Red Spotted Hanky dicontinuing Tesco Vouchers & loyalty points

[OwlMan]

Extracts from emails received today.

RedSpottedHanky will not be continuing their loyalty points scheme into 2019. If you have loyalty points with us, don't worry, you have until the New Year to redeem them. Get the most out of your remaining points and redeem them all to use on your next journey.


On 31st January 2019, RedSpottedHanky will no longer be a partner of the Tesco Clubcard Scheme. This means that Tesco Clubcard points will no longer be redeemable against RedSpottedHanky vouchers.
In order to redeem your points, please create your RedSpottedHanky account using the same email address as your Tesco Clubcard account, before 31st December 2018.
Don't worry though, you have up until 31st January 2019 to redeem your current Tesco Clubcard points on our vouchers, and 6 months window to use them.​

 

[Merseysider]

...which basically means there’s zero reason whatsoever for anybody to use RSH

 

[ForTheLoveOf]

Indeed. Perhaps this is a leadup to RedSpottedHanky closing entirely?

 

[mikeg]

I did see the email myself and wondered 'Well what's the point of RSH going to be then?'

Answer: It will have about the same use as the sheepline. However, you never know there may be a new clubcard partner around the corner. Maybe a TOC website... Hey, I can dream can't I?

 

[Envoy]

Who owns RSH? What is the reason behind this? Has Tesco pulled out or have the Railways decided to pull out of the deal?

 

[Bletchleyite]

Who owns RSH? What is the reason behind this? Has Tesco pulled out or have the Railways decided to pull out of the deal?

ATOS own it, and it is also used for internal sales so I doubt it’ll go away.

 

[Greenback]

I stopped using RSH a while back. The ability to redeem Clubcard points didn't really interest me, since we don't go to Tesco much. I can see why people would have been keener to use them than me, but I can't see any point to it now.

 

[CaptainHaddock]

Shame really - I remember them launching in a blaze of glory by offering £10 off their first ticket purchase to each new customer. However when someone on Hot Uk Deals spotted it was £10 per new email account, not per person, there must have been a flood of people opening multiple email accounts to get hundreds of pounds off train tickets!

Once the offers stopped and they started charging booking fees, there was no reason to use them over any other booking site.

 

[Shimbleshanks]

There is one very useful facility on Red Spotted Hanky, namely the ability to reserve a cycle space at the same time as making a seat reservation. Don't think the Trainline offers that and the alternative - going down to the local ticket office and trying to get the guys there to do it - is just too horrible to contemplate, as they almost always make a pig's ear of it and it takes forever. Without it I'd probably give up on taking my bike on most journeys and possibly go by coach or car instead.

 

[Hadders]

In the early days I used them regularly. I used to collect a lot of Tesco Clubcard points and always converted them to RSH vouchers, ISTR it being 4x face value too in addition to their own loyalty programme!

These days I have no need to use Tesco and the booking fee was the final straw.

Shame as it wasn’t so long ago we had Clubcard vouchers via RSH and East Coast Rewards.

 

[ForTheLoveOf]

There is one very useful facility on Red Spotted Hanky, namely the ability to reserve a cycle space at the same time as making a seat reservation. Don't think the Trainline offers that and the alternative - going down to the local ticket office and trying to get the guys there to do it - is just too horrible to contemplate, as they almost always make a pig's ear of it and it takes forever. Without it I'd probably give up on taking my bike on most journeys and possibly go by coach or car instead.

It's not unique to RSH - it's unique to their booking engine, ATOS Worldline ("MixingDeck"). This is also still available on other websites, e.g. TPE.

 

[Shimbleshanks]

It's not unique to RSH - it's unique to their booking engine, ATOS Worldline ("MixingDeck"). This is also still available on other websites, e.g. TPE.

Just done a trial run and, yes, you're right. Seems very counterintuitive for a transpennine operator to be selling tickets from Purley to Weymouth, but the rail industry always likes to baffle its customers. Transpennine also seems to have the advantage that they don't seem to charge commission, though I didn't actual take the trial booking through to its conclusion so can't be sure.

 

[BlueFox]

Transpennine also seems to have the advantage that they don't seem to charge commission,

None of the TOC operated ticket sites have booking fees. Most (all? ) of them charge for delivery, if you don't want to collect your ticket from a machine or use an e/m-ticket

 

[Deafdoggie]

Who owns RSH? What is the reason behind this? Has Tesco pulled out or have the Railways decided to pull out of the deal?

There are lots of changes to Tesco clubcard, many long-standing partners are no longer (or will no longer) be part of it anymore. RSH is just one of many.

 

[gray1404]

I think some still offer free postal delivery.

