I think you might want to contact one of the lawyers in the Ralph's case I mentioned in post 4.

Once again, it seems the sponsors didn't do their homework. I believe the sponsor wasn't out to cheat you. They thought they were getting some great deal. A bit of research would have sent them running away from this type of deal. In any case, they are responsible for the agency they hired to do this for them.

Really Bad Experience
 

I'll try to condense this, but will start by saying if you look at BBB for TLC Marketing you'll find 111 complaints for this year (a week ago it was 97). I sent in my cert approx 6 weeks in advance of my trip date of Dec. 7. After waiting the required time, I started calling. Every time I got another excuse & runaround--told to call back later, 3-5 days, next week etc. No one ever contacted me as promised until I filed a complaint with BBB.

That prompted a TLC rep to call me yesterday. I'm guessing it was her first day on the job, as she put me on hold about 10 times and at one point said I have to go, I'll call you back. She did not have the hotel that was listed in the booklet available at the "promotional rate", even though the hotel has plenty of rooms available at a rate of about $138. I am looking for something in the Palm Springs area--there are at least a hundred hotels with availability under $150 for my dates.

She had only one choice for me, Palm Mountain Resort. After reading reviews, I declined. Some reviews described a nice room & stay, so they must have received the refurbished rooms. Others said their room was filthy, dark, cockroaches, scum & mildew bathrooms, tattered furniture, sagging beds with springs poking through, hanging electrical outlets. I phoned the hotel and learned with the promo I'd receive a "standard" room (i.e. not refurbished); one reviewer described the place as being akin to a Mexican roadside motel. I was told by the TLC CSR "tax" would be $44; when you check the hotel's website tax comes to $24. CSR said they don't send new certs but I can call any time to book something else later; I've called twice since & no return phone call from TLC.

MA BBB says they're closing my file as case has been resolved, per the company.

There's quite a dialog about this promo on FatWallet. Recently people who have been lucky enough to get something booked, arrive to find their room hasn't been paid for by TLC. I sure wasn't going to risk that happening with all the time I've already spent on this. Besides the BBB, I've also filed complaints with the MA & CA Attorney General's offices.

Well, after reading all the previous posts, I think I won't even try to use my certificate.

Chalk this one up to experience. Dockers and Kohl's got a boost in sales. We got a fairly good discount on the Dockers' purchases, but not sure we would have bought $100 worth except to qualify for this promotion.

Lesson learned. Think I'll pass on any such future promotions like this unless I can check out the company handling the promotion.

I don't mean to tell you what to do, but I would advise you to try it out. I was able to get 2 nights in Arlington VA.

Semi-Successful Ending
 

I was able to get 2 nights through this promo for Vegas, Dec. 24 & 25, a quick trip we decided to make to visit the in-laws over Christmas. Not a very good bang for my $100 Dockers buck, but I just wanted to be done with this. Hotel rates were low for these 2 nights, so they offered me a choice of several properties--I chose Orleans as we didn't need to be on the Strip and I'd read the rooms were decent & large. Booked a second room myself as well; the rate was $60 which also included 2 breakfast and 2 dinner buffets. But other options offered (all had rates under $100 for these dates) were: Hard Rock, Luxor, Stratosphere, Westin, Southpoint and a few other dives I didn't bother writing down.

Room was prepaid, so no problems there. They gave me the option of a $30 food & beverage credit at the hotel or two $25 restaurant.com gift certs; I chose the $30 and it showed on my account as promised.

Good luck to everyone else, I'd say give it a try and contact the BBB if you don't get a response from TLC Marketing. I'm pretty certain that's the only reason they worked with me. Would be interesting to see what they offer in pricey cities such as NY or Boston.

I'm going to Vegas, too. As it happens, I'll be there on a pretty expensive weekend. The rates at most of the hotels listed in the brochure are in the high $200s. They called me within a week of receiving my voucher and the guy asked where I wanted to go right away, as if he hadn't even gotten my details. He eventually offered Palace Station or Vegas Club; I took Palace Station. The rates are $160 a night for the same nights through the hotel, though they apparently also offer $39 rooms sometimes. :eek: I'm not overly pleased, but I kind of painted myself into a corner by booking flights without checking hotel prices first.

Last weekend I stayed two nights at the Millenium Hilton, NYC. There were no surprises at the hotel and I'm glad to have participated in the promo.^

Has anyone used the flight vouchers? I saw one post elsewhere saying someone flew US and got miles, but I am looking for more results. It's probably not worth the hassle for me unless I can get miles. If I can, I'll consider it a cheap MR.

Did anyone go for the golf vouchers? This was proving to being a challenge too. Appreciate any feedback of those who went for golf instead and your success rate in using the certs. Thanks.

Hotel-Yes, Flights-Yes
 

After several (5-10) voice messages left by TLC over the past week or so, I have successfully booked a hotel package and 2 flights through the 2 Dockers promos.

