Really? These are the same card that were on sale @ Coles and @ BigW earlier and currently at Woolies. Look at those threads and see how much popular they are.
10% off TCN The KIDS Gift Cards @ Target » All Comments
be careful too, you cannot eliminate any possibilities, sales jump from store to store could be a new way of 10-pots-with-just-9-lids situation where latter spenders would suddenly become the biggest losers if it ever burts
Just checked FB but still dont know why…? they only have posts prior to October now and no comments
do not buy any TCN card!
Why? What are the issues? These are the same kind of cards discounted at Coles & Big W and currently at Woolies.
read their Facebook page for concerns, plus they has removed support phone number from website, lack of support from customer services with cards suspended/not usable etc.
look at what’s happened on the restaurant card. They keeps removing places where you can use the card, they also removed cafes from the list . For now you can’t even check where you can use the card on their website. For the restaurant card, you use it once in a place, then they will ban that place… for now it’s extremely hard for you to find a place to use the card.
Please keep in mind that TCN cards are prepaid gift card. You pay them money in advance. They just sell these cards with discount to make people buy these card but won’t let people use the money. I’m feeling they will take all these money away and then start the bankruptcy process.
exactly what I was thinking too, I already notified media to run deeper investigations based on gathered info. it would not surprise me there are lot of people gonna have a very shitty Christmas because of TCN
Obviously this is all anecdotal - and that's important for people to be aware of - but I can say that I had no problem using $900 worth of TCN HIM/HER cards in a single JB Hifi purchase recently.
It sounds like mileage varies greatly on these.
At the beginning people can use TCN card to purchase JB HIfi gift card online, for now you can’t.
Keep in mind one you purchased the card the money are not yours. I’d like to suggest people who purchased TCN card, try to use them asap.and how were people buying JB Gift cards online when you can only use these in store ?
@Diplomats: At the beginning the TCN card can be used online. You see, TCN keeps add limitation on how you can use the card.
Holy moly yeah check out the fb comments!
they deleted comments and blocked people who complained about them already
Will be interesting to see the comments
Anyways to retrieve cache?
I just used $600 of them to save $90 off an Xbox Series X…no complaints here :)
depends on when you got those cards and what types, if you don't believe us then go check on their Facebook page and try to get more and see how it goes
Ouch!
yep
Ooops. Went out for TCN card hunting this morning and unluckily (read luckily) couldn’t find any. And now I am happy that there was none.
Opposite i have my $1500 of 19% off cards and of which I had the pleasure of using $800 at JB HI FI :)
I wonder who the winner of both of us is lol
@popsiee: Still 700$ left unused though. Don’t be too sure until you have used it :p
Jokes aside based on the other comments I think it’s probably the newer batch of the cards are affected. Did you buy yours recently? Regardless I do hope that no one loses there money. And for me, I would rather be safe than sorry.
@Anonymous101: It's not that dangerous. You hear people have this or that problems, you don't hear more and more people that having no issue and enjoying the discount.
My gut feeling tells me that this is going to be scandalous, all involved retailers would soon have to deal with a flood of refunds and complaints. Simply put, how can you afford to run 10-15% discount from store to store, week after week without losing money? Unless this is the case where first buyers enjoy the fruits while latter buyers have to pay for that. I got stuck with the latest batch of cards now, not a recommended experience to be honest. Lucky enough that my earlier bigger discounts would compensate for this loss if it is a case of administration soon.
Are you thinking ponzi?
yes, clever tactic too coz investors would be more suspicious and careful these days, not so with … majority of consumers where all they can see is bigger than normal discounts
Are your latest batch of cards restaurant cards or the retail shopping ones (I.e. HIM / HER / KIDS etc.)?
About as smart as buying Dick Smith gift cards in December 2015
this is worse, this is a fraud coated in legitimate outfits run through all big retailers one by one. they cleverly planned for this as a group, with the intention of exploitation - gift cards not refundable.
I’ve had over $3000 worth of TCN cards in last month and had no issues with any. Used all in JB
as I said, first batches would be ok, now is too late as it is coming to an end of it to expose self as a fraud by using latter spenders' money to honour/pre-gift first batches of buyers
Mate I think you need to see a real therapist
only time can tell, go ahead and buy some now if you want. it wouldn't affect the first few batches just so people would still help them market the sales to roll out more cards for sales to the point they have to stop honouring them because money are being plugged out
I used $200 worth on Friday, zero issues.
the person possibly behind this TCN is named R.H.
I mean, they have 9 employees on LinkedIn and the person with the initials RH has on his profile "Co-Founder at TCN".
I'm not sure what the big conspiracy is here..
I never buy things in Australia that not able to use them without ability of refund so far, except this TCN company where money spent and your cards are not usable. Please tell me, would not not suspect any fishy and/or dodgy thing(s) going on? Then, when you contacted them so many times without response, even took it on their Facebook page, yet they still ignore you and block and delete all no so good comments about them. Please tell, which decent Au company/business would do such things?
Bought a few last time, no major issues.
Same. Was a pain with the activating but after about 2 hours it was all fine.
because those are first batches, the latter purchasers would be the ones who are going to suffer.
My restaurant tcn used to work at McD and some bread store, but now no longer working. Having said that when i looked at tnc, it says no fast food or quick serve restaurant. So to be fair, looks like they're trying to fix whatevs stated in tnc. Hoping that they won't go fraudulent or bankrupt.
Read the comments too, sounds dodge… black swan event soon I imagine.
yes, very dodgy
Just buy and use it. Don’t hold onto it basically. Or swap it for jb gc if you allowed
would be ok at the beginning like a week ago, now it is bit late, my bet is there would be just 2/3 or half or whatever portion would be unusable to put people on hold while selling more cards until they suddenly plug out, poop, money gone
So this card is not longer accepted at JB? I have 1k!
I just used mine at jb. No issue.
@Dienk: Was it suspended in the first place? I don't get it how using at jb will make the card suspended.
Over $1000 of my cards are currently suspended.
There is no phone support and they don't respond to emails.
I stupidly paid via Coles GC so can't even do chargeback. I bought 3 today from woolies and immediately used them as soon as they were active but cursing the day when I bought them from Coles.
Totally f***d up
What do you mean with suspended? Balance still $0? And you still had another purchase?
Someone posted that a bunch of people took cards from the shelves at woolies and purchased them at Coles for the 15% discount.
Obviously the company has some level of tracking of where the cards were sent to, so they suspended those cards purchased from a different company to where the stock was sent.
Ahhh naughty 😜
Sounds fair! 🤷♂
Interesting, never thought of that.
that's their lame excuse, do you honestly think people are that stupid to move a bunch of gift cards recklessly about potential criminal charge if get caught, all for just discount, not even for free?
Balance shows $100 but the status is suspended. I have asked for a reason time and again but there is absolute silence. They are not contactable via phone, so don't know what can be done when the payment was via gift cards.
They said they had a limit? You went double the limit?
I get the upset obviously though.
so your most recent purchase from wws works fine, those you brought from coles last week all suspended?
I bought over $2k from Coles and about 40% are suspended but shows full balance.
yep, and good luck dealing with them
Did you take them from Woolworths to buy at Coles?
Just got 100 suspended. Haven't tried the other. Went to Coles they refused to refund me
You bought giftcards with coles GC? I thought they didn't allow this.
You can as long as you have full balance.
Depend on the cashier, some of them do not care.
I thought you couldn't purchase gift cards with Coles gift card as they closed that loophole?
Back on topic, I bought 2 x $100 TCN Him/Her with the 10% discount at WW- used it at JB hifi on Wed no issues. But reading the comments glad that I managed to use mine and will be staying away from them for a while until the mess is sorted out!
Im curious why you wouldnt just get a prepaid visa vs this when theyre at normal price?
You wouldn’t, people are getting them because they are 10-15% off
Deal also includes the seemingly less objectionable Catch, Spotify and Google Play cards:
Edit: objectionable, not injectable. I don't think any of these are suitable for intravenous use.
Thanks for sharing.
It might depends on where and when you purchase the TCN. Bought $500 at Woolies Canberra on Thursday, fund loaded within one hour. But highly recommend anyone who purchased use them ASAP, or just transfer to the JB GC using their return policy.
How do I transfer to Jb gift card? If I bought at woolies, do I transfer there or at Jb?
No there is no straight way to transfer. The work around is to buy something at JB and return it so you get JB GCs
Wouldn't you need the receipt? What would they do when they see on the receipt that TCN cards were used?
JB would not let me buy a JB gift card with them today.
They are active.
That would be correct as per T&C. There is no straight way to transfer. Work around which some are following is to buy a product and then return it.
Ok, so it depends on the sales. I just bought jb gc with tcn at Northland.
Are you talking about physical or digital?
you are right, some cashiers do not really clear of this, or they just do not care, then you are lucky. most store won't let you do .
This used to work right? What's the error? Did you try them on their website?
I don't think TCN can be used on their website?
I got my TCN gift card purchase cancelled as they requested photos of my government ID and credit card, which I declined. Been chasing them up for 8 weeks now but they have not responded!
consider doing a chargeback instead
I paid with a prepaid Visa card (from a camera promotion).
Is this a digital card you bought?
Yes.
hi OP were you the one who was sweeping away all the TCN cards at Target Cannington earlier ?
Haha.. Nope.
If anything goes wrong would Coles give me a refund?
nope
Just got 100 suspended for no reason
Lol so many paranoid people on this post
Exactly
go ahead and spend few thousands and then being treated as a criminal, see how you feel :)
Comeon guys…this is considered a very good deal… Not sure why people are targeting this particular post, when others similar ones had hundreds of votes. I just had a look at their Facebook page. Very few issues compared to thousands of happy customers. Thanks Op.
that's because they removed a post full of complaints in the comments overnight
they indeed did, very dodgy and dishonest company. but people are not stupid to not take photos or screenshots of comments and posts before being removed forcefully, at least I did as part of evidences to shovel up their asses if still not able to use what I paid for.
Bought a fair few earlier today and still not active, wish I saw this post beforehand.
Where did you buy?
Target Forest Hill, checked a few cards online and it states thats they're active but with $0 balance. Has anyone else had this issue?
I had plans to get some from my Woolies place but now having 2nd thoughts about it. Generally it takes few hours to show the balance from what I gather based on previous comments. When did you activate?
@ZYDMZ: I finally purchased $1500 cards. Showing $0 aswell. Can you keep me posted once your balance is up.
last time when coles were selling at 15%, it took them up to 8-10 hours to actually load money, so maybe just wait.
Coles told me they take 24 hours to fully activate
mine were activated and been sitting for a week, then double checked prior spending yet still got suspended without notification even I did registered my cards on their website aka they obtained my info including my phone number and email. don't you think it is minimum decency to even contact me first, no. they don't even bother to apologise sincerely or take action to rectify their wrong doing.
What cards did you buy?
on the wws activation docket, it says could take 48 hours. lol
(From some of the complaints I see) Am I right in thinking that a whole heap of people have tried to dodge the system by grabbing them from alternative stores, and TCN have reacted by suspending the cards… possibly until they can ascertain their validity?
Looks like yes and others are mostly to do with the restaurants cards where the list of merchants is shrinking…
Not applicable for everyone for e.g. my case. Some people had card suspended without reason and there is absolutely no response from TCN. Someone posted above that they deleted their Facebook post full of complaints, so it verifies their dodgy practice.
For people who got it from other store to redeem in Coles, they did wrong but isn't TCN also holding funds illegally. I mean these people paid 85% value of the card so how TCN can withhold funds.
Yes absolutely there is no argument that people who got it from other stores and redeemed in Coles were wrong.
LOL maybe they should have done small trials earlier to find out which store match and have no problems .
Lacking a little R&D :)Yep, I did went into Coles and grab whatever available and paid, yet still be treated unprofessionally and disrespectfully by TCN. when I complained on their Facebook page, they deleted them and blocked me, same as others. Dodgy AF. Their explanation as others been moving cards from other stores to scan at store that is running discount is very lame too, as if people are so stupidly desperate to steal and potentially get caught with crime for just 10-15% saving??? Common
@webtherapist: Did they specifically say you got it from another store?
At least you got a response…
Taking something out of the store without paying for it is stealing 😂
Simple as that
Yeah, i was thinking to grab some his cards from target n paid in woolies but i thought it's not very ethical. Good thing, i didn't go ahead.
not only it was unethical, but also risky for yourself. do you think it is worth it to get caught with criminal charge for a discount?
If you didn't do those dodgy practices, can you report your case to ACCC?
Very sad to hear about the people who are affected by this. I am actually on the other side of the boat.
I purchased a few for Cole’s at 15% off, a few from BigW and finally some from WW today. Used them to pay for iPhone 12 pro and Apple Watch. All went smoothly. May be I was one of the lucky ones.
Note: I didn’t take cards to other stores to pay for them and didn’t buy any restaurant cards either.
I only had HIM/HER cards.
Hopefully the issues affecting others will be sorted soonhow long do the cards take to activate once they've been paid for?
It looks like there is a 2 stage activation.
Stage 1 is like the recongise the card is been sold; this happens while you are in the shop and it says on your receipt.
Stage 2 is credit applied to the card and the card can be used. This can take up 24 hours.
is the only way to check Stage 2 by scratching off the pin?
@dorikin: yes you have to. otherwise how do you know?
how about this
balance is still 0, but you do not know. you went to a shop, siwpe,SCRATCH the pin number. transaction is declined, now what, you have a card with scratched pin and balance 0.
it is the same as you scratch now, worest is a scratched card with balance 0.
Stage 1: you pay for the cards at the checkout and it takes a minute or two to process and the receipts are printed. If successful the receipt says successful with amount mentioned
Stage 2: it’s take a few hours typically 3-4 hours if the website is not bombarded with activations. For some people it has take more than a day.
Unfortunately only way to check is scratch the pin and enter the details on their website to check balance. Make sure you remember the email address you entered cos if you want to check the balance again and don’t remember the email then you won’t be able to
I don’t even know why they need your email address and mobile number just to check the balance. Just harvesting your personal information.
Unfortunately only way to check is scratch the pin and enter the details on their website to check balance.
After 24 hrs you can turn up at JB and fire away as more than 99%+ are activated by then .
I've never bothered checking balances to date at their WS .
Called my friend, who is a manager at one of the Woolworth Supermarket, he advised me not to buy TCN gift cards. He said many people are having issues with them, and it is not worth the risk to save few dollars. He said the headache is more than the saving. He told me when you buying these, you are basically gambling your money.
He also said the system doesn't allow for returning these cards.
I guess most of them maybe experience the balance 0 issue and complaint to wws. If they are not familiar with it.
Used $1700 worth of Him/Her cards today at JB without issue. These were a mixture of Coles cards and some bought yesterday from Woolworths. I have already redeemed $500 and $1800 without any problems.
I appreciate there is also an inherent danger when purchasing something which leaves you as an unsecured creditor but my experience with these cards has been smooth.
Did you register or checked balance before using them?
Checked balance to make sure they were loaded before redeeming but did not register the cards.
I am also able to check balance.
Seems most of the people complaining are those who circumvented the t’s and c’s and bought either more than 5 or did a dodgy store swap thing. I’m glad TCN are clamping down on that. Too many people taking the p*ss which means genuine shoppers miss our and likelihood of offers like this being repeated is zilch
What about me that had 100 suspended for no reason?
That’s bad, suspending for no reason is very bad. Was it one $100 card?
Her card
@digitalane So you are being Salty because you missed it?
People could have went with their partner and parents to buy 5 card per person. This is absolute horrendous excuse to suspend a card.
yes, very lame excuse
so, what is wrong for you and your partner getting 10 cards in total as per 5 cards each? mate, stop judging others unless you are working for TCN and/or getting benefit(s) from them. don't preach people here when TCN is on the wrong side of a lot of things here: changing Ts and Cs without notice to their customers, suspended without proper reason/ground but assumption (that … people stole cards from one store to another etc), ignored complaints then also removed contact phone number off website while people are stuck and frustrated with money out of pockets for legitimate purpose - to save some money (and it is TCN's intention too with the discounted promotion)
Hi There!
Thanks for your enquiry. Your request (XXXX) has been received.
Due to your support, the Coles promotion has been an overwhelming success.
However, because of the increased volume our customer service team has been a little busy. If you are still waiting for a response, we will bet back to you shortly.
We will ensure all enquiries are addressed as soon as possible, so you can be rest assured we will get back to you.
Please be aware that typically gift cards can take up 6-24 hours to activate from the time of sale at retailers.
Please note, due to the promotional limit of 5 cards per person we can only assist each customer with 5 cards.Thanks again for your support and patience and we look forward to getting in touch with you soon.
The Card Network Team
This 5 cards per person limit - is that for purchase at Coles only or at BigW/Woolies/Target as well?
It would be very easy for them to suspend cards especially for low value multiple cards in 1 transaction or for those who checked balance online giving same email / phone number.That is what I did. I have 9 Cards at my email address and phone number. I did 2x transaction total 10 cards
Were these all from Coles or also mixed from Big W/Woolies? Were they ever working? If the reason for suspension is more than 5 cards, then the onus should have been on Coles to enforce limit! I hope TCN refunds you. It's holiday season and people could be buying multiple to give gifts to others.
@bajirao: All from 15% Coles. All my card were suspended straight after activation. Looks I did the mistake of activate it using my email and phone. Staff from JB told me I should register before using it however saw some people saying I should use it straight away without register after couple hours
@Dienk: You don't need to register anything. If you want to check whether they are loaded. Just check 1 card from same batch. Normally if 1 ets loaded, then all the batch so.
@Dienk: Where did u register? Is this the one where you check balance online (to make sure it's loaded) or add it to app?
@Dienk: That sucks. I used the same link though I did not buy from Coles. Bought from BigW/Woolies/Target. Didn't get $100 so had to settle for $30/$50 multiples.
But why are you providing email and phone number?
Balance can be checked just using card number and PIN via link below.
@Ash-Say: Your link showed that
Date Value Vii Receipt Number Description
01/12/2020 0.00 Suspend card - m by [email protected]
30/11/2020 100.00 WEB_load OPERID incomm@Dienk: You need to email [email protected] and seek reason for suspension
Good luck and mine is another person and still awaiting a response after dozens of emails.
@Dienk: Excellent. Very happy with the positive outcome. I used mine today at JB without any drama (except the amused cashier and my own guilt of taking so much of her time as I wasn't able to get a single $100 one and so had bunch of $30 ones)
@salman2sms: Good for you. Use them quickly before they randomly decide to suspend without any reason.
@bajirao: Same for me even I didn’t get any $100 cards. All $50 i got 28 cards now 😬
Want to buy iPhone 12 128GB@salman2sms: Should not be a problem. Just the receipt might be couple of meters long :)
One thing to note is that in case any GC doesn't work during payment, I was told they won't be able to cancel transaction and you need to cover via alternate means. Thankfully all my GCs worked well.@salman2sms: Use this link provided by @Ash-say -> https://www.eftposgc.com.au/
This one doesn't need email id / phone number@bajirao: Successfully purchased iPhone 12 128gb today with all $50 HIM/HER/TEEN Cards (28 cards) at JB ;)
I bought them with Zip, does Zip cover you like a Credit Card?
I have to pay my zip account today, however I was going to directly transfer. Hopefully they work at JB next year!
On the 10th December, I brought 2x HIM $100 cards when I first spotted them as having instant 10% off.
Later in the early evening of the 15th I decided to get more GCs from WWS. This was after researching a product that I wanted and finding a good deal for it at JB HiFi on their website. I hadn't realized how good the 10% off was, but with this major purchase, I was going to get as many cards to help as possible to improve the deal. The original price at JB was $1,449, I paid $1,379 plus $55 for the delivery — now the delivery is free, but it was a good deal at the time already with other retailers charging over $1,700 for the same product! But you never know with JB HiFi, they can have a good price one day and it's up the next, so I made the deal.
In the late afternoon, early evening of the 15th, I managed to visit a number of WWS and collected a further $970 value, 14x $30 TEEN, 11x $50 HIM/HER (all the $100 cards were gone). Everything worked fine when buying the GCs with one exception, when I got the 14x $30 cards from one WWS, they made sure that I wasn't being scammed and they had to do two transactions as the register would only do 10 cards at a time. But there was no question about limits other than the WW checkout system requiring each single transaction be limited to 10 cards maximum.
Not long after returning home, I went to JB HiFi to get the best deal on a product that I wanted — they had no stock but I wasn't in a hurry and they also had a delivery option that I was happy with, so I placed the order and immediately paid $1,170 with the 27x GC that I had in hand. I paid the balance with JB's own giftcards that I had due to some other offer almost 12 months ago (non-expiring $400 JB HiFi Gift Card with mobile number ported to Telstra plan). Anyway, the sale went through with a really good deal and the checkout person was very patient and very happy to process all the cards, one at a time for each amount at face value. And yes, my receipt is very, very long indeed. This was also very close to their closing time, so I could not complain about anything at JB.
My delivery is now coming later today, the 19th December.
Aside from the running around to collect the cards, I had absolutely zero issues with buying them (other than not being able to buy them at one place and having to make do with the $30 and $50 cards only) or using them for payment; all GCs registered properly at each of the WWS checkouts.
After paying for my JB order in full, I went home and a little bit later went out to see if I could restock my cards, but none of a number of other WWS had any to buy whatsoever; they were "cleaned out" as far as I could tell and I knew the offer finished on the 15th, so I wasn't surprised, I also knew the deal was talked about here at OZB.
On Thursday the 17th, I did visit a WWS that I had previously visited on the night of the 15th and they had plenty of the right cards on hand (including $100 ones) and I thought they may have been hidden or removed from display, so I queried the staff and was told that they often keep extra stock that doesn't fit on the pegs of the display cabinet in storage behind the display. So, perhaps stores that had "none", actually had plenty, but none on display.
I didn't know about the 15% Coles offer, so none of my cards come from there. WW didn't seem to have any actual limiting terms on the number of cards that were allowed to be purchased by one person, so at the one stop where I got 14 cards, it was still no problem aside from having to do two transactions.
It wasn't particularly long before I got my last GC and was in store at JB paying for the order; I'm pretty certain it was less than 2 hours. I didn't count on having to wait for the cards to have value applied as I asked at WWS if I needed to do anything at all before using them and they told me that all I had to do was go to the store I wanted to use them and pay with them on the spot. I didn't notice anything on the receipt to say that it could take up to 48 hours to have the value added to the cards (it was actually on the receipts though, I just didn't notice it) and each receipt actually showed activation was approved and therefore successful…. So, no registration at any website, no checking balances, nothing like that. Again, I had zero problems. Had I seen the posts here before I got them, then I would have been worried and may have waited a day or two before going to JB, but as I expected, everything worked perfectly even after less than 2 hours after I had purchased my last GC from WWS.
I'm glad the 48 hours wasn't a thing, because it could of put a spanner in the works.
Thanks for sharing. Glad to hear everything worked smoothly for you. Most like you and me did not have any issues with WWS or BigW or Target. It's just the Coles initial day had issues. I also noticed the Coles post listed 5 limit whereas WWS/BigW did not list any limit. The 10 per transaction is probably system limit at WWS which is not an issue as anyway the Zip cashback is limited to $30 so u need to make multiple transactions.
The restaurant card on the other hand is causing lot of challenges for many. That's the one to avoid.Yes, I was only buying ones that let me use them at JB; I wasn't and never have gone near any restaurant GC options from any supplier as I see them as much more risk and less value to me. Also, I think that at least some of the suspended cards from Coles have gotten sorted. The question remains whom "paid" for the extra value, as someone said, they thought that Coles may have contributed something to the offer, but they didn't think WW would have..? Going by history though, it has been a clear winner for retailers selling short expiry GCs that get wasted because of expiry or even other losses, but these days I believe the retailer must give a 36 month expiry on most types of GCs (if not all). I much prefer no expiry, just like the deals with electricity — those ended in 12 months are a pain as you have to take action to deal with them again. Anyway, that's off topic, so I'll stop now.
The free shipping….. got them to refund that for me.
Tuesday, no free shipping, was $55.
Ordered and paid for in full on Tuesday.
Friday, free shipping on website.
Saturday, got delivery.Today, visited JB, asked them to refund shipping due to free shipping offer occurring so quickly after the order and even before my delivery had arrived.
First off, they said I got a deal already that included the shipping consideration; I said I got the deal and then shipping was a consideration after the deal price.
Then he said that free shipping is for online orders; he checked the website, online wasn't necessary, local was and I am local.
Then he said I paid with gift cards, knowing about the discount on them; I said that is just a payment method, it's irrelevant, which he agreed.
Finally he agreed to give me a JB gift card for the $55 delivery charge.If you don't ask, you can't get it; I did ask, it took some work and convincing, but I got it.
Had it been a couple of weeks or a month later, I wouldn't have tried to get the shipping refunded. But it was just 3 days after ordering that the free delivery was offered and my order didn't arrive until 4 days, so I thought, what the heck….
stay away from TCN for now, you better check on their Facebook page to see why. unless you have time and efforts + money to spare for frustration