Restaurant.com

I manage a business that signed up with Restaurant.com to help get NEW customers into the business. When we signed up, the representative told us that users could only purchase coupons once a month and that our subscription could be cancelled at any time.

After seven months, we noticed that the same customers were constantly using the coupons (definitely more than once a month), and it was drowning our sales tremendously. We did not have any new customers coming through the doors with these coupons and it was costing us a ton of money (since the business does not see any of the money that consumers pay to purchase these coupons), so we decided to cancel. I called customer service and was told that a supervisor would have to call me back to be able to cancel our subscription. After 4 days with no call back, I called again. And again, they told me that someone would have to call me back. After almost a month of this (I left my work number and my cell in case they called while I was not at work), I finally was able to speak to someone about cancelling our subscription. I was then informed that we were under a year contract and we not allowed to break it! I felt completely tricked since I asked the representative over and over again to make sure that I could cancel this at any time! I had been blatantly lied to. Apparently their policy is that you have to give mailed, written notice that you want to cancel your subscription, and it can only be cancelled 90 days from the date the letter is received! Even after I jumped though all of these hoops and mailed the letter, after 90 days, they were STILL selling coupons for my restaurant and it took ANOTHER 3 weeks for someone to of course, call me back. It wasn't until I called there threatening to sue because they were selling $100 for $4 after the 90 days was WELL up, they finally took our site down.

I have had numerous customers call here, asking if we accept restaurant.com certificates. We do only because we feel like it is not the customer's fault that restaurant.com is dishonest.

As a restaurant manager, I would definitely not recommend that any business sign up with this company. As a consumer, it is a great site to use as long as the restaurant still accepts the coupons. I would definitely call the business first, just to make sure, before purchasing.

This website is little more than a scam. A few things to keep in mind:

1. The "gift certificate" is basically a percentage coupon. You can buy $15 from a restaurant for $6, but then you'll have to spend $22.00. This is the deal I tried to buy. Which isn't a bad deal, but some of the restaurants require you spend quite a LOT to even get to use the certificate, which makes it more a discount, not an actual certificate.

2. Restaurant.com does NOT pay the restaurant any money for what they buy. All of this money is going in their pocket. Yes, the restaurant agrees to it... but you're gypping a restaurant out of money in a way. Which is why pretty crappy restaurants tend to be on the list of choices.

My personal experience: I purchased a gift certificate and was planning to use it this weekend. I paid for it, Paypal immediately let me know that not only was my transaction confirmed, but the payment had already been withdrawn by Restaurant.com, and was not even pending.

I checked my email for my certificate, excited. Nothing. I went on the website, seeing if it was under my account. Nothing. By then, I'm getting worried/confused. Why did Restaurant.com take my money and not send me anything?

I waited for a bit, thinking maybe it took some time. I searched around the internet and their website to see if there was anything saying that you had to wait 48 hours to use the certificate (which is the case with Livingsocial, for example.) NOTHING.

I emailed them, no response. I called them, and of course, the office is closed and says "please check our FAQ" which is useless. Meanwhile, they have my money and I have no certificate. I ended up going to the restaurant anyway without the certificate. It wasn't that awesome, guess that's to be expected.

I opened a Paypal dispute, and I see today that my money was refunded. However, ZERO apology or explanation from Restaurant.com, even though I sent two emails asking for help/guidance. I'm sorry, but if you take a customer's money and then don't offer anything in return, or it's a site glitch or whatever, you RESPOND and say how sorry you are! I have worked in customer service and if we ever did something like this, you bet we would be working hard on apologizing for that BS!

Moral of the story: buggy site that is not much better than a scam.

Here's the email I wrote to Customer Service, followed by their reply.

Refund request: This is the third time I am sending this message. Please reply. Hello, I have been a member of Restaurants/com for several years, and I see that you still have only three (3) restaurants in Napa. I have been to all three of them, and only one of these restaurants is any good - Rancho Grande on Silverado Trail. I see that there are some decent reviews forVilla Romano, but I was not at all impressed that when I went the waitresssquished two flies against the window. Iwill not be going back. The Rincon DeMichoacan is nothing special - very basic, average food. I imagine that you will not be adding anynew restaurants in Napa, so what am I to do? I do not want to drive 30 miles round trip to Vallejo in order to save a few dollars on a meal.

REPLY FROM CUSTOMER SERVICE:

Hello, I do apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. Restaurant.com does have an exchange always policy; we do not offer cash back. Even if we were to issue a refund as a courtesy, our system will not allow it since your certificates were originally purchased more than 6 months ago. Restaurant.com Cards do not have an expiration date on them, so they will never expire. The Restaurant.com Cards will also stay in your Restaurant.com account until you are able to redeem them. If you do not wish to keep the Restaurant.com Cards, you are more than welcome to give them away as a gift. We do have an active sales team that is seeking new restaurants to participate in our program.

MY LAST WORD:
Napa CA has scores of restaurants, but only three are on Resaurant.com. I'm not holding my breath that their "Active Sales Team" will add any new ones to the network. Hugely disappointed.

I'm being inundated by spam now thanks to these $#*!s! Nobody accepts their certificates either!