At the beginning of this year, I bought a refrigerator, washing machine and other home appliances from a well-known home appliance brand's offline store, spending more than 20000 yuan. At that time, the salesperson said that spending 1 yuan accumulated 1 point, and reaching a certain point could exchange for small home appliances. I thought about buying more home appliances in the future and saving enough points to exchange for an air fryer. However, when I checked my consumption points not long ago, I found that the store had reset my points without any notice! "Ms. Zhou from Beijing angrily said. After discovering that her points had been reset to zero, she immediately contacted the store, and the staff asked to contact the official customer service. The customer service replied, "The points are valid for 3 months, as stated in the rules. Ms. Zhou searched through the "Membership Center" and "Help Center" of the brand's app, and consulted customer service several times before finding the relevant text description in "Attachment 3 of the User Agreement": Consumer points are valid for 90 days from the date of acquisition and automatically reset upon expiration. Such an important rule, not only is the font small, but the location is also very hidden, and no one has told me before that the points have an expiration date, and I have not received any expiration reminder. Isn't this intentionally preventing me from redeeming items with points? ”Ms. Zhou said. Consumer points are a reward given by businesses to encourage consumers to make purchases. Some points can be exchanged for limited products, while others can enjoy exclusive member discounts. A recent investigation by reporters found that it is common for businesses like Ms. Zhou to reset their points without notifying consumers in advance. Regarding this, Lawyer Ma Lihong, a member of the Lawyer Expert Database and senior partner of Beijing Deheheng Law Firm, said that according to the provisions of the Civil Code on the legal protection of virtual property on the internet, if consumer points can realize their value through exchanging goods, services or deducting fees, they should be regarded as the legitimate expected interests of consumers and protected by law. Whether the unilateral clearing and freezing of points by merchants is legal depends on two factors: firstly, whether the rules are "clearly communicated", that is, merchants must inform consumers in advance of the validity period, clearing rules or freezing conditions of points in bold, pop ups, text messages and other ways that can attract consumers' attention. If the rules are only publicized in small font, hidden pages, deep agreements and other ways, and fail to fulfill the obligation of prompting, they will not become part of the contract content, and consumers can claim invalidity; The second issue is whether the rules are "clearly unfair". If the validity period is too short (such as less than 3 months), frozen without evidence, or expired without reminder, it may violate the provisions of the Consumer Rights Protection Law that prohibits operators from setting unfair and unreasonable transaction conditions, and may be suspected of infringing on consumers' fair trading rights. Duan Wei, Executive Vice President of the Beijing Consumer Rights Protection Law Society, said that in practice, some merchants may argue that "points are a benefit for merchants and can be unilaterally disposed of". This viewpoint actually lacks legal basis - the acquisition of points is based on consumers' consumption behavior and is not a free benefit, but a part of the consumption contract. Merchants cannot deprive consumers of their legitimate property rights under the pretext of "welfare". The essence of points is "a part of the consumer consideration", and merchants unilaterally clearing without informing is no different from "encroaching on consumer property". During the investigation, the reporter found that various points rules have caused headaches for many consumers. Mr. Zhang from Shanghai is an old user of a certain telecom operator who has been using a monthly package worth nearly 100 yuan. At the end of last year, he accidentally learned about the "consumption can accumulate points" policy, but after checking, he found out that he did not have any points. The customer service said that the points need to be manually activated, and without activation, there will be no points. However, I have been using it for more than ten years and no one has ever told me to manually activate it. "Mr. Zhang requested to add 9 years of points, but the customer service refused on the grounds that" the validity period of the points has expired "and" failure to activate will be considered as giving up ". Ms. Zheng from Tianjin participated in a "clock in and earn points" activity of a certain home appliance brand. The rules stated that "if you clock in continuously for 30 days, you can earn 100 points per day, totaling 3000 points". After being able to clock in continuously for 10 days, Ms. Zheng found that the activity page changed to "The quota is full, and the points will be stopped from being issued". Ms. Zheng said, "I asked the customer service and they said 'the activity has a limit of 1000 people, and you are not included in the quota', but the promotional page of the activity did not say there was a limit, and there was no prompt when checking in that the quota was full. Therefore, Ms. Zheng requested the merchant to compensate for the 1000 points corresponding to the 10 days of clocking in. The merchant replied that 'the final interpretation of the activity rules belongs to the merchant' and refused any compensation. In Duan Wei's opinion, when providing goods or services to consumers, operators should truthfully, comprehensively, and accurately inform consumers of the quantity, quality, price, cost, performance period, performance method, after-sales service, and other information of the goods or services, and shall not make false or misleading propaganda. The "special" rules in the points accumulation rules directly affect consumers' rights to obtain points and belong to "important information that should be disclosed". If the merchant fails to disclose or conceal it, it violates consumers' right to know. In addition, the reporter also noticed in the investigation that the points redemption advertised by merchants may seem to be "full of benefits", but in the actual redemption process, there are often problems such as "popular products cannot be obtained" and "poor quality of redeemed products without after-sales guarantee". Mr. Zhang from Beijing exchanged 8000 points for a "wireless Bluetooth earphone" on a bank app, which he accumulated through "credit card consumption of 1 yuan earns 1 point". After receiving the earphones, Mr. Zhang found that they had serious noise and short battery life, which was seriously inconsistent with the merchant's promotion of "no noise, 8-hour battery life". I contacted the bank customer service, and they said 'the products redeemed with points are provided by third parties and do not enjoy return and exchange services'. They asked me to find a third-party merchant, but the third-party merchant asked me to find a bank and shift the blame.' Ms. Wu from Beijing found that many platform merchants and banks have launched 'full point redemption' activities, such as' 5000 points for 10 pounds of rice 'and' 8000 points for 5 liters of edible oil '. But after each event starts, popular products will display "sold out" within 3 seconds, while the same products that are on sale at the same time and need to be purchased with "points+cash" often have sufficient inventory and can be bought at any time. Duan Wei said that consumers have the right to fair trade, the right to obtain fair trade conditions such as guaranteed quality, reasonable prices, and correct measurement, and the right to refuse the compulsory trading behavior of operators. The occurrence of "high markup" and "virtual inventory" in point redemption is essentially a behavior of merchants depriving consumers of their right to fair trade. Duan Wei believes that the core reason for the current chaos in point redemption is that merchants view points as a "marketing tool" rather than a "consumer consideration," ignoring the property attributes of points. Consumers should pay attention to retaining screenshots of the points redemption rules, redemption records, and evidence of product quality issues (photos, inspection reports, etc.) when redeeming points. Once their rights are damaged, they can protect their rights through the path of "negotiation complaint litigation", and should not abandon their rights due to "low value of points". Ma Lihong reminds that points are not a "liability exemption tool" for merchants, but a legitimate property of consumers. Merchants must manage the points rules in accordance with the law and fulfill their obligation to inform; Consumers should also attach importance to the rights and interests of points, and protect their rights in a timely manner when encountering chaos. Only by jointly complying with the law can points truly become a "welfare" rather than a "consumption trap". (New Society)