BHS shoppers left short-changed by voucher policy
One elderly woman was left shocked when she was told her £50 gift card was only worth £25 - and to spend it she would have to pay cash for half the value of the goods.
Maureen Halliday, 82, tried to spend the £50 gift card that her son gave her as a Christmas present at a BHS store.
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Hide AdShe was told that the gift card was only worth £25 and that she must also spend £25 cash to redeem the card at the store in Bromley, south west London.
Maureen, from Mottingham, south west London said: “We have had several deaths in the family and I haven’t really thought about clothes until now.
“I went in there and they told me that were was only £25 on there, it’s disgraceful.”
BHS has agreed to continue accepting gift cards despite going into administration, but shoppers need to spend twice as much as the face value of the card.
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Hide AdMaureen felt the situation was not made clear to her while she was shopping or when she tried to pay at the store on Tuesday morning.
She said: “The assistant just said that was the rules and regulations with them closing down, I said can you explain to me why I’ve got to pay anything to anyone.
“It is just not right, they have just got a small thing up on the counter, and she wasn’t very patient.
“She was looking at me like I couldn’t understand what she was trying to tell me.”
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Hide AdMaureen left the shop with nothing as she did not have the money to pay half in cash.
She said: “I couldn’t pay for the clothes that had been put by for me, I said that I’m not having that, I said I’m an old age pensioner, I don’t get money out of the sky.
“Now I have lost the whole £50, the reason that I had the card was to treat myself, from my son.
“It is terrible, I can’t believe my son paid £50 and I have got to pay half of what I buy.
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Hide Ad“They are taking money off you, I wish something could be done because I think it is all wrong.”
Money Saving Expert advises that people spend gift cards as soon as possible after receiving them.
When a company goes into administration it is no longer obliged to accept gift cards - yet many shoppers may not be aware that their vouchers are suddenly worth less.
BHS entered administration last month, threatening a total of 11,000 jobs.
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Hide AdThe company, which has 164 stores across the UK, has debts of more than £1.3 billion and a pension fund deficit of £571 million.
Phillip Green bought the company for £200 million in 2000 and sold it to Retail Acquisitions last year for £1.