Complaint Review: Onrebate.com

On Nov. 18 2005, I ordered a barebones computer system from Tiger Direct.com for $410.94. Most of the items ordered had rebates available through onrebate.com. These rebates totaled $120 and had to be submitted to onrebate.com individually for each item purchased.
This only involved six "easy" steps. (repeated five "easy" times) via a dialup connection. Six "easy" hours later I had printed out my rebate forms and submitted confirmation numbers for each of the five items.... but I wasn't finished yet. I still had to find upc barcodes which had to be taped to the submission form, signed and mailed to the address on the rebate form and confirmation numbers sent back to onrebate.com's website. A week later on Dec.12th I recieved the following email from onrebate.com:

Dear *******,

It has come to our attention that we haven't
received your required
NO-WAIT REBATE application by mail.

If this is the case, please mail us your
documentation as soon as
possible in order for us to honor your NO-WAIT
REBATE guarantee.

Our rapid rebate team will personally walk your
application through the
system.

Thank you,
Your Onrebate.com Team.

On Wed. Dec. 14, after calling their 1-800 number, my wife spoke to a man identified as "RJ" who initially told her the rebate forms had been recieved and it would be 72 hours until they were processed. The week after that, I called onrebate.com's 1-800 number and talked to "RJ" again.We were still checking the confirmation numbers on their website only to find the rebates had not been processed for payment. "RJ" had also changed his story and told us the forms had not been recieved. I tried to find a valid email address for onrebate.com and finally ran across ripoffreport.com's website. I contacted a lady named Nadina and explained that onrebate.com had not recieved my rebate forms. The following are email transcripts:

Dear Nadina:

I got your email address from a website for consumer complaints. Last week I recieved the following email from onrebate.com:
--- onrebate.com wrote:

Dear Barry ,

It has come to our attention that we haven't received your required NO-WAIT REBATE application by mail.

If this is the case, please mail us your documentation as soon as possible in order for us to honor your NO-WAIT
REBATE guarantee.

Our rapid rebate team will personally walk your application through the system.

Thank you,
Your Onrebate.com Team.

All the rebates were mailed out on Dec. 3 2005 to the PO
Box on the mailing label shown on the rebate
certificate. Last Wednesday (Dec. 14) my wife talked to a guy named "RJ." saying my rebate submissions had been recieved but it would take up to 72 hours for them to be processed. As of today (Dec. 21) when I got on your website, my rebates still have not been processed. I would greatly appreciate if you would look into this matter and let me know when I can expect to get my rebate. A valid phone number would be useful as we have spent up to an hour on hold when we tried your 1-800 number.
Thanks,
Barry

Dear Mr. *****-

If you received the email bellow is because we have
no records of receiving your rebate doc's. Should you have copies please fax them to 1-888-426-9467 attn Nadina and will process them immediately.

I apologize for the misunderstanding with RJ.

Thanks for your attention!
I then emailed her the following:

Dear Nardina:

RJ told my wife the rebate docs HAD been recieved & we have only the original invoices from Tiger Direct (minus the barcodes for the items purchased) that were sent in. If those invoices are sufficient please let me know and I will make copies & FAX them immediately.
Thanks,
Barry

She responded:

Dear Mr. ******-

We will need copies of the upc also in order for the rebate to be accepted. Please note that we have individual contracts with the vendors and we do not present to them the rebate form, invoice and upc code (at least copies) we are not allowed to accept the rebates.

Please look into your records and when you locate all the copies please fax them to 1-888-426-9467 attn Nadina. Should you have further questions please contact us directly at 1-888-222-9300 or simply reply to this email.

Thanks for using Onrebate!
Naidna-

Since I mailed off the original barcodes, I contacted Tiger Direct by phone and was told the only way to get copies of the barcode was from the item's manufacturer. After calling the first 1-800 number (Intel's number) and waiting 30 minutes the phone automatically hung up.
I later checked online and discovered that Tiger Direct owns Onrebate.com.

Barry
Sterrett, Alabama
U.S.A.

Click here to read other Rip Off Reports on Tiger Direct

Click here to read The *EDitorial: The Marketing Rebate Rip Off ...Manufactures invent reasons why not to pay the consumer