Complaint Review: WorldwideRebates.com TigerDirect Systemax

On 12/9/2008 I bought "Wintec AMPO 1024MB PC3200 DDRR 400MHz Memory" from TigerDirect which had a $10 rebate. On 12/15/2008 I mailed in all of the rebate documentation. On 1/8/2009 I received an email from WorldwideRebates.com indicating that my submission was considered valid and I would received a check within 8-10 weeks. My rebate tracking number was given as "0656385462787651". If you go to their website and enter this tracking number, you will see that the rebate is stuck in "Claim was Approved" status. After 11 weeks and no check, I started trying to contact them. No matter how many emails you send to their email address (the very UNhelpful customerservice@help.worldwiderebates.com) and no matter what you put in the subject line or the text of the email, all you get back is (an obviously auto-generated reply) "How can I help you?". After 15 minutes of hunting around on their website, I finally found a customer service phone number (1-800-286-9146). When I gave the rebate tracking number above, which shows up as valid on their website and provides me with valid status, their VRU indicates that this is an invalid or unknown tracking number. It then tries to track using my phone number, and tells me about a rebate check for another item they sent me in early 2008. After a bit of trying, I found that if you indicate you have "another problem" and then say "operator" it says it will connect you with a customer service operator. OH BOY, a human! NOPE. the machine then tells you that all their operators are busy, please call back later and HANGS UP! I called at least 10 times over the course of a day and got the same result. I believe that there is in actuality NO ONE THERE, and they have absconded with the rebate money they're supposed to be giving out. On 3/27/2009 I called TigerDirect and talked to a representative called "Alex" who went through the same route as I did (went to their web site and ensured my rebate was valid, then called their customer service number and got hung up on) and then told me he would look into the problem and email me later that day with status. Guess what?! No email from Alex either. I found on Wikipedia that WorldwideRebates is a subsidiary of Systemax Inc, and so is TigerDirect, so you would think that the representatives at TigerDirect would have a bit more luck than I at finding out what's going on there, if they cared to.

Gretchen
Bahama, North Carolina
U.S.A.