Gumtree Advertising Part 3
My story
Please be aware this is a very long post containing detailed information.
Gumtree Advertising Part 3
Gumtree Advertising Part 3
Gumtree advertising, ummm – I have thought long and hard about proceeding in this vein as I’m not the type of person who goes looking for trouble or wishes to create trouble. I have always accepted just and unjust behaviour from where ever and I have been on the end of many an unjust turn throughout my business life. I have always turned the other check, took whatever was dealt and carried on but there comes a time when you have had enough of being everyones whipping post, scape goat or being made an example of, so this stances is completely out of character for me.
Yes on the 2nd of January I received an email from Gumtree somewhat vague but an allrounder on there part which I’m guessing suites them down to a tee as emails are admissible in a court of law. They have chosen not to discuss anything with me but have said they will refund my costs of advertising.
Some costs have been received directly to my bank account but not all.
I was hoping a Corporate company such as Gumtree would have written to me in a professional manner but alas that wasn’t to be.
Under these circumstances regarding the content of Gumtrees email to myself on the 2nd January 2020, I now feel that it would be acceptable for myself to share my letter with you and all corespondents so you can see and understand how this has escalated to this point.
I will start at the beginning by adding the first response from Gumtree advising me my ad was removed and then there response after i questioned the initial removal with screen shots of the emails.
This ad had been running with no alterations for nearly 6 Months
Here is another screen shot of the last email I sent to Gumtree before calling them, there was no point in sending any further emails as I never received a reply from the previous 4! This is when Jason sent me his email to rate him for helping me when I never received anything from him/Gumtree.
Whilst my ad was being removed and reinstated here is a couple of screen shot telling me that people are loving my ad from Gumtree
Mia was the first email response after the first removal of my ad and reinstated it saying it had been removed by accident
Gracie also reinstated my ad after again being removed
I received this email from Jason asking me to rate him even though I never received an email from him originally?
Willo is her name, I never received an email asking me to rate her?
The last call made to Gumtree was to a foreign lady called Willow, I found her very unhelpful and very unsympathetic to my request to reinstate my ad. After the telephone conversation I was told to wait for an email to see if my ad would be reinserted on her instructions. I waited, It was this lady in the end who had my ad removed permanently. Here is a copy of that email.
Recorded Letter
– My address has been omitted for obvious reasons
7 December 2019
Gumtree.com Ltd
5 New Street Square
London
EC4A 3TW
RECORDED LETTER
Dear Sirs,
Re: Advertisement ID XXXXXXXXXX – Female Masseuse – Seuder name Sue
I think under these unusual circumstances, it’s in mine/your best interest to enlighten you as to who I am. I’m a mature professional business lady having owned many business abroad where I have spent more than 20 years overseas. I returned to the UK after having all my monies stolen from my news paper business by my ex husband.
At my time of life it’s very difficult to start from the bottom again after being very successful for many years. A legal equuntance referred me to my massage business of which I having been working at for the past 6 years. purely as I’ve always worked for myself, on returning to this country and after applying for over 200 jobs, I was only offered part time work with an income of 3-400 pounds a month obviously not enough to survive on.
My character being old school, honest, trustworthy, my word is my bond, I haven’t found the same of current companies since returning to the UK. It seems the larger the company becomes the more unscrupulous there behaviour is towards the little people. People like myself who wish to work and survive are trodden on and cast aside by Gumtrees behaviour but without people like myself there would not be a Gumtree.
Having now been a female masseuse for nearly 6 years, I have come across numerous people whom have been treated poorly by yourselves. They place their ads in good faith having to pay the monies upfront only to have the ad removed by yourselves, anything from 1hr to 5 years later. Gumtrees work ethic towards the little people is disgusting, It’s the little people who have enabled Gumtree to grow to such a size. When searching for Gumtree reviews, there are many people who have placed an ad with yourselves and had their money stolen by you – Gumtree – Really not a good work ethic!, when the little people advertise because they need to survive in todays world having made you the giant you are today.
Here is my cases which I think is a little unique and I wish you to rectify this before I have to go down other avenues. I am happy to make this letter to yourselves public at anytime as I have told the truth and anyone who knows me will know I am honest.
I understand Gumtrees policies and how they overreact to some wording in adverts and get around issues by saying “you have broken gumtrees rules – ad removed – keeping the little persons monies with no refund”.
Taking all that into account, after having my website launched mid May 2019 because my clients requested it. I decided to telephone Gumtree to discuss the possibility of placing an advert with yourselves on Friday May 24th and spoke to Chloe on your automated system extension 4. I believe Chloe is a lady of authority within Gumtree and picks up the calls when employees aren’t available hence hearing her moving around what seemed to be her kitchen.
After a lengthy and very helpful chat with Chloe, I was assured that if I placed a simple ad with yourselves with no reference to the word Tantric there would be no problem with me advertising and I would be allowed to just add and pay the extra for a link to my website.
I will add that I am not a lady of the night, Prostitute or Escort and if you look on my website you will see there is a disclaimer to that effect which was written by a police officer. Yes my website mentions Tantric, Sensual and Erotic but this is marketing as you well know.
Immediately after the conversation I placed my ad with yourselves and true to her word the ad has run with no problems for over 5 months. No alterations were ever made to my ad over this period, all I did was pay to bump my ad up consistently.
On Sunday evening, November 17th I receive an email from yourselves telling me you have had to remove my ad? By return, I instantly reply by sending you a pleasant email asking why as this ad has been the same for the last 5 months and nothing has been altered??
