Dispute Resolution Policy

This policy explains how to raise a complaint with Blooms Point Gifts and Flower Shop, what we do when you raise one, how long it takes, and where you can go if we have not put it right. It applies to any disagreement arising out of a transaction with us, including:

• orders — what was ordered, accepted, cancelled or charged;
• delivery — timing, failed or incomplete delivery, and the address used;
• the condition of what arrived — damaged, defective, wrong, missing or short;
• refunds, replacements and cancellations under our Return and Refund Policy;
• payments made to us, and amounts we have asked you for;
• your customer account and the transactions recorded on it;
• how we have handled your personal data, or a recipient’s;
• the conduct of our staff or a rider delivering for us.

It is written to satisfy the requirement in section 24 of the Internet Transactions Act of 2023 (Republic Act No. 11967) that an e-retailer maintain an internal redress mechanism, and it should be read with our Terms and Conditions and our Return and Refund Policy.

Please come to us first. Most complaints are a misunderstanding or a mistake we can simply fix, and the fastest route to a replacement bouquet or a refund is an email rather than a form filed with an agency.

Our official complaints channel is inquiries@bloomspointph.com. You can also call +63 935 856 1320 during support hours, 7:00 AM–10:00 PM daily, but please follow a phone call with an email if you want it treated as a formal complaint — a written record is what lets both of us point at the same facts later.

To let us investigate properly, please tell us:

• your order number, and the name and contact details on the order;
• the delivery date, and the address if the complaint is about delivery;
• what happened, and what you expected to happen;
• photographs, where the complaint is about the product;
• what you would like us to do — a replacement, a refund, an explanation, or something else;
• anyone at the shop you have already spoken to, and roughly when.

We would rather have an incomplete complaint than none. If you do not have all of that, send what you have and we will ask.

Every complaint follows the same four steps, and you should hear from us at each one.

1. Acknowledgement. We confirm in writing that we have your complaint and record the date it was filed, which is the date that matters for the seven-day period in section 4. We aim to do this within one business day.
2. Assignment. One person takes ownership of it, and we tell you who. You are not passed between people who each need the story again.
3. Investigation. We check the order record, the payment record, the delivery record and proof of delivery, the photographs you sent, and the notes from the branch that built and delivered the arrangement. We may come back to you once or twice with questions.
4. Outcome. You get a written answer setting out what we found, what we are doing about it, and — if we are not offering a remedy — why not. We keep the correspondence and the outcome with the order record.

We aim to resolve a straightforward complaint within a few days of receiving it — often the same day, where it is a replacement we can simply book. A complaint that needs a branch to be consulted, a rider’s account of a delivery, or a payment to be traced takes longer, and we will tell you if it is going to.

Section 24 of the Internet Transactions Act of 2023 provides that a consumer must use a merchant’s internal redress mechanism before filing a complaint with a court or a government agency, or resorting to alternative dispute resolution — and that the mechanism is deemed exhausted if the complaint remains unresolved after seven (7) calendar days from filing.

A complaint is “filed” on the day it reaches inquiries@bloomspointph.com, or the day you raise it with us by phone if you follow it up in writing. Where a complaint is resolved by agreement — you accept a replacement, a refund or an explanation — it is resolved on the day you accept it.

Ask for it to be reviewed. Reply to the email you received, or write to inquiries@bloomspointph.com and say that you want the decision looked at again, and say why — a fact you think we got wrong, something we did not consider, or evidence you have since obtained.

A review is carried out by someone other than the person who made the original decision, and the outcome is confirmed to you in writing. A review does not restart the seven-day period in section 4: that period runs from when you first filed the complaint, so asking us to look again never costs you an escalation route.

Both of us are better off settling a disagreement directly, and we will always try to. We will engage in good faith, explain our reasoning, listen to yours, and propose a practical remedy where one is due — a replacement, a refund, a partial refund, a credit, or a correction to our records.

Anything either of us says while trying to settle a complaint is said in an attempt to reach agreement, and an offer we make to resolve a matter is not an admission of liability. Equally, nothing you say to us while trying to settle it will be used to suggest you gave up a right.

If we have not resolved your complaint, you may take it to the appropriate regulator. There is no filing fee for a consumer complaint for redress under the Consumer Act, and you do not need a lawyer to file one.

