What happens when you mess with Groupon?

When I found out that Groupon had made a 'mistake' with their expiry dates, I tried to call them on their Customer Service number. No answer, several times. So I joined their Facebook group 'Groupon Belfast'. On their page, I asked why the expiry date had been changed. The administrator told me they would look into the problem. Over the course of several hours, 6 other people posted on the page stating that they also had the wrong expiry date.

Eventually Groupon got back to us, and posted under each of our posts that they had made a mistake with 'a handful of people' and they were sorry. Those familiar with Groupon will know that when you purchase from them, there is a ticker saying how many people have already bought the deal. So I knew that 843 people had already bought the deal with the wrong expiry date. So under each of their posts, I asked:

'How many is a handful of people? As far as I know 843 people bought the voucher with the wrong expiry date. I wouldn't consider that a handful.'

Well this is where Groupon got UGLY!

First the Groupon Facebook page wrote a top post, which goes out to every one of their 15,700 fans, that posting more than once was spamming and they would start removing people. This is where it got messy. All of a sudden there were about 15 people under this post, naming and shaming me. Some of the posts included:

'Ban her! BAN HER NOW!'

and

'Shut up Megan, we're all sick of listening to you!'

I thought this was quite a harsh response from the Belfast public. Afterall, they couldn't see what I was writing unless they were really looking for it. It was hardly annoying Facebook behavior. And suprisingly, this harrassing behavior continued on the Groupon Belfast page for several days. Mostly it was the same 15 people posting horrible vile things about me. Anyone who came to my aid were abused and berated as well. I couldn't figure out what was going on, and I was embarassed and confused.

Well 2 days later I got an email from a woman. She didn't like the bullying that was going on, and she gave me the names of 2 Groupon Belfast sales reps. I looked up these employees on Facebook, and checked their Facebook friend lists. And to my suprise, nearly every one of the bullies was a friend or family member of these 2 Groupon employees!

I have sent screen shots of the nasty messages that were left for me to Groupon management, along with screen shots of the employees Facebook pages with their friends. Groupon has responded saying they are investigating, but I haven't heard anything in 2 days.

Clearly, I haven't learned my lesson yet. I'm sure Groupon employees will continue to harrass and bully me while I run this website. However, I think its important that someone gets out the word about how this company operates. It is one of the most questionable businesses I have dealt with.