The Lotter Unprofessional practises London, UK Internet

An ongoing issue with thelotter.com that is not being dealt with in a professional manner! 

This report is to inform others who may in the future comes across the same ordeal by the said company above.

I'd foolishly registered with the above co. with out thorough research - regret!

I'd played only a couple of times with thelotter.com since then; but found the games very costly & couldn't understand what their bonus points are about; for as you don't seem to be able to use them to buy any real tickets to play at all.  They're there only as a number but you can't actually use them for anything real.  Anyway, I'd queried about this, but wasn't any wiser afterward (too complex for me maybe).  Oh well whatever, I thought that I'll just close this a/c then no problem.

Before doing so, thelotter.com sent me an email saying my debit card that I'd first registered with them at the time of opening had expired.  So, I signed in & deleted the expired card & updated it with another debit card with new data before the withdrawal & close the a/c.

You're supposed to first withdraw the balance left in your a/c  in order to close it.   The first time I'd tried this the a/c dept. rejected it b'cos their system does not accept pennies, i.e. my balance is GBP 2.53 but I can not type the pennies in so I typed GBP 2.00 instead but was rejected.  Their withdrawal system kept rejecting the request b'cos the a/c dept. said I was using a credit card & that it wasn't registered & the card was never used on their site before.

Their reply quote: '...according to the regulations of the credit card company visa, customers are not permitted to withdraw to their card if they have not used it on the Merchants website previously, therefore, your withdrawal request was refused.  To withdraw funds successfully we request that you attempt your withdrawal again with your credit card ending ...8549.'

That is fine except that I didn't:

1)  registered with a credit card with them -  ever.

2)  the previous expired card was not a credit card.

3)  The card that ends with ...8549 was EXPIRED. 

You see, the a/c dept. didn't bother with checking these details & just blindly sent over an automated reply - a further waste of time!

An unfruitful dialogues went back & forth using emails & their chat lines.  I was always handled by a different entity in first name terms during these chat operations.  The email responses were from nameless automatons. 

Anyway, I'd requested for a chat operator  to provide a name of the person who deals with my case so that I'd know who it is suppose to be dealing with my case & whom I can contact directly from then on.  

This chat operator refused to do so repeatedly & said to use her name instead. So, I asked her who her Manager is; but again she refused to release his/her name.

I tried to use the email system to voice my concern about the case b'cos all I want here is to withdraw my GBP 2.00 & to terminate my a/c permanently.  I want to know what are they doing to resolve the issue.  

But the a/c dept. resent these emails back to me with no acknowledgment.  Was it a case of behaving rudely to customers they do not agreed with? Is that why they'd prefer to remain nameless behind titles?

Finally, I'd to make a complaint & forwarded 2 email letters to the manager of thelotter.com using their support@thelotter.com address.  But I got no reply, no acknowledgment to date!  I'm not even sure if these emails get delivered to the Manager at all.  This is how much trust I've come to believe in this company!  

Last week, after more back  & forth emailing & chatting I was told that my case has been escalated & they'll come back to me this week with a solution but before I did this report, I'd sent them a reminder this evening.  And unfortunately, I fear I may have to keep on reminding them daily until who knows when!  Nothing is as straight forward as it seems with this company!

Either way, I'll have to update this report & log down the conclusion to this unseemly tale of a bad 'customer service' experience.