Yasmin Jade

Review of The Gourmet Society

I previously had a tastecard which I used several ...

I previously had a tastecard which I used several times and found that the offers were fantastic for me. I came across an offer on o2 for a 6-month membership with gourmet society so I thought I would try them for a change. During the time I only used the card once as I found the offers in my area weren't great and felt like I wouldn't renew my membership.

I visited the website in May to try and see if there was a way to cancel my account but there is no option on their app or on their website, there aren't even any FAQ's on the matter.

A few months later, a logged into my account to check what money I had left before going food shopping (only a few days before payday), my car insurance was yet to be taken but I had reserved the money for this. I noticed a payment had been taken and when I looked at transactions I discovered it was for renewal of my gourmet society membership. Confused, I went into my emails (which I check several times a day) and searched for their name in all mailboxes (in case it fell into my spam folder), no emails came up, no warnings about renewal, no reminder about payment being taken out, and no emails to even advise me that my policy had been renewed. I decided to log into my account using their non-mobile friendly website which told me i had to register again for some reason, so after having to put in all of my information, AGAIN, i was finally logged into my account, i searched everywhere for a 'cancel' option but found nothing, i logged into the app and also found nothing about this, the only thing i could find was a general contact email address. I sent an email to them advising that i wasn't aware of the renewal date of my membership and that they have taken my car insurance money out of my account, leaving me short for the rest of the month. It took 4 working days to receive a response, which read:

"I am sorry learn that you had not anticipated the renewal of your membership.

I can however confirm that when you joined us on a promotional offer you agreed to the terms and conditions of membership and were made aware that your membership was an ongoing subscription service.

This is detailed at the time of application, the confirmation email and also the renewal reminder we send (which i did not receive). If you do not obtain a cancellation code prior to your renewal date you will be billed for an annual membership.

In order to cancel your membership, you would have needed to contact us no later than 5pm on the working day preceding your expiry date.

As we did not receive any notification of your cancellation you were charged for your annual membership accordingly.

Your renewal reminder was sent via email on the 24/08. I am not therefore in a position to refund this fee to you but can confirm that all future renewals have been cancelled and no further payments will be taken for your membership."

I went back to my emails to search for any emails i may have missed, i have received a total of 3 emails from them since i joined, all from when having to re-register to their appalling website, but nothing about renewal. I also do not understand why they make it so difficult to cancel a policy. Why should i need a code to cancel? it should be made clear on the website and i should be able to cancel with the click of a button! i also contacted them as soon as i noticed that money had been taken, literally 2 days later so my policy had only just "renewed" and i had not used the service and had no intention to. there should be a cool down period to which i should be able to receive a refund, i should not be paying for a service that i have no intention of using. If i would have received a renewal email, i would have followed the steps to cancel, not left it for money to be taken, and yet even though i advised i hadn't received any emails in my message to them, my response was made out as if i had received it but had not bothered to act upon it!!!

For anyone considering trying a gourmet society membership through a trial, please take all of this into consideration.