I bought a OpenTable Spotlight deal for Creola in San Carlos in February 2011. I must have used it shortly after purchase. But, by November 2011, I forgot.
So when I stumbled upon it in November 2011 while perusing through my OpenTable account, I contacted OpenTable customer care and asked if I had used the certificate yet. Their response: The certificate was still "valid."
Then in early February 2012, I got an email reminding me to use the certificate before it expired.
Not wanting to lose out on a deal, I promptly made reservations for the Friday before the certificate expired. Following instructions, I gave our server the certificate right after we put in our orders. Mid-meal we were informed that our certificate had already been used. So, instead of having a $50 credit towards our meal, we had $0. Creola is awesome (especially their fried chicken), so it's not like it wasn't worth the money, but we were expecting that the certificate was still valid because of (1) OpenTable's representation in November 2011 that it was "valid" and (2) the reminder email in early February 2012 from OpenTable.
When I contacted OpenTable about their misrepresentations, they explained that they do not keep track of what certificates are redeemed. Instead, they pass off that administrative task to the restaurants. Since that's the way they conduct business, they should not have told me the certificate was still valid in November 2011, and they should not have sent out a reminder email to use a certificate if they did not know whether it was already used.
I might have been willing to forgive the misrepresentations to a certain extent, but not after OpenTable refused to accept any responsibility for their misrepresentations, or even acknowledge that they made misstatements.