Pricewatch: Readers’ queries

Twirls seem to be getting smaller and dearer

Hilary Spurgeon asked us to highlight the increasing cost of a Cadbury Twirl. "They have introduced a new 'treat' size, she writes, "but when comparing bag and weight they are considerably more expensive than the old bags. In the past she used to buy 13 Twirls weighing 279g, and was happy to pay €3.99 for the treat. She is not so happy now to be charged the same price of €3.99 for 11 bars that weigh 154g. This means that a kilogram of the chocolate at the new price is €25.90, while it used to cost €14.30.

“You are paying nearly 5 cent more for bars that are 33 per cent smaller,” she says. Her son wrote to Cadbury to complain, and describes the answer he got as “most unsatisfactory”.

“Thank you for your enquiry concerning our new size Twirl Treatsize,” it starts. “I was most concerned to learn of your disappointment with this product and that you feel the pack represents poor value for money.

“Cadbury has long offered its chocolate in a range of sizes and shapes and these have regularly changed over the years. This particular change is driven by the need to keep our bars competitively priced in the face of rising ingredient costs which have been well documented recently. Some of our competitors have chosen to increase the price of their products, but we wanted to maintain a great price point for consumers and customers so have removed some weight to allow us to do that.

“ We very much value your feedback and would extend our thanks to you for taking the time and trouble to contact us.”

So, they don’t want to increase the price point so they just shrink the chocolate.

“I know that cocoa has risen in price recently but think there must be more honest ways in putting up prices,” Spurgeon says.

We contacted Cadbury and were told that it could not “really add anything more to the original response”. A spokeswoman said there was “an issue around the cost of ingredients, commodity costs, fuel and other manufacturing-related expenses, and Cadbury has taken the approach in this instance to maintain the price point, while reducing the product size. Others have taken the decision to increase the price.”

Apoplectic at AIB’s phone runaround

Mary Higgins from Churchtown has been an AIB customer since it was called the Royal Bank of Ireland (it became AIB in 1966). This week her dealings with it left her “apoplectic”. She wanted to contact her local branch, so she rang the number and the call was rerouted into the bank’s main call centre, where she was confronted by the multiple options put in place.

She did not want to go through all the rigmarole, so she hung up and rang her branch number again. The call was again rerouted to the central system, so she jumped through the hoops and explained that she wanted to speak to someone in her branch. “All I wanted to know was if they had Canadian dollars or would I have to order them,” she says. “I am well used to phone banking, but this was a specific query that related to my branch, which is why I called my branch.”

She voiced her concerns to the call centre operative, who told her that people were available at the counter to help with such queries, and he also said he could transfer the call.

“That is fine, but if I dial my branch I want to talk to my branch. I had to go through all the rigmarole,” she says. “This is not customer service. Why have they got a bloody branch if people can’t just phone it?”

In response, the bank said it had introduced a centralised phone system eight years ago “to assist customers with more routine queries. Over 70 per cent of customer queries are responded to quickly and satisfactorily through this system. If customers need to speak to their local branch, the call will be transferred.”

Betfair? Not according to one unhappy punter

In early August a reader called Fergal placed a bet on Betfair for Celtic to qualify for the next round of the Champions League. "They were losing from the first leg but were playing the second leg at home, so I decided to have a punt on them," he writes.

"Unfortunately, Celtic were well beaten on the night, so I lost my bet, until it came to the attention of Uefa that Legia Warsaw had fielded an illegible player, and therefore Celtic were awarded the game with a result of a 3-0 home win. Therefore they did qualify for the next round."

He thinks he should have won the bet, as it clearly stated that it was for Celtic to qualify. “I contacted Betfair about this and they started talking about some 24-hour rule that made no sense to me. They didn’t even offer to refund my stake.”

We looked up Betfair’s website. It says payouts are made “on the official result of the relevant governing body, regardless of any subsequent disqualification or amendment to the result (except if an amendment is announced within 24 hours of the initial settlement of the relevant market in order to correct an error in reporting the result)”, so, alas, our reader is not entitled to his winnings.