

Except, you know, it's not first come first serve. So you're wrong. Everyone who feels slighted should chargeback if the company refuses to offer a refund.

Since it actually /is/ random who gets the code and who doesn't, they are, in fact liable.

[Yahallo]

Except, you know, it's not first come first serve. So you're wrong. Everyone who feels slighted should chargeback if the company refuses to offer a refund.

Since it actually /is/ random who gets the code and who doesn't, they are, in fact liable.

Just make sure to make the good faith attempt first and respond to Grubhub that a refusal to refund means you will be considering a chargeback. The cost of just getting a chargeback filed against them can cost more than them just refunding you. Just the threat of a chargeback, especially if multiple are doing so for the same reason, can pressure them to refund.

Otherwise yeah, people should be filing chargebacks if Grubhub doesn't budge and just refuses to refund them.

Honestly, having this option is a huge reason why I make almost all of my purchases with a credit card. Aside from getting cashback on everything I purchase (1-5% definitely accumulates over time), having the option to chargeback is really useful; just mentioning it can get you favorable response as most businesses would rather not deal with it if they don't have to. Obviously I only make the threat if I don't get proper service, but it is very useful to have in your back pocket when you need it. Plus, I am pretty sure the credit card companies love that I am making nearly all of my purchases with my credit cards since they make money off the transaction fees.