Just got back from B&N with my $128 Nook Color.

[iammimi]

Damn tired of thieves, you jerks get me so angry.
It's a game to steal and get away with it.
Morally wrong, depraved, corrupt, dishonest, do any of these words mean anything any more.
What's the difference doing these scams and out right walking off without paying. NOTHING. And if you think because you scam a big business you didn't hurt anyone.
Think about it. BN has over 177 store nation wide each with a very large staff. You keep stealing BN will go under and all those people will join the ranks of unemployed.
But YEA for you and your freebie today. To hell with what it really cost everyone else.
Maybe they should just raise the price per purchase FOR EVERYONE to accomodate the amount you steal.

[iammimi]

You agreed to the terms and conditions when you purchased it.

Barnes & Noble Groupon Terms and Conditions
Your use or purchase of this Groupon for Barnes & Noble products and services (“BN Groupon”) indicates your acceptance of these Terms and Conditions.

•Limit 1 per person. Valid on all items - including sale items. Not valid on previous purchases and/or adjustments. Not valid with other offers.
•Except as prohibited by applicable law, on April 10, 2011, any funds remaining on the BN Groupon shall be reduced by $10.00. For example, if you use your BN Groupon to make a $6.00 purchase sometime in March (meaning your BN Groupon would have a remaining balance of $14.00) but do not use it again thereafter, on April 10, your BN Groupon will be reduced to $4.00 (because $14.00 minus $10.00 is $4.00).
•Except as otherwise stated below, BN Groupons can be used at any Barnes & Noble store nationwide, at BN.com, Bookstar or any B. Dalton Bookseller location. They cannot be used at any Barnes & Noble College location or websites.
•Maintenance, dormancy or service fees do not apply to balances on BN Groupons. Except for the reduction in value date described above, BN Groupons have no expiration dates.
•Hold your BN Groupons securely and write down your BN Groupon number and PIN in a safe place. BN Groupons that are lost or stolen will ONLY be replaced, up to the value remaining, with satisfactory proof of purchase AND the BN Groupon number. Call 1-800-THE-BOOK in order to have a lost or stolen BN Groupon replaced.
•BN Groupons are not redeemable for cash, except to the extent required by law.
•BN Groupons may be used to purchase annual memberships in the Barnes & Noble Membership program (continuous billing memberships require a valid credit card).
•BN Groupons may be used to purchase single issues of eNewspapers and eMagazines; however, they cannot be used for subscriptions to eNewspapers or eMagazines.
•We reserve the right to prohibit the purchase of Barnes & Noble gift cards with other BN Groupons.

[jedifarfy]

Thank you for trying to save my job. Sadly, many people just don't care. They want what they want and they want it cheap. I can't blame them for that, but trying to scam us isn't going to work.

I thought I'd update for those considering the e-gift card method: We got another memo regarding that one now. They clarified which numbers indicate a Groupon (yes, there is a specific set of starting #s!) and also showed up images of a the fake e-gift cards that were attempted at a store.

PLEASE just stop. At this point I'm sure the company will NEVER do anything like this again. It's taking too much time and effort to stop people from abusing the system and we're to the point where we just will deny you. Have a fit, call a manager, do what you want. You're just ruining it for those of us who are honest.

[jasoraso]

I take it that iammimi feels very strongly about this! Actually, my understanding is that in the first several hours of the Groupon, the groupon did NOT state clearly that it was 1 item/transaction; and that subsequently, the terms were changed (or clarified) as the case may be. I know when I bought my first Groupon (I only bought 2), the website DID NOT say that; and I couldn't find the link to the terms and conditions. The second one I bought DID say clearly 1/transaction; as well as have a link to terms and conditions.

Also, please understand that the OP CALLED corporate B&N ... and that their policy appears to changed VERY quickly as this Groupon was rolled out.

[travfar]

Originally Posted by jedifarfy

Thank you for trying to save my job. Sadly, many people just don't care. They want what they want and they want it cheap. I can't blame them for that, but trying to scam us isn't going to work.

I thought I'd update for those considering the e-gift card method: We got another memo regarding that one now. They clarified which numbers indicate a Groupon (yes, there is a specific set of starting #s!) and also showed up images of a the fake e-gift cards that were attempted at a store.

PLEASE just stop. At this point I'm sure the company will NEVER do anything like this again. It's taking too much time and effort to stop people from abusing the system and we're to the point where we just will deny you. Have a fit, call a manager, do what you want. You're just ruining it for those of us who are honest.

I agree about the people printing out those barcoded GC's. I just don't see the point to it. I went in with my Groupon PDFs. They aren't fake though since the only thing that matters is the number and the pin. Whether your print them out or scribbled them on a bubble gum wrapper is just as valid. The only thing that matters are the numbers.

B&N and Groupon have no one to blame other than themselves. It's not like this is a rare occurence. LS and Amazon had the exact samething happen to them 2 weeks beforehand. I highly doubt B&N/Groupon didn't know about that since it even hit the news. So the fact that they didn't take simple steps to prevent it, shows that either they are incompetent or they simply don't care. I don't think they are incompetent so they simply must not have cared.

As the other poster said. The T&Cs initially did not say 1/transaction. All they said were 1/account. By Groupon's own definition, all the deals are differentiated by city. So the B&N deal in New York was different from the B&N deal in Miami. There were 10's of cities where this B&N deal was active. So each one was a separate deal as far as the 1 deal per account phrase was concerned.

