On 20th September, I had given the September Cook-Off (div 1) and secured the top position in my college, Delhi Technological University. I was pretty happy with my performance, and as a bonus I would be getting a free 1 month subscription for Unacademy. I had filled the application
form beforehand and confirmed my name in the list given at: http://bit.ly/cook112
However, 2 days later I had still not received any mail, or in fact any communication related to the matter so I decided to investigate on Codechef discuss. On the forum I found a relevant post so I left a comment highlighting my own issue: Unacademy free subscription - #71 by lolboyyyy
Again, no response. I noticed that most people were complaining about their names not being on the list and a lot of people saying that they had received the mail, so I decided to write a mail to Codechef feedback. I highlighted this issue and reconfirmed my email ID as well as provided some alternate emails (maybe I had entered an incorrect email in the form).
After 3 more days of complete silence, I got a response from Codechef feedback and it was the most unhelpful mail I had ever received in my entire life, which I am pasting below.
"Hi Gunagya,
Did you check your spam folder? Also, we are really sorry but we won’t be able to help you now since we have stopped giving free subscriptions. Please do not feel disheartened, there will be many more opportunities as such in the future.
Regards,
Merrick
Team CodeChef
Feedback: Missing Unacademy Subscription after September Cook-Off 2020-09-23"
Of course, I had checked my spam folder multiple times prior to this. I got no confirmation whether my email was correct, no information why I did not receive any communication, instead I got a mail basically saying “Oops sorry, you can’t get the subscription anymore”.
What a brilliant strategy right? Too many candidates for the subscription? Just don’t send a mail to some of them! What a modern solution! Thanks Codechef, for making me miss out on an opportunity through no fault of my own (or maybe it was, I don’t know, you never told me ). I saw so many people complaining about people wrongly changing their University last moment just to avail the scholarship, due to which their name was not on the list. Don’t worry guys, even if you had made it to the list it wouldn’t have done jack! They will just choose not to send you a mail.
Personally, I couldn’t care less about the free subscription, in fact it probably will be more useful in the hands of a user who has a lot to learn. But I hate dishonesty, I hate cheating, and I hate being deceived. Is this how you reward your top performers? Is spreading false information your marketing strategy? I was played pretty hard, so all I can say is, gg Unacademy.