08702202020

Entered a competition to win free lazer surgery, sent away the e-mail and within seconds received a phone call and have had several calls since, I asked only for e-mail corrospondance, theyve called me several times, sent me a brochure in the post yet no e-mail! BECOMING VERY ANNOYING.

Exactly the same as last few posts. Didn't answer the call but came on here straightaway.  Usually careful who i give my mobile number to.  Won't be giving my number again on Facebook that's for sure.

Firstly, the competition isn't a 'con' in that the September winner hadn't ever attended a consultation with us... Please check our website.
We also need to call customers in order to schedule a consultation to determine if they're suitable for treatment. We want people to see how Laser Vision Correction can offer life changing benefits.
If someone doesn't want to speak to us then we will endeavour to stop calling them as soon as possible.
Should you have a problem, please contact us.

B.S to the last comment from optical express. There is no excuse for your constant harassment, if someone doesn't answer the phone to you 10 times...
they do not want a consultation.

You're a horrible company and would recommend, if someone wants laser eye surgery - just use google and youll find much better and professional people to deal with.

And to the person "worker" who commented about how horrible it is to work at optical express... we have nothing against you guys. It's the fat greedy men who you work for.

Re: the comment from Ian.

We use an automated dialler system to only call interested people who have provided contact details, the last thing we want to to is make you feel harrassed. I do understand the frustrations voiced in the previous pages of this thread.
If we do call you again, please let the operator know that you don't wish to be contacted and we'll stop calling.

My experience working for Optical Express has been great and I haven't had any issues in the 15 years I've also been a customer.
I feel bad for the employee who doesn't enjoy the company as much as I do, but it does not make it a bad employer or company.
And over 98% of our patients are extremely satisfied with the overall laser surgery experience, that'll probably be why Optical Express is so successful.

As per my previous post: If you have a problem, call us.

Right! after reading all the complaints here and no one actually doing anything about it here's what you can do.. payback time! Ring them! This is the number for complaints and customer services... ring and ring and ring and complain again and again.. see how they like it.. and also here is the website for complaints too... now it's up to you guys..

08444 771 177 and ask to be put through to Customer Services.

http://www.visionexpress.com/information/contact-us

As for the vision express guy above.. get a grip!!! Everyone here has the same complaint.. they entered a fre ecompetition NOT to be bloody harrassed! You had to give your number for the comp and nowhere did it say you would be called for marketing or anyhting like that... VE should be ashamed... I was going to go get some glasses as can't aford the surgery now I'm going somewhere else...

Having just left Optical Express as a "customer care advisor".  I can see why a former employee would say the the things he did.  I hated working there and the people there are as bad as he said.  "The blind leading the blind".  The team-leaders are awful, treat staff very poorly and dont have an emotional bone in their body.  If you're face doesn't fit, you are out.  I was there 8months and it was 8 months of hell.  They make you call customers every 2 hours until they answer or up til 29 calls a week.  I only stayed as there were no other jobs around at the time.  Dont get me wrong some of the people there are good people but the majority of them acted like you were nothing.  They ruin your happiness day in day out.  As you can tell, I will  
not miss the place, and would not advise applying for a job no matter how much you need one.  


Yours

Not so happy, formor employee

How about all u idiots wh actually put your details and telephone numbers on websites on facebook get a grip they deserve all the hassle they get and stop looking for sympathy!!!!?

I have no idea how these people got my number but they call every other day and don't speak if I answer. I am fed up with it, I dive into my bag to get my phone thinking it's something important and it is this number again.

I have no idea how these people got my number but they call every other day and don't speak if I answer. I have not entered a competition and am not stupid enough to post my phone numbers on any website as some prat here suggested. I can only think that it must be a result of taking an eye test several years ago. I am fed up with it, I dive into my bag to get my phone thinking it's something important and it is this number again.

Didn't answer, saw the dodgy number and thought:

'It's 8AM I'd rather not have a conversation with whoever this is'

Googled the number and Oh, what a suprise! Its the stupid Facebook competition I entered.

Why, oh why did I use my real number? lol

Never to make that mistake again :D

Unless they are telling me I have free laser eye surgery coming my way then there is nooooooo chance.

Actually next time they ring I'm going to say that!

