Complaint Review:
30 second smile
On December 24, 2011, I replied to a national TV ad for a product. The advertisement said that, if I call within 20 minutes, I will get various things included (INCLUDING FREE DELIVERY) FOR A TOTAL OF $59.95 AND NO MORE.
When I called, it was a FULLY AUTOMATED order desk, and it became obvious that they were not going to credit me for having called within 20 minutes, and the bill kept rising. It rose to $117.34
This amounts to fraudulent advertising.
I hung up the phone and immediately went online to see if I could cancel immediately. All I could get was an online chat room agent, who said there was no way that the order could be cancelled by her, and I would have to phone the office when it opened. I phoned at just after 10 a.m. December 24 when the office opened and tried to cancel the order, but they would not let me. I was quite obviously dealing with India.
I immediately phoned Visa and they said I would have to receive the parcel and then ship it back, retaining proof. This I did, but still I had to fight with them for the refund. For reasons best known to themselves, they had charged me $75.78 on December 24, and had plans to charge me the other $44 or so on January 23. I don't know why.
Despite proof of return, they kept dragging out the refund, and then finally they said they had refunded me $55.68, saying they were keeping the tax. This is quite simply ILLEGAL. I cannot pay tax on goods that I do not have. If we take something back to a store, they refund us the full amount and do not hold back tax.
This company is operating outside the law. It has a warehouse at 5130 Halford Drive, Windsor, Ontario, N9A 6J3. Its head office is in Ontario California but it operates out of India.
They are running a fraudulent advertising campaign and right from the beginning, according to British Columbia law, I had the right to cancel within seven days. I tried within seven minutes and they would not allow it. It cost me $17.44 to receive the item and send it back to them, and they have no right to charge taxes for goods that I have not had. This is simply illegal. Furthermore, the item should never have been shipped to me in the first place as I attempted to cancel the order within minutes, and they simply refused to cancel the order. I should not have had to pay any delivery charges.
They should have been refunded in light of their refusal to cancel.
I spoke with an agent at Revenue Canada 1-800-959-5525 regarding returned goods, and he told me that I am entitled to receive the full taxes back because I had returned the goods. They have simply pocketed the tax.
This is part of their scam, I am sure.
I feel that this is fraud on a national scale and would like to prevent others from being hurt by this company.