Gamestop "Trade in any game and get this for €__ "

MitchKoobski

Might be a bit long, but this really annoyed me yesterday. Went into the local Gamestop to trade in (Ill shorten the name as they arent really important):

• Red Dead (for which I was offered 9.90)
• Prince of Persia ( for which I was offered 1.50)

Was just gonna trade em anyway, regardless of the low offers, but I was happy with the tenner for Red Dead. I wanted to buy Dead Rising 2 for €32 and get that trade in taken off it, leaving me with only €20.60
(€32 - €11.40) to pay.
Then I spotted an X-men game with price tag €32 and sticker saying "Trade in any game and get this for €2!!" so I thought, why not?
Sticker also pointed out it could not be used in conjunction with any other offer, game cannot be a sports game from before 2009, must be same console, subject to standard terms and conditions.
Sounded like a good deal to me (I'd pay €22.60 for the two games together that way) so I went up to the counter and traded both games in against the cost. I gave €40 and was given back the receipt, the two new games and €7.50. And this seemed weird to me. I looked at the receipt and I have been charged €32.50, not €22.60.
I noticed they hadnt given me the €9.90 credit for Red Dead! I went up to the counter to point this out and get the money I was owed by mistake, when I was told the receipt was completely right. I pointed out I hadnt been given the credit and was told "Yeah because you got X-Men for €2". I point out the deal and the sticker saying "Trade in any game and get this game for €2" and the terms and conditions on it. I asked why did this negate the Red Dead credit and why it doesnt say this on the offer's details. He said "thats just the way it works, you cant have both." I asked why they didnt negate Prince of Persia €1.50 instead, so I could get more value on my trade in. "Because its too small."
I was pretty annoyed, and as much as I hate being THAT GUY, I asked for the transaction to be re-done without the €2 game so I could get more value from it. The guy said "Sorry we're really busy at the moment and it does take some time to re-do, and we have a queue of people here." I said "Well if you told me this at the point of sale it wouldnt be an issue, and if I leave the shop Im better off not coming back." Eventually the manager agreed to re-do the transaction. It took 5 minutes.

I left with Dead Rising and paying €20.60 but the fact I wasnt told about the negation of the trade in value annoyed me. I generally used to trade in there the whole time on the offers and this is the first time something like this happened. I might sound like I'm moaning a bit, but what is the general situation when you arent given the full details on the offer? If I had left the store and only found out later would I still be entitled to go back on it because I wasnt notified of the other detail on the offer?

Zapp Brannigan

Have to say I would have thought that it would have been easily understood that the trade in value would be negated.

Plus it did say terms and conditions apply so you'd have to ask them for the full T&C's as there's only so much space on a sticker.

joxers25

I only trade in to xtravision:

I had 6 games to trade:
GameStop offered me €47
I went across the road to xtravision and they offered me €88

Simples

MitchKoobski

I paraphrased the "could not be used in conjunction with any other offer, game cannot be a sports game from before 2009, must be same console, subject to standard terms and conditions." It extended over about 10 lines and took up half the big circular sticker. Adding "Offer cancels out trade-in value" wouldnt kill 'em. Even if it was on the sign above the stand like every other offer there it would make sense.

astrofool

MitchKoobski wrote: »

I paraphrased the "could not be used in conjunction with any other offer, game cannot be a sports game from before 2009, must be same console, subject to standard terms and conditions." It extended over about 10 lines and took up half the big circular sticker. Adding "Offer cancels out trade-in value" wouldnt kill 'em. Even if it was on the sign above the stand like every other offer there it would make sense.

I'd think the cancelling of the trade in would be pretty obvious.

Nody

astrofool wrote: »

I'd think the cancelling of the trade in would be pretty obvious.

Have to agree, why you would think you'd get to buy the game for 2 EUR AND get the full trade in value is beyond me.

noodler

Fragrant misunderstanding of the offer on the part of the OP here.

humanji

MitchKoobski wrote: »

Sticker also pointed out it could not be used in conjunction with any other offer, game cannot be a sports game from before 2009, must be same console, subject to standard terms and conditions.

Isn't that the relevant part? The other offer was trading the game in for €9.90.

MitchKoobski

The trade in isn't an offer, its a long running service they have. Plenty of times I've bought a game by trading something in AND using a voucher (voucher stating not to be used etc).

Looking at it now I probably should have figured out how the deal worked there and then and I do feel a bit silly.

Gamesnash.ie: Pat

I'm very concious of not wanting to appear biased etc towards a competitor and will do my best not to do so.

AFAIK one of the terms of the offers where you trade in any game and get a particular game for €2.00 etc is that gamestop reserve the right to refuse any game. This has previously been on the sticker itself or at other times has been covered by "other t's and c's apply ask at counter for details" lines or similar.

That said they should have explained that clearly to the OP at the time that the game being used for the €2.00 offer was the Red Dead Redemption one as Prince Of Persia did not qualify and not blindly put it through which was likely to lead to confusion afterwards.

I'd also say for future reference anybody in this situation knowing one game is worth less than another should conduct two seperate transactions - ask for X-Men for €2.00 first offering prince of persia which would force the retailer to accept or reject that offer first, then offering a seperate transaction of the trade in of Red Dead for the higher priced Dead Rising 2.

astrofool

They were definitely wrong using the higher priced game without asking. Any other store wouldn't do that (e.g. Boots 3 for 2 will optimise the sale for best value without asking), here the counter guy was just chancing their arm.

