Mum’s shock £47 charge for pair of pick and mix bags
A MUM has spoken of her shock at having to pay more than £47 for two bags of pick and mix from a sweet shop company at Cardiff ’s Winter Wonderland.
Rhiannon Brown, a health care worker from Mountain Ash, visited the Christmas event with her husband and two young kids on Saturday. While there, her children spotted the Great British Fudge Company and asked if they could get two bags of pick and mix sweets.
Much to Rhiannon’s surprise, however, the two items amounted to just under £50.
In response, Great British Fudge Company has said that they have been in contact with Rhiannon and have offered her a full refund.
They also explained that they were working on ways to improve their services so they could avoid similar issues in the future.
“We know full well that you’re going to spend money when you go to these places,” Rhiannon told the Echo.
“We try to go to Cardiff’s Winter Wonderland every year. This time round, we just went for a little look around and the kids wanted to go on some rides. We bought 40 tokens for £40 for them to have 20 each, then we had crepes which were £7 each – pricey but again we expected it.
“Then, as we were walking out to leave the Great British Fudge Company was there all lit up and it looked amazing. The kids ran to it asking for sweets, so I said okay. I helped my youngest to do hers and my husband said ‘don’t go mad on the sweets – it’s £2.79 for 100g.’
“We both made sure the kids never went overboard. The bags were nowhere near half full, but nobody knows what 100g of sweets looks like.
“As my husband was paying, my little girl started eating the sweets so I couldn’t have put some back if I wanted to.
“I didn’t hear the woman say the price to my husband but I could tell by his reaction it was high so I asked him how much. He said ‘£47.26,’ and I said: ‘What, you can’t be serious?.’
“I think we were just shocked we knew it was going to be expensive but I was thinking maybe £20-£23. He just paid and we left.”
Rhiannon says that she shared her experience on a social media post and says that a few other people have contacted her saying they’ve had a similar experience.
She added: “It really put a downer on the day we had had. Nobody nowadays can afford to spend £47 on a pick n mix. I feel like they should maybe display a couple of display bags of sweets saying how much this would cost you on average, so people are aware..
“I would definitely go back to Winter Wonderland – we loved it and yes, it’s pricey but expected. But I can’t say I’ll be returning to this company.”
In a statement, a spokesperson for the business said: “We would never have forced anyone to pay for something they did not want or were unhappy with and would have accepted, as many have said they did, if she left the bag or asked for some items to be removed.”
They added: “We can confirm that the scales are checked and set with no way to adjust them once we are set up so for the total to be £47 this would have been just over 1.6kg of sweets in two bags. We have offered Rhiannon a full refund, and explained that we are already working to improve our service so we can avoid issues going forward: clearer signage explaining weighing and pricing to customers, retraining our staff to be able to offer better assistance to avoid similar incidents going forward, adding some pre-mixed priced bags minimise issues and lines waiting to weigh sweets. We are very sorry that Rhiannon felt she was obliged to pay and hope that she accepts our offer to refund.”