Barclaycard Price Promise Insurance

...a member benefit of the Barclaycard credit card, so don’t be fooled into thinking that you can rush out and subscribe to this service without the card. Nonetheless, it’s an absolutely corking scheme that I thought I should share with you all.

One thing that really gets on my nerves is buying something and then spotting it the next day cheaper somewhere else. I’m quite a shrewd shopper, and I do shop around, but I ...
.../> As a member benefit, Barclaycard have come up with a rather good initiative that takes away the pain of overcharging. Providing that the item in question costs more than £50, Barclaycard will refund the difference between a price that you paid and ANY comparable offer elsewhere. This isn’t limited by geography. If you can provide some evidence of a cheaper deal (e.g. a print of a web page, a leaflet a magazine advert) then Barclaycard will ... more

You might think that this is a strange category, and in some ways it is. I’ve had to put this in the insurance category, but it’s actually a member benefit of the Barclaycard credit card, so don’t be fooled into thinking that you can rush out and subscribe to this service without the card. Nonetheless, it’s an absolutely corking scheme that I thought I should share with you all.

One thing that really gets on my nerves is buying something and then spotting it the next day cheaper somewhere else. I’m quite a shrewd shopper, and I do shop around, but I think after a while you get an overall impression of what’s cheap and what’s not, so you know that you can get a fair deal in Argos, Dixon’s or the like. The trouble is, a competitive price on the high street isn’t necessarily the same thing as a competitive price on the Internet, nor will you be able to keep your eye on all the sales and special offers in place at any one time.

As a member benefit, Barclaycard have come up with a rather good initiative that takes away the pain of overcharging. Providing that the item in question costs more than £50, Barclaycard will refund the difference between a price that you paid and ANY comparable offer elsewhere. This isn’t limited by geography. If you can provide some evidence of a cheaper deal (e.g. a print of a web page, a leaflet a magazine advert) then Barclaycard will honour it, and refund the difference to your account. This goes way beyond any similar offers that I’ve seen elsewhere. Most of the high street retailers will impose geographical limits or time restrictions and often won’t take into account special offers. The price comparison web sites can be good, but they can also miss out on special deals.

So what does this mean to you as a customer then? Well, I can only speak for myself, but now if I’m spending more than £50 on something then I don’t really give a hoot where I buy it from, and I simply get it from whichever place is convenient. Barclaycard have actually provided me with another reason why a credit card is so much more practical than cash, because I can now have complete confidence that I won’t get ripped off.

Here are a couple of examples of how this has worked for me. I purchased a Nintendo Game Cube last year from Curry’s. At the time, there was one of those bundled deals where there was a fixed price for a console, 1 handset and a game. A few weeks later, I was wandering through Argos when I picked up a leaflet advertising their Christmas sale and noticed a Game Cube deal that equated to a saving of about £20. I was a bit pissed off by this, because I thought that most retailers would be offering the same price. It’s only £20, but hey – that’s four tickets to the cinema! More recently, I bought a Sony mini-disc player for £240 in Dixon’s. When I happened to do a check on www.pricerunner.co.uk, I found a web site that stocked the same model and would deliver for free, with a price difference of £43. That’s quite a lot more! In both cases, I have claimed on the Barclaycard Price Promise.

The claims process is simple enough – although not so simple as to make it easy, of course. You telephone a dedicated telephone line, where the advisor takes the details of the claim and records it as an official claim. Nothing too complex is required – you just give your card number, price paid, price found and so on. The process probably takes five minutes at most. Once the details have been registered, you are given a reference number. You then have to write in to the claims centre with a letter outlining the details again, and include a copy of your proof of purchase, a copy of the card statement showing the transaction and proof of the better deal. Upon receipt of the paperwork, Barclaycard then processes the claim, checks you aren’t lying and subsequently refunds the money to your account. End to end, I would estimate that the claim cycle takes about three weeks, maybe four at most. The only downside to this is that the item may have formed part of a minimum payment before you get the credit, so it might be that you pay it off in full and then receive a credit after that.

There are some restrictions. As I said before, only spending above £50 is covered by the promise, so don’t try and claim against your weekly groceries, item by item. The item must be on sale in the UK – but this can be online or offline. The goods concerned must be branded. You only have 60 days after the purchase to register your claim, but once this is done, you can take as long as you like to send in the paperwork. It’s important that you print off web site details on the day that you make the claim, because this will be your only proof that the price applied at that time. My mini-disc player increased in price by £10 between making the claim and posting the letter – but Barclaycard still honoured the lower price. There is a limit of £500 per claim, and you can only claim up to £1000 in any calendar year.

Do I have any criticisms? Well, I would say that the claims procedure is a little administrative. It would be easier if the claims centre sent out a printed form that you simply signed and returned – or even better, one that you could download from the Internet. Of course, it’s also worth noting that it’s still up to you to track down the lower prices after the purchase event, but at least you have the pleasure of the goods whilst you’re doing it, rather than having to wait until you’re completely sure that you have the best deal.

The Price Promise is yet another reason why I will continue to be a committed Barclaycard customer. I simply never pay for anything with cash any more. Combined with the purchase protection and insurance, this deal makes shopping about as safe as it can get.

Highly recommended
 

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