I pretty much had the same experience working for this lot as the ex-employee and worker above have stated for themselves.

Pardon the following long windedness of this but if you want to know how Optical Express conducts its business....

Every 'patient' that we phoned was a 'warm lead' and had actively seeked out information from ourselves in relation to pursuing the 'Laser Vision Correction'(LVC) treatment.........or so we were led to believe.

As everyone here knows, it is nothing more than a legal ruse - some may say scam - to get people through the shop doors and part with their money.

Each 'warm lead' was from, that I personally handled anyway, 90-95% competition entries/online surveys/telemarketers/existing customers.

Only a fraction of people I called had actually inquired and were generally interested about LVC and to speak to these people was, amongst other things, a relief let me tell you!!

If we called someone and they weren't it would get put back into the system and would be phoned roughly 2 hours later. So if that happened at 9am then we could phone a number maybe 6 times a day up until 9pm!! That is tantamount to harassment in my opinion!!!

Overall a number will be called about 28 times in total (that was the highest amount that seen for a number) unless it's a closed lead ( not interested or an actual booking).

Big issues arise when certain advisers will schedule a 'callback' for a number when the customer indicates no interest. They will schedule a callback so as to not ruin his/her stats which get constantly monitored by pedantic and soulless managers.

when no data (leads) comes in, it has been known to...what's the word... create leads by dipping into old data or to send out marketing emails/letters to normal glasses/contact wearers and this is interpreted as that recipient as having shown interest in LVC. WTF????

You will not be surprised that there is a high turnover of staff here. It is, sadly, the same as any other call centre trying to sell products but what I have issue with is the fact that OE are trying to market themselves as 'Clinical Excellence' and 'Unsurpassed Customer Satisfaction'.  Instead OE are coming across as a money grabbing and ignorant company... which unfortunately they are.

If everyone of the people who I spoke to who had a grievance left a comment on this site, i reckon this site's servers would shut down!!

Believe it or not, the treatment itself is effective for the people that actually want it, but its aggressive marketing and the treating customers and general public as mere pound signs will no doubt be harmful to the company in the long run..... but hey weekly stats are getting better and better!!!!(that last bit aimed for the OE manager's! :) )

 
Now this here is my advice so as to not get calls from OE, or even any other company like them I suppose.

As I said, OE gets your number from one of a lot of places. You may be an existing customer who bought glasses years ago or had an eye test x months ago.  You WILL get phoned or have junk mail..sorry..correspondence through the post/email at some point.  If you're fed up with the junk, then you can be asked to be taken off the mailing list but if they don't then if I were you, I'd vote with my feet and go elsewhere with my business and put through a complaint and make sure you've recorded your complaint as well so you have a base of reference.

Now this is where you may start hating me.... :)

OE haven't just went into the directory and went from Aardvark A Aardvark to Zed McZed and called them.  Either you've left your actual number at the website or an OE competition/survey or OE have paid a telemarketing firm to phone people up to ask about their interests.  I've never actually had anyone phone me selling anything and that's because I don't leave my real number on these sites/surveys!! If you must enter these competitions then you email will suffice for entry and i would recommend a Googlemail or Hotmail account specifically for comps/surveys. Companies can easily contact you by email and do not need your number!!. Leave an 0777777777777 number if you must leave something.  

It's almost prevention is better than cure at this point.

Now if you have been phoned from an OE adviser again, I would suggest politely but firmly registering in no uncertain terms that you are not interested.  Don't even hint at maybe 'in a year or 2' or you're goin on holiday soon or you're too busy to talk as the advisor will see this a chance to put you in for a callback so s to not ruin their stats and not get shouted at from the job worths.

If you get a answer phone message, I would suggest phoning back on the FREEPHONE NUMBER - 0800 023 2020 - (funny that they keep that numberquiet yet shout from the rooftops about the 08702 charged number, eh!) and asking to be taken off the dialing list. If you give your name they can search in their database for your call and close the lead(you) off.  

Sometimes leads get duplicated in the system, god knows how that happens, but it can lead to someone being phoned even after they have said no to LVC already.  If this is the case, the adviser can close this off and if this is diagnosed can search for any other instances of yourself and close them off as 'incorrect data'.