Hotel: 2 nights at the James Hotel Chicago in March. The James wasn't even listed in the promo materials, so I was quite surprised to hear the rep even mention it. When he did, I jumped on it. The 2 nights I am staying are listed on the James website as $300 and $400 for my stay. Seeing as I paid $125 for the promo (and returned a few items that didn't fit or my wife ixnayed) and I am paying $52 in taxes, overall an EXCELLENT result. And St. Paddy's day the first night to boot!!!!! Never been, but have always wanted to be in Chicago for St. Patrick's day.^

Flights: Wife and I MSN-SFO in June. Total for flights booked through YX:$606 taxes paid by me:$180. Not great result, but not bad. However, TLC had the EXACT airline and flights that I wanted. :D Used TY points to put my kids on the same flights for another $130 in taxes with the fixed-point option through TY, and now we're looking pretty good. $1300 in flights for around $500 total spend between Dockers purchases and taxes.

The nice thing about the whole deal was that I never filed a BBB complaint, never threatened to when I spoke with anyone from TLC, and they called me every day or every other day after their initial contact w/me.(I was incredibily unavailable when they were calling) In fact, I called their number yesterday after the latest round of phone-tag, and while it was ringing, the rep rang me back and said he saw that I had just called and tried me back right away.

I was very cordial with both the hotel rep and the flight rep, mentioned to them that I imagined they were getting a lot of crap from others due to the popularity of the promos, and they readily admitted as much. I thanked them for their persistence in trying to get back to me, and I think I shocked them a little bit that I wasn't being a complete horse's a**.

Overall, even with a few hiccups and a little bit of a delay on the initial response from TLC, I am pretty happy with how this turned out.

I called recently. CSR said someone will call back. 5 weeks later, still no call.

It is good to learn some people are having success without the BBB or legal route. Just don't have time for this. :mad:

As I indicated on Day 1 of this thread, these things have a tendency to not work out as well as the merchant had planned. In the end, you are eventually going to get something out of a major corporation, if the contracter fails to provide the expected bounty. It's a pain, and it might take a class action lawsuit, but in the end, you'll get something, if you are willing to work at it.

A couple of weeks ago I got the automated call about the "free" Dockers flight, but that's the last good news.

Three days ago, which is 30 days before my my first requested flight date, I called TLC (866-377-4084 1,3,0) and talked with a pleasant CSR who said she would expedite the Booking "department" to get something done. She said to call back by lunch today if I had not been contacted. She seemed to say that the Booking "department" doesn't work Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

In the absence of any callback, today I called in again just before noon Eastern time. Today's less-pleasant CSR said to call back in 4 days. He said he will notify the Booking "agent" to contact me.

Both CSRs complained that their computers were slow...it seems that TLC could double their productivity by fixing that problem.

I'm glad that the BBB / Attorney General option exists, if this whole thing bogs down too much.

One bit of advice to others: Carefully note the date that you get the automated phone call, as both CSRs asked for that bit of information and one mentioned a 14 day (from automated call to human call-back) internal policy that they have. The CSRs cannot look up the date that the automated call was made.

I decided to look up TLC Marketing on the Boston BBB website.

Here is the summary about TLC:
The Bureau processed a total of 207 complaints about this company in the last 36 months, our standard reporting period. Of the total 207 complaints closed in the last 36 months, 207 were closed in the last 12 months.

These complaints concerned:
24 regarding Advertising Issues
1 regarding Advertised product not available
8 regarding Advertised terms not honored
3 regarding Advertisement did not disclose all conditions required to take advantage of an offer
1 regarding Advertisement misrepresented a product
6 regarding Advertisement misrepresented a service
1 regarding Bait & switch advertisement
4 regarding False or unsubstantiated claims in advertisement
38 regarding Contract Issues
37 regarding Failure to honor a contract or agreement
1 regarding Invalid or false contract
3 regarding Credit, Billing or Collection Issues
3 regarding Failure to substantiate charges
37 regarding Customer Service Issues
14 regarding Failure to provide promised assistance or support for products or services
23 regarding Failure to respond to phone calls or written requests for assistance or support
37 regarding Delivery Issues
2 regarding Late delivery of products
3 regarding Late delivery of services
16 regarding Non-delivery of products
16 regarding Non-delivery of services
1 regarding Guarantee or Warranty Issues
1 regarding Failure to provide promised written warranty or guarantee
6 regarding Refund or Exchange Issues
6 regarding Failure to honor refund, exchange or credit policies
2 regarding Sales Practice Issues
1 regarding Sales presentation misrepresented the service
1 regarding Sales presentation not consistent with advertisement
59 regarding Service Issues
43 regarding Delayed completion of service
14 regarding Failure to honor service estimate or agreement
2 regarding Improper or inferior service

These complaints were closed as:
25 Administratively Closed
25 BBB determined that despite the company's effort to address complaint issues, the consumer remained dissatisfied.
182 Resolved

For reference, in late November 2007 (just 2-1/2 months ago) this data appeared in message #107: "I'll try to condense this, but will start by saying if you look at BBB for TLC Marketing you'll find 111 complaints for this year (a week ago it was 97)."

Wow! Imagine how many more disgruntled people who had not had the time to file a BBB complaint. Must be thousands :td: