2.9K views
11 comments

Well yesterday I decided to use Overstock's chat service to delete my account. After talking to their representive Jessica for over 20 minutes, no progress was made. From what she said, "We have an internal record policy." That dang policy wasn't mentioned upon registering for an account, without my given consent to store my own personal information the company now uses this data freely.

Don't buy things from this horrible company.

Here's a copy of the conversation I had with an Overstock representative.

Jessica: Hi, my name is Jessica. How may I help you?

Visitor: I was wondering how I can cancel my account please.

Jessica: Hello there.

Visitor: I was wondering how I can cancel my account please.

Jessica: I am so sorry as you do not wish to maintain account with us.

Jessica: For record keeping purposes accounts cannot be removed from our system.

Jessica: However, you can remove stored credit card information and stop emails from being automatically sent to your email address by following the following instructions.

Jessica: Click on the "My Account" link located at the top of the homepage, and log into your account.

Jessica: Log in with your current existing email and password.

Jessica: To remove stored credit card information:

Jessica: Click on the "Account Settings" tab.

Jessica: Click on the โ€œPayment Settingsโ€ link.

Jessica: Remove the check from the box next to โ€œOn my next order, save my payment information for quicker checkoutโ€ by clicking it.

Jessica: Then click the "Submit Changes" button.

Visitor: Why can't my account be removed?

Jessica: Your account will be invalidated.

Jessica: For record keeping purposes accounts cannot be removed from our system.

Visitor: Was this mentioned when I signed up?

Jessica: Please invalidate the account.

Visitor: Was this mentioned when I signed up?

Jessica: No.

Visitor: Why not? If I knew this in the first place I wouldn't have signed up.

Visitor: I wan't my account permantely removed fromyour data base.

Jessica: You just need to invalidate the account.

Jessica: It will be same as your account is removed.

Visitor: What's the difference? You obviously used different wording.

Jessica: By, this, you'll stop receiveing our emails too.

Jessica: *receiving

Jessica: Only option is to invalidate the account.

Visitor: Why can't my account be removed from your system, that wasn't mention when I signed up/

Jessica: I am so sorry. For record keeping purposes accounts cannot be removed from our system.

Jessica: Please follow the steps I have provided.

Jessica: and invalidate the account.

Visitor: Why do you need to keep my account?

Jessica: For record keep purpose of the orders placed, we are unable to delete the account.

Jessica: By invalidating the account, you'll stop receiving emails also we will have a record of the order.

Visitor: So you guys will foreverly hold my information that I did not consent for?

Jessica: Please invalidate the account by erasing your information.

Jessica: To remove stored credit card information:

Click on the "Account Settings" tab.

Click on the โ€œPayment Settingsโ€ link.

Jessica: Remove the check from the box next to โ€œOn my next order, save my payment information for quicker checkoutโ€ by clicking it.

Jessica: Then click the "Submit Changes" button.

Visitor: Why wasn't consent given for this?

Jessica: I apologize that I was not able to resolve that issue for you. Are there any other concerns I can address for you?

Visitor: Why wasn't consent given for this?

Jessica: Our customer have never contact us to delete the account once they have registered.

Jessica: The only option for you is to invalidate the accout.

Jessica: *account

Visitor: That doesn't answer my question whatsoever. Of course there's a percentage of costumers that demand their account to be closed for every company.

Jessica: We have not got any contact about that.

Jessica: Please invalidate your account.

Visitor: I seriously don't believe you. I want my account completely removed. I did not give you guys permission to hold my information.

Jessica: Once you invalidate your account, we will not have any information of your except the order.

Jessica: So, invalidate your address, erase your card number.

Jessica: This is the only option.

Jessica: Is there anything else I can help you with?

Visitor: Why is the order information needed?

Visitor: Still didn't answer the question why my permission wasn't granted for the company to do this.

Jessica: You have created account with us,

Jessica: Please invalidate your details.

Visitor: Just because I created an account does not mean the company can store information about past customers without noting any permission needed upon signing up for an account. How is that revelant to my question?

Jessica: Once you livalidate your account, we will not have any of your details accept the order.

Jessica: So, please invalidate the account.

Visitor: Why is the order information needed?

Jessica: For record keeping purpose, we need the orders.

Jessica: So, we are unable to delete account. Please invalidate your account if you do not wish to maintain account with us.

Jessica: That is the only option.

Jessica: Is there anything else I can help you with?

Visitor: Why is this information important to you guys? What details about the order are specified?

Jessica: We need the details of the number of orders placed on our site.

Visitor: Why can't my account be completely closed once you store the information into your database?

Jessica: That is what I am informing you to invalidate your details.

Jessica: By this your details will be erased.

Jessica: Is there anything else I can hel;p you with?

Jessica: *help

Visitor: What details are you keeping?

Jessica: Order details.

Visitor: What is that exactly?

Jessica: Ordered item, order total.

Visitor: You said that accounts can't be removed from the system?

Jessica: Yes.

Visitor: Why not?

Jessica: That is the reason I am asking you to invalidate the account by the, we will not have your details.

Visitor: You have the item ordererd saved already, why not completely remove the account then?

Jessica: For record keeping purposes accounts cannot be removed from our system.

Visitor: You have the item ordererd saved already, why not completely remove the account then?

Visitor: Why keep the account if you only want to know what was ordered? What's the purpose of doing this?

Jessica: I am sorry. But we do not have an option to delete account. Invalidate the information.

Jessica: As per our policy, we do not have an option to delete account,.

Jessica: Is there anything else I can help you with?

Visitor: Why isn't the option given? Where in the policy is this mentioned?

Jessica: We have internal record policy.

Jessica: We are not able to provide it to the customer.s

Visitor: Internal record policy that is hidden from the customer? Really now. Why isn't this information given when signing up?

Jessica: I am sorry. I do not have that information.

Visitor: This isn't moral.

Jessica: There is no way the account can be deleted.

Jessica: Please invalidate the account and we will lose your details.

Jessica: Only details, we will have is the order.

Jessica: Do you have any other questions for me?

Visitor: Since I can't take your words for granted, given no proof I want my entire account deleted from your system.

Jessica: Okay.

Jessica: Do you have any other concerns for me?

Visitor: Make it happen.

Jessica:

Thank you for contacting Overstock.com. Before you go, we invite you to check out the exclusive benefits of becoming a Club O Member. Club O allows you to earn rewards and save more with every Overstock.com purchase. It's our way of saying 'Thank You' for shopping with us. Click here to learn more!

Jessica has disconnected.

Location: Saratoga, California

Do You Have Something To Say ?
Write a review

Comments

chat-icon

Please avoid publishing any personal information and promotional content

You will be automatically registered on our site. Username and password will be sent to you via email.
Post Comment
Guest

EVERYTHING SHOULD BE IN THE HELP PART OF THIS WEBSITE. EVERY SINGLE THIN.

I NEED TO DELETE "MY LIST" AND IT IS NOT LETTING ME. I KNOW THIS IS MORE TECHNICAL STUFF BECAUSE AM DELETING MY LIST ON THE WEBSITE WHERE I SIGN UP.

Guest

I don't remember ever creating an overstock account, but I guess at some point I did. Never used it, but noticed it had a saved username/pword in Chrome.

Went to delete the account couldn't find that option. A google search how to do it brought me here. This *** is kind of disturbing. Seeing that the OP posted this nearly 4 years ago, I decided to try chatting with a rep to see if they've changed policies at all.

They haven't. They still keep all accounts for "record purposes."

Here's the transcript:

Stephanie: Hi, my name is Stephanie. How may I help you?

Visitor: Hi Stephanie, I'd like to delete my account.

Visitor: But I'm not seeing any option to do that.

Stephanie: I'll be glad to check and help you with the information. Stephanie: I'm so sorry we do not have an option to delete the account. Visitor: Why is that? Stephanie: Please login to your account and under the account settings edit the account information and enter the invalid email address and your account will be blocked permanently.

Visitor: Enter what invalid email address? Just make one up? Stephanie: Instead of Overstock@***.com enter invalidOverstock@***.com Visitor: Oh, so just add "invalid" in front of my existing email address? Stephanie: Yes.

Stephanie: Correct. Visitor: And that will delete my account? Stephanie: Yes. It will be blocked.

Visitor: What's the difference between blocked and deleted? Stephanie: Blocked is you cannot login to the account with the original email address. But still the account exist with the invalid email address. Visitor: Why can't I simply delete the account?

Stephanie: There is no such option to delete the account. Visitor: If I change my email address to invalid@***.com, would I be able to log back in with invalid@***.com? Stephanie: Yes. Visitor: So we're just changing my log in information, not actually deleting or disabling the account in any way?

Visitor: Why is there no option to just delete the account? Stephanie: For our internal purpose there is no option to delete the account. Visitor: What purpose is that? Visitor: That seems pretty ridiculous.

Stephanie: Are there any other concerns that I can assist you with? Visitor: Yeah, you can explain why your company is not deleting my account/information. Stephanie: I'm so sorry we do not have more information regarding that. Stephanie: Please contact Our phone number is 1-800-THE-BIG-O (1-80*-***-****).

Stephanie: We are available Monday - Friday from 6 am MT to 11 pm MT and Saturday-Sunday 7 am MT to 8 pm MT. Visitor: This is some pretty shady stuff you guys are doing.

Stephanie: Please contact the above number for more details. --------------------------------------------------- Since there seems to be no chance at actually resolving this and getting my account deleted, I took the next logical step which was to change the email address associated with my overstock account to fuckoverstock@***.com.

Guest

Yep. Just talked to them myself.

When I asked to delete my account, they told me to unsubscribe from all emails. I told them no, I want to delete my account. They said that unsubscribing will automatically delete my account (yeah, right).

Funny thing is, I was already unsubscribed. I pointed this out to the CS rep, that I had already followed their instructions and I could still log in, so clearly their instructions were incorrect.

They said nothing.

I told them I'd check again in a couple days, and if I could still log in, I'd contact them again. They just responded "Yes."

Absolutely worthless.

Guest

just went through it. just try and delete it.

Guest

Got the same response today and have never ordered. Never again!

Guest

Just had a similar chat conversation. I'm wondering if it's an algorithm conducting their chat and not a real person.

The answers are so caged. I was trying to merge two accounts, but if they are selling data then that reduces one contact they can be paid for.

Guest

These idiots of course pissed me off because I put in an order and they cancelled my order but took my money but said that they lacked the information to process my order. When I called them they tried to say it was fraud but all of my information was legit. Never again will they get any business from me or anyone else I know.

Guest

Apparently they are selling the data, and I guess they still get paid for it, even if the data is old and/or no longer particularly pertinent.

Guest

I was able to have a duplicate Overstock.com account deleted. I made a point to tell them that I had never purchased anything using the account and that there had never been a credit card or debit card linked to the account.

As soon as that information had been verified, they deleted the duplicate account. I realize this may not be helpful to everyone, but Overstock did get rid of the duplicate account.

Guest

I also tried to get my account deleted since I haven't shopped on overstock in like 5 years. The representative told me is for security purposes--another completely different reason than that mentioned on the website.

I can't see how it's more secure for me to leave open an account where someone could go in and take my information or fraudulently buy something.

If this is for record keeping purposes, that's fine.

I'm sure they could find a way to delete the account but still maintain the purchases in the system. This is a horrible feature of the website.

Guest

Sounds familiar! I'm dealing with them right now and I can't believe their robotic bull.

*** I'll never order from them again.

Bad customer service is the downfall of every company.

Overstock Reviews

  1. 124 reviews
  2. 40 reviews
  3. 25 reviews
  4. 11 reviews
  5. 11 reviews
Overstock reviews