TINA HELME: Stand up for what you believe in

This involved me visiting ASDA, Newgate Lane, Fareham.

There is nothing unusual about that, you may think.

As I do my normal food shop I always include a few dog treats for our lively Jack Russell, Serendipity.

Three weeks before Christmas his favourite dog treat was selling for just £1 for a packet of six meaty sticks.

These are sold under the trade name of Webbox in chicken and beef flavours.

Two weeks before Christmas I repeated this experience.

I was shocked to find the whole Webbox range had increased to £2 per packet – a 100 per cent increase.

One week before Christmas the Webbox dog treats had risen to £2.50 per packet for the entire range of dog treats.

I rang ASDA who put me through to the department manager.

She politely explained pricing came direct from Webbox and prices in their scanner were final and unalterable for the customer.

She was sympathetic, saying she too had a dog and didn’t like the price rises.

So I telephoned Webbox head office where a lady took my details and said she’d call back in the new year.

I visited ASDA on January 7 and the dog delights and full range of Webbox products were back to £1 – success.

Yet nobody had phoned me back from head office. So I rang them again.

The lady remembered me and said they rang ASDA directly because they had no idea why the prices had been increased.

The moral of my story is to stand up for what you believe in. At Christmas and all year pet food should not be hiked up for extra profit.