 

[Skymonster]

There are lots of changes to Tesco clubcard, many long-standing partners are no longer (or will no longer) be part of it anymore. RSH is just one of many.

The mass cull of partners implies the relationships concerned are not delivering sufficient value to back to Tesco - and / or that fulfilment (i.e. rail travel vouchers in the case of RSH) is costing Tesco too much.

 

[gray1404]

I have failed to understand how it is possible for Tesco to benefit from clubcard vouchers being used at 3 times the value outside of their business. Who is it costing, Tesco or the partner the vouchers are being used with.

 

[Skymonster]

I have failed to understand how it is possible for Tesco to benefit from clubcard vouchers being used at 3 times the value outside of their business. Who is it costing, Tesco or the partner the vouchers are being used with.

I doubt the full commercial aspects of the arrangement will ever be in the public domain. However, the true worth of a club card voucher is NOT what is printed on it.

Simplistically, if a member redeems their points in store the scheme owner - Tesco - bears the cost of providing those products - they are funded out of profits made from the sale of goods that members bought when they earned the rewards. The reward doesn't actually 'cost' Tesco the full retail price of the products they have to give away, just the cost price. For example if you have a £10 off voucher for Tesco and you pick up products to that value, the cost to Tesco of these 'free' products is not £10 but somewhat less and is based on what was paid to the supplier / manufacturer to put the product on the shelf.

On the other hand if a customer redeems with a partner such as RSH then nothing is taken off the shelves at Tesco, and it is the partner providing the free or reduced price goods. Therefore, there is usually a financial transaction behind the scenes (in this case it would be from Tesco to RSH) to compensate the partner for value the product or service it provides to Tesco customers. However, it does not follow that if a Tesco customer gets a [for example] £10 RSH voucher, then Tesco will pay RSH that same amount - Tesco may pay far less than the £10 face value of the voucher, and RSH swallows the rest of the price of being a partner in the scheme. How much Tesco pays RSH for each £1 of rail vouchers will be commercially confidential.

In both cases - redeeming in store or via a partner - the cost of providing the reward is almost certainly LESS than the notional value the customer sees in the voucher. The partnership works because people who want rail travel discounts are more likely to keep shopping in Tesco, giving Tesco greater market share and profits. In return Tesco customers will buy discounted tickets via RSH, and are more likely to buy non-discounted tickets through RSH at other times. Except now it seems that one side - most likely Tesco - doesn't see value anymore.

 

[DeeGee]

It's more complicated with RSH, though, isn't it, because in effect, they only receive a commission on the sale anyway, the full value of the ticket is split many different ways through ORCATS? And with the Clubcard redemption having increased from 2x to 3x the voucher value recently, someone's losing big. No doubt RSH have to pass the full price of the ticket into ORCATS to get their commission back, so if Tesco are paying below the market rate for the voucher the discount will have to fall somewhere between 0% and 100% of RSH's ORCATS share, so I wouldn't imagine it would be a huge amount shy of the actual face value of the ticket. The commission isn't financially sustainable anyway, hence the move to a £1 transaction charge.

I reckon Tesco has pulled the plug as it's a massive loss-leader that it just can't sustain; they've maybe asked RSH about a slightly bigger discount on the voucher, only to be told no dice. Perhaps it wasn't a great idea to move everything to the same 3x redemption value.

Shame, because I liked the days when I could get cashback on my RSH purchases, which I could take as Tesco vouchers, double in value on RSH purchases, which I then got cashback on!

 

[James H]

Given the above announcements it was odd to receive an email from RSH today saying:

You've used your Clubcard points with redspottedhanky.com, so why not keep booking your train tickets with us to build up your loyalty points for more money off future train travel.

 

[RJ]

It's a pity really. It's entirely possible to generate £300 of Clubcard points per quarter and redeem them to reduce cash spend on tickets, something I would do to a lesser extent to keep Advance ticket purchases off my balance sheet.

...which basically means there’s zero reason whatsoever for anybody to use RSH

There'll still be a loyal customer base who will stick with them, not everybody is on the value taking hustle!

 

[jrh2254]

Extracts from emails received today.

Don't worry though, you have up until 31st January 2019 to redeem your current Tesco Clubcard points on our vouchers, and 6 months window to use them.​

Pulled early
"This product is currently unavailable. We are working with the partner to bring the product back soon. If you currently have Clubcard vouchers to redeem with redspottedhanky, please check back soon to see when these can be used.

Once this product is available again, you will be able to exchange your Clubcard vouchers for this partner until 31 January 2019. Any vouchers you receive must be redeemed within 6 months; the expiry date will be shown clearly on your vouchers."

I doubt this will be fixed before 31 Jan 2019?