Consumer complaints — Department of Trade and Industry

The DTI handles consumer complaints about goods, services and online transactions, and its process begins with mediation between the consumer and the business before it moves to adjudication. As the DTI publishes them, its consumer channels are:

• Online: consumercare.dti.gov.ph
• Email: consumercare@dti.gov.ph
• Hotline: 1-384 — the DTI Consumer Care hotline (1-DTI)
• In person: the nearest DTI provincial or regional office

Those details are the DTI’s, not ours, and an agency can change them. Please check the DTI’s own site for the current route before you file. We will co-operate with any DTI process, and we will provide the order, delivery and payment records the mediator asks us for.

Personal data complaints — National Privacy Commission

A complaint about how we have handled personal data — yours or a recipient’s — can be brought to the National Privacy Commission under the Data Privacy Act of 2012. The NPC ordinarily expects you to have raised the matter with us first. Its site is privacy.gov.ph. Our Privacy Policy explains how to make a privacy request to us.

The Alternative Dispute Resolution Act of 2004 (Republic Act No. 9285) recognises mediation, conciliation and arbitration as voluntary alternatives to litigation. Where a complaint has not been resolved between us, we are willing to take part in mediation, including the mediation the DTI conducts as part of its consumer complaint process.

If a matter goes to mediation or arbitration by agreement, we will agree the process and who bears the cost with you in writing beforehand, and we will not ask you to travel unreasonably to take part.

Your order and these policies are governed by the laws of the Republic of the Philippines. Blooms Point Flower Arrangement Services is a Philippine business, operating from Silang, Cavite, and selling to customers in the Philippines.

You may bring a claim in any Philippine court or before any agency that has jurisdiction over it under Philippine law, including the courts and offices where you live. We do not require you to sue us in any particular city, and we do not apply the law of any other country to a consumer transaction on this site.

Small claims procedures exist in the Philippine courts for money claims below the threshold set by the Supreme Court, and they are designed to be used without a lawyer. Whether that route is open to a particular claim is a question for the court rather than for us.

We would rather tell you where a complaint belongs than accept one we cannot act on. Some matters sit with a third party and have their own process:

• Banks, card issuers and e-wallet providers. A charge you do not recognise, a transfer that left your account and did not arrive, a failed wallet transaction, or a chargeback — those are handled by the institution that holds your money, under its own rules and timescales. We will supply whatever we hold about the order to support your claim with them.
• Couriers on provincial deliveries. Where a courier carries the parcel, a claim against that courier is ours to make rather than yours — so bring it to us, and we will pursue it. Your remedy is against us under the Return and Refund Policy, and it is not reduced because a courier was involved.
• The content of a card message or a gift. A dispute between a sender and a recipient about what was written or what was sent is not something we can adjudicate. We can confirm what we were asked to write and what we delivered.

Naming a third party does not make a complaint go away: where the problem is ultimately about an order you placed with us, our obligations under the Return and Refund Policy still apply.

We keep complaint correspondence with the order record so that a later question can be answered from what was actually said. It is personal data and it is handled under our Privacy Policy, which explains how long we keep records and what rights you have over them.

Complaining costs you nothing. We will not close your account, refuse to serve you, or treat you differently because you complained, escalated to an agency, or left a review saying what happened.

This policy is drafted to align with the following Philippine laws. Links go to public texts of the statutes so that you can read them for yourself.

• Republic Act No. 7394 — the Consumer Act of the Philippines — Product quality and imperfection, implied warranties, and the consumer's remedies of repair, replacement and refund. Its implementing rules also prohibit a “No Return, No Exchange” notice.
• Republic Act No. 11967 — the Internet Transactions Act of 2023 — Obligations of an e-retailer, the consumer's remedies in an internet transaction, and the internal redress mechanism a complaint must go through first.
• Republic Act No. 8792 — the Electronic Commerce Act of 2000 — The legal effect of the electronic documents this shop runs on — your order, our confirmation email, and the record of both.
• Republic Act No. 10173 — the Data Privacy Act of 2012 — How personal data — yours and your recipient's — may be collected, used, shared, kept and secured, and the rights you hold over it.
• Republic Act No. 9285 — the Alternative Dispute Resolution Act of 2004 — Mediation and other voluntary alternatives to litigation, which remain open to both of us by agreement.