Pacing Mule

astrofool wrote: »

They were definitely wrong using the higher priced game without asking. Any other store wouldn't do that (e.g. Boots 3 for 2 will optimise the sale for best value without asking), here the counter guy was just chancing their arm.

Best value for Boots :pac: It's always the lower priced item free but this is clearly stated all over the POS.

astrofool

Pageant Messiah wrote: »

Best value for Boots :pac: It's always the lower priced item free but this is clearly stated all over the POS.

I'm talking if you buy 6 items which are all in the 3 for 2, they'll bundle the 3 highest price items together, then the 3 lower price items, without even asking, maximising the customer saving.

castie

So ignoring the fact that you were going to buy a second game...

You were trading in a game which they valued at 9.90.

You expected to trade this in and hey would in turn given you x-men for 2 euro AND your 9.90?

Does that make any sense?

Jev/N

noodler wrote: »

Fragrant misunderstanding of the offer on the part of the OP here.

Smells fine to me

Gamesnash.ie: Pat

castie wrote: »

So ignoring the fact that you were going to buy a second game...

You were trading in a game which they valued at 9.90.

You expected to trade this in and hey would in turn given you x-men for 2 euro AND your 9.90?

Does that make any sense?

The OP had 2 games to trade in - one valued at 9.90 (Red Dead) and one valued at 1.50. (Prince Of Persia)

He expected to be able to avail of the trade in any game and get X-Men for €2.00 by trading in Prince Of Persia.

Seperately he expected to trade in Red Dead and get €9.90 off the price of a different game.

What actually happened was the game valued at €9.90 was used against the X-Men game and the game valued at €1.50 was used against the second game making the entire transaction cost €8.40 more than he expected.

slimjimmc

Gamesnash.ie: Pat wrote: »

The OP had 2 games to trade in - one valued at 9.90 (Red Dead) and one valued at 1.50. (Prince Of Persia)

He expected to be able to avail of the trade in any game and get X-Men for €2.00 by trading in Prince Of Persia.

Seperately he expected to trade in Red Dead and get €9.90 off the price of a different game.

What actually happened was the game valued at €9.90 was used against the X-Men game and the game valued at €1.50 was used against the second game making the entire transaction cost €8.40 more than he expected.

Judging from the OP it seems he didn't actually ask to arrange the transaction in this way and just assumed the shop would give him the maximum saving. If he did ask I'm sure either they would have complied or they would have told him that they don't do it that way.

castie

Gamesnash.ie: Pat wrote: »

The OP had 2 games to trade in - one valued at 9.90 (Red Dead) and one valued at 1.50. (Prince Of Persia)

He expected to be able to avail of the trade in any game and get X-Men for €2.00 by trading in Prince Of Persia.

Seperately he expected to trade in Red Dead and get €9.90 off the price of a different game.

What actually happened was the game valued at €9.90 was used against the X-Men game and the game valued at €1.50 was used against the second game making the entire transaction cost €8.40 more than he expected.

He said he didnt realise that with the offer he didnt get his trade in value.
Hence why I simplified it to a 1 game scenario.

MitchKoobski

slimjimmc wrote: »

Judging from the OP it seems he didn't actually ask to arrange the transaction in this way and just assumed the shop would give him the maximum saving. If he did ask I'm sure either they would have complied or they would have told him that they don't do it that way.

castie wrote: »

He said he didnt realise that with the offer he didnt get his trade in value.

Hence why I simplified it to a 1 game scenario.

Once I was told how the offer worked I asked could I just get the offer with the Prince of Persia but I was told I wasn't receiving enough credit for it. I wasn't given enough credit from them to avail of their offer. If they had used the Prince of Persia credit, I would have still taken the offer tbh.
There was also nothing to state on the offer's details that the trade-in had to be of a certain value. This condition is visible on other offers they have where it states the trade-in value must be worth €29.99 to avail of. It also has the same specifications as the deal mentioned earlier. The only visible difference being that a minimum value is required.

Gamesnash.ie: Pat

castie wrote: »

He said he didnt realise that with the offer he didnt get his trade in value.
Hence why I simplified it to a 1 game scenario.

Yes but by simplifying it you fundamentally changed the scenario. At no point did the OP expect to recieve €9.90 credit AND a game for €2.00 using one single game to trade in.

Either way the lesson learned here is to use seperate transactions for these offers to avoid confusion all round.

Dublin_Gunner

MitchKoobski wrote: »

Might be a bit long, but this really annoyed me yesterday. Went into the local Gamestop to trade in (Ill shorten the name as they arent really important):

• Red Dead (for which I was offered 9.90)
• Prince of Persia ( for which I was offered 1.50)

....

1. Go up to counter with PoP, and purchase X-Men.

2. Walk away from counter.

3. Go up to counter with Red Dead, trade for 9.90, purchase RDR2 for 20.60

4. Leave happy.

Advice for these deals - only ever do 1 at a time, in a separate transaction.

**edit
Just noticed Pat pretty much posted the same advice above (teaches me to not just click 'quote' and read the second page and stop being a lazy git!).