Today, we’re publishing a surprising series of correspondence between Tesco and CheapEats reader Audrey O’Byrne. The emails, all sent between October 10 and October 13, confirm that many of Tesco’s prices will be rising with the end of the Change for Good campaign. It coincides with yesterday’s news that Tesco is more expensive in Northern Ireland than in the Republic.
We’ve deleted some extraneous information from the emails – formalities, apologies for the delay in responding, and the name of the customer service manager in question. Many thanks to Audrey for sending this in.
Below, Audrey queries why the prices reduced as part of Tesco’s “Change for Good campaign have increased in price:
Dear Sir
I am wondering if Tesco has abandoned its Change for Good campaign. Over the last few weeks I have been shopping in your store in Douglas, Cork and I have noticed that prices that were reduced in your original Change for Good campaign in August have now been increased again. I see from an article published in the Irish Times of August 29th that Mr Kenny Jacobs, Marketing Director of Tesco Ireland stated that Tesco reached an agreement with Unicef whereby Tesco will no longer use the term “Change for Good” after September 11th 2009, however it does not state that along with not using the term Tesco will not be using the “change for good” prices either. Several items that I purchase have gone back up in price since they were reduced during this campaign.
I would be grateful if someone could clarify the situation on prices for me.
Yours faithfully
Audrey O’Byrne
Because, comes the reply, it was all just a marketing promotion, and “change for good” actually means change for a few months:
Dear Audrey
In relation to your query regarding the change for good campaign, I can advise that regrettably this has now ended in our stores since the start of September.
Therefore this is why you will now be noticing a increases [sic] in our product prices. I hope that this helps to clarify things for you.
If I can help you any further please don’t hesitate to contact me at customer.service@tesco.co.uk quoting [code number deleted].
Kind Regards
[name deleted]
Customer Service Manager
Tesco Customer Service
Audrey, agog, asks:
Dear Mr [name omitted]
Thank you for your response.
Could I ask you were you advertising something as “change for good” when in fact it was only for a few weeks? Surely that is misleading to customers. What did Tesco mean by “change for good”?
Kind regards
Audrey O’Byrne
Tesco’s mealy-mouthed response?
Dear Audrey
Firstly, I would like to thank you for your response to my email correspondence.
I would like to apologise that you found the wording of our change for good campaign misleading, please let me assure you that this was certainly not our intention to mislead any of our customers.
In relation to the wording, I feel that this was meaning a change for the better, as our customers were able to make considerable savings during this promotion. Regardless of this, I can still understand why you and other customers may have found the wording of this misleading.
Therefore I can assure you that I will fully log your comments and they will be passed to the relevant department, to take on board for any future wording of promotions.
Once again my apologies and if I can help you any further please don’t hesitate to contact me at customer.service@tesco.co.uk quoting [code omitted-
Kind Regards
[name omitted]
Customer Service Manager
Tesco Customer Service
Audrey was flabbergasted. Did he really just say that? Speaking to CheapEats.ie, Audrey said: “I thought Tesco were making a really good effort to give customers in the South a good deal, I suppose I should have known it was too good to be true. I couldn’t believe the reply I got to be honest. Whoever thought up that slogan was very clever, or did they just poach it straight from Unicef?”
So there you go. It’s not that their Change for Good campaign was misleading at all. No, the problem is you, their tiny-brained customers, are far too unsophisticated to understand the linguistic nuances of the word “good.” Why, next time, you should give it more thought before you cross Tesco’s threshold.
It’s time now for a genuinely independent, properly funded consumer watchdog, not the defanged, government-funded National Consumer Agency.
What do you think of this revelation from Tesco?