REMEMBER that your ire should be directed at Optical Express and not the sanity and soul sapped adviser phoning you.  Believe me, we can empathise with you. The adviser doesn't like annoying people or calling at 9pm in the middle of a Champions League game. As the Ex worker above said, jobs are fairly scarce for people and money can be tight for students so whilst it's easy to blow off steam down the phone at them, they're just the puppets for the powers that be.

The current OE employee above is clearly hiding behind the stats and numbers that the OE managers love to generate for themselves. He/She (I have an idea who it actually is! :) ) obviously doesn't have to do the 300-400 calls per day that the advisers do and can sit on their smug [***] waiting for a chance to 'supervise' IE  talk down to you and pretend they're the big boss.

The company ethos is that the general public are treated like fish that if you throw a big enough net, you'll get some prime game fish. To hammer the calls and generate sales. It's disgusting and left me increasing disgusted and disillusioned with my own morals and sanity for actively taking part in it, hence why I got a new job and got the funk out of dodge!!

I agree with the person before about giving them their own medicine. Tell your friends about their ways. Inundate their servers and phones and complaints department with stuff. A bad reputation has a habit of travelling faster than a good one and trust me, Optical Express has earned every little bit of it's fast growing reputation!! ;)

Anyhoo sorry about the length of this, I could have typed a hell of a lot more about the practices and given specific examples of OE's service but I fear my little fingers wouldn't cope!! :)



To summarise:

Optical Express :  Greedy conglomerate company hell bent on phoning every one in the UK (and indeed outside!!) to extract money from

Phone Advisor : Pawn and general punchbag for OE

NEVER leave your actual number on a website or say 'yes' to anything promoting anything you don't want. It could be as indirect as on a non OE site answering a glasses related question. OE buys its data from a variety of places!!

I completed one of those pop-ups which said "win free laser eye surgery" ....how stupid can I be! Anyway, as soon as I clicked SEND I got an email telling me they were going to call to discuss an appointment (when did I ask for that?!?!) and within 5 minutes the 0870 number was ringing on my phone!  A chirpy Scottish lass has left me a voicemail inviting me to "a free consultation regarding my optical requirements" ending with the fact she is going to call me back later to follow up. That's not what the form said when I filled it in!! I put the number in GOOGLE and found this web site! Upon reading all the comments, I have send Consumer Rights an email asking them for advice - when I get a response, I will put it up on here as there must be something we can do to stop the calls!  That'll teach me for filling in a "win xxx free" form - never again! You don't get anything for free!!!!

Thanks for your comments there - I thought they were most informative and excellent advice.

I certainly will follow your lead from now on, with anything I get like this and urge everyone reading this to do so. I whole heartedly agree that you should NOT vent your anger at the poor person on the end of the phone, they are only doing as their employer instruts.  (I must have been typing my comment (which shows below yours) as you were submitting yours, hence it not sounding like I had read your advice...as I hadn't at that time!)

As you will see from my comment, I have sent my moan to the Consumer Rights people - and told them about this web-site, so hopefully one of their reps will look at this site and read how many people have fallen into the "win free laser eye surgery" trap and possibly help do something to stop them calling!

Thanks again - thought your comments were great :-)

As many people above, i have also entered a comp on facebook to recieve free laser eye surgery and i got a phone call from this number about 10 minutes later.  best thing about it it is nearly 9pm.  i didn't think people phoned that late on a night. i didn't answer it though as i don't answer 0800 numbers and if i just keep dismissing their call hopefully they will stop trying to contact me.

I'm being bombarded with calls from Optical express from different numbers it seems....also got something through the post. Why are companies allowed to get away with this. I left them 2 years ago and they've pestered me since!! I'll never go to them again solely down to this relentless marketing!!!!

Just called the freephone number 0800 023 2020 as suggested by ex-emp2 and spoke to a very nice pleasant girl who didn't try to sell me anything but offered to immediately take my name off the list. Here's hoping it works!!

I actually was interested in getting laser eye surgery, but after reading about this company's marketing practices I will be going with someone else. I would not trust a company that endorses such unethical marketing practices with my eyesight.

these people keep calling me but wont tell me who they are until i give my name, but im reluctant to give my name as i dont no who it is...could you please help me in finding out who these people are.