After having a very stressful night worrying about the removal of my ad as I receive traffic to my website from my ad. The next morning, I received an email from yourselves apologising telling me the the system deleted my ad by accident and its been reinstated. Because of the time of the month this occurred, I bumped my ad up to featured costing me £99.00, great or so I thought, how wrong was I!
The first week the ad ran ok until Sunday when it was removed again, I never received any notification from yourselves and only noticed something was wrong with the lack of traffic to my website. I sent you an email again explaining as before and that it must have been removed in error. No reply from yourselves, Again I sent you an email, no reply as you can imagine this is taking a serious toll on my business and effecting my well being. The stress and worry have been horrendous with server chest pains but trying too carry on, I sent yet another email and again no response from yourselves!
Completely disgusted with the way I have been treated by an enormous company such as Gumtree who is always willing to take my money but wont return my emails, I decide to make a call to Gumtree at 9.00am on November 27th. Going through you automated system again, I was extremely lucky and got through on existent 4 to Chloe who I originally spoke to before when I initially placed my ad all those months ago. I explained the whole scenario to her again and the way I’ve been treated and she said that she would look into this so my ad would not be removed in the future and told me quit categorically that I would not have any trouble with my ad again as long as my ad stayed the same, Chloe promptly placed my ad live. Thank God!
For my troubles Chloe agreed to give me a week of featured ad free of charge but to receive this, I must call back on December 2nd on which I did. Again noticing my ad had been removed once more?. I asked to speak to Chloe but was refused and received a lady called Willow, not a compassionate lady by any means but after a while she agreed to reinstated my ad live with the feature.
The next day my ad was removed again? Can you imagine what this action does to people who are trying to earn money to survive? I call Gumtree again and my ad is reinstated on the 4th my ad was removed again before my eyes as I changed my picture to add Merry Christmas to it and a couple of sprigs of holly, all wording remained the same. I called you again only to receive Willow on the line, I asked her to reinstate my ad and explained it must be a mistake as all I’ve done is add merry Christmas to my picture etc. She refused to make it live again and said she needed to look into this, I explained that not making my ad live was costing me money but she still refused and said I would receive an email from here after a decision has been made? “what decision? I have been told on a number of occasions there is nothing wrong with my ad” I never received the ad time I paid for.
A few hours later I receive an email, worded for my benefit telling me basically my ad will stay removed? (I am happy to show the content of all emails if this letter goes public)
Over the years and most recently I have seen paid ads on gumtree mentioning all kinds of things of which I have copies of, plus you accept paid ads from google, bare faced advertising of Swedish / Sensual /Tantric / Erotic yet my ad had nothing of the sort mentioned.
I am now wondering if this is a case of victimisation?
We are all adults here, so let me explain and probably most of your gents employed by Gumtree and some of the ladies have sort or thought about a massage service/session.
Swedish massage normally means they will both be naked throughout the session
Sensual massage has no reference to sex what so ever it’s simply a lighter way to massage someone, not everyone wants a sports massage.
Tantric does not mean sex, it’s a way of giving sensation to someone and taking them on a journey, Tantric has been practiced for many years in the Hindu religion and different forms are used.
Erotic This isn’t sex either its away a person perceive a vision or how they feel
I have been nothing but open and honest form the start of my advertisement with yourselves and have conducted myself in nothing other than in a professional manner.
The way I have been treated is unjust and unfair, your actions have cost me financially and seriously taken a toll on my health.
I urge Gumtree to look into my case urgently as your actions can not continue to hurt people like my self on a regular day by day basis and get away with it. I kindly ask you to reinstate my advert at your earliest please. It would be a decent act on your part to offer me compensation for the loss of earnings and severe stress to my health caused by your incompetence and unprofessionalism in this matter. If I had treated my advertising clients within my news paper business in this manner my business wouldn’t have survived a month!
Hopefully you will see how unjust yore behaviour has been towards myself and do the right thing by reinstating mad ad forth with!
I look forward to hearing your comments at your earliest. Please bear in mind the holiday season is upon us, so urgency in this matter is needed. Thank you.
Yours faithfully
(Yes I can see a few typos in my above letter but obviously this was written with fury and you are blinded, no matter how many times you read the letter before sending it. Obviously I can not correct these typos as this was the letter that was sent.)
Gumtree reviews on google
Here are a few screen shots of just a few reviews on Gumtrees behaviour towards “the little people”
Here are a couple of screen shots taken in December of adverts placed on Gumtree just to prove that i’m not being unreasonable.
Gumtrees response via email to my Recorded Letter dated 2nd January 2020
I have since replied to this email and here are the screen shots of my email sent to Gumtree yesterday. You will notice in the content I have mentioned if you type into google sensual full body massage, tantric full body massage etc., its Gumtree who comes up first!, don’t you think this is strange? considering they do not allow these words in adverts!
3 x screen shots of the email I sent yesterday
Whilst compiling this very long post, to my surprise, I have just received an email from Gumtree in response to my email sent yesterday.
Here is a copy of that email and you will see there is no mention of the key words? that obviously upset them as they clearly will not allow me to advertise under any circumstances.
As you can see by the content of this email they are admitting that there was confusion on there part? Really! I don’t think so as I telephoned them initially asking them if i could place an ad with them, with a link to my website as my website contained Sensual and Tantric wording.
I have now sent them another email and here is a screen shot of my email sent to them today.
This has become a nightmare and I don’t know what I have done to receive this cause of action. I will continue to try and get to the bottom of this but I doubt I will every receive the whole truth. The sad thing about all of this is, all I wanted was for my ad to be reinstated and run as it did for nearly 6 months before its unjust removal.
Thank you for reading this very long post but hopefully this has enlightened you a little as to the way I have been unjustly treated.
As always, take care of you and yours
Sue x
(Simply standing up for the little people)