B&N corporate initially said that they didn't care how many Groupon GC's were used on one transaction. They only changed their minds later after it became "too popular".

All this could have been prevented easily by B&N/Groupon. As you have said, the Groupon GC's have a unique sequence. It would have just taken one line of code to limit it to 1 per transaction. B&N still hasn't done this. Groupon could have just as easily enforced the 1/person rule by filtering by address. They didn't. Instead both companies are retroactively changing the terms and conditions that were agreed to. They are also zeroing out people's GC's and haven't provided refunds. If the goal was to promote B&N in a positive light, this is not the way to go about it.

[jedifarfy]

By B&N "Corporate" you probably mean the BN.com people, who are the ones who answer the phones. They're CSR just the same as the rest of us and probably hadn't even heard of the Groupon... like the rest of us. B&N was alerted to people trying to use multiple groupons and put the limitation of 1/transaction.

The groupon was listed for multiple cities as B&N is IN multiple cities. People have their accounts set for their area and this way many people could see it. If you are using the argument, that the deal was posted 10 times for 10 different cities and therefore is 10 different deals, then you should be forced to use them just in those cities. The deal was 1 per account, which equates to 1 per person. No one, no company, expects people to make multiple accounts. That scams not just B&N but also Groupon.

You can pretty much guarantee that this won't happen again in the future. Either the legal lingo will be tightened, or most likely, big companies will just not participate.

[iammimi]

Originally Posted by jasoraso

I take it that iammimi feels very strongly about this! Actually, my understanding is that in the first several hours of the Groupon, the groupon did NOT state clearly that it was 1 item/transaction; and that subsequently, the terms were changed (or clarified) as the case may be. I know when I bought my first Groupon (I only bought 2), the website DID NOT say that; and I couldn't find the link to the terms and conditions. The second one I bought DID say clearly 1/transaction; as well as have a link to terms and conditions.

Also, please understand that the OP CALLED corporate B&N ... and that their policy appears to changed VERY quickly as this Groupon was rolled out.

The terms you agreed to have not changed.

[iammimi]

I am confused. You abused the terms of this coupon (one per customer/one per transaction) and taking the fraudulent groupon #'s from you, resulted in them stealing from you? Wish you had called the police I would love to see how that played out.

Groupon's have unique numbers so the receipt will clearly say that the books were purchased with a groupon. Just like using a regular coupon, when you return books you don't get back the retail value you get back the value you paid. So my guess is you'll get back 1/2 the value.

I just want to say this type of attitude towards theft is why our country is where it is today. We are responsible for our behaviors and if not today, still we all will pay.

You keep treating others like this we will all see the consequences sooner rather, than later.
Theft is not a game. And not something you should be proudly posting online.
The results for some might be closing of a business, and for others loss of their jobs.
Way to go!

[kalex]

Are you done?

Wow 7 posts and all in this thread.

[travfar]

Originally Posted by jedifarfy

The groupon was listed for multiple cities as B&N is IN multiple cities. People have their accounts set for their area and this way many people could see it. If you are using the argument, that the deal was posted 10 times for 10 different cities and therefore is 10 different deals, then you should be forced to use them just in those cities. The deal was 1 per account, which equates to 1 per person. No one, no company, expects people to make multiple accounts. That scams not just B&N but also Groupon.

Ah... no. You've never used Groupon have you? That's not how it works. Your account is not bound to a city. It's just an account. There's a handy dropdown on the Groupon page that let's you change which city you are currently looking at. It's quite prominent. So with the same account you can buy deals in any and every city. Different cities have different deals. Each deal in each city is considered a different deal. Some cities have the same deals, others don't. Creating multiple accounts is not necessary.

As for calling corporate. My local mgr didn't just talk to the front line phone CSRs. She specifically asked to speak to a group who "would know". They told her to accept multiple GC's per transaction. It just not the phone people. The website itself was programmed to accept multiple transactions as was the phone system. If B&N intended it to be 1/transaction from the start, why did they specifically program it to accept multiples? If B&N wanted to limit the use to specific cities or 1/transaction, they could have easily done so from the start. They didn't.

I find it offensive that you refer to this as a scam. I didn't use fake names or addresses or go into the store wearing a mask. Every step along the way I told them what I was doing and they approved it. How's that a scam?

[jedifarfy]

Basically, you've decided that getting multiple gift cards when only 1 per account was allowed is just fine, that that's great. Yes, I DO know how the website and system works. Thanks for telling me how my own company functions. Also, there IS no direct corporate line. They called 1-800-The-Book and yes, our system does allow multiple EGCs.

I've never used a groupon previously but knew how it works: you buy the ones for your city and move on. I do know you can scroll down to other cities and get other deals. That's groupon's fault. I doubt they intended for people to buy multiple city deals and use them together. I bet that will change in the future.

Overall, I'm just sad that this site allowed this thread and the links within to promote scamming and scheming against any company. I'm done with this site and will stop recommending it to others interested in message boards and online help. Such a shame.

[jhempel24]

Originally Posted by kalex

Are you done?

Wow 7 posts and all in this thread.

+1 that was my thought exactly.....get over it. I bought two...I must be fraudulent and evil.

[kalex]

haha. Yes you should be ashamed of yourself for buying them. Go to your local BN and demand that they charge u extra.

your avatar is very appropriate for that poster