Complaint Review: Cotton Candy Shop

   My daughter is 7 months old and this will be her first Halloween. I was very excited and ordered a Peacock Tutu Costume from cottoncandyshop.com on August 20, 2010. The costume was very expensive and I thought it was a little crazy to pay that much but it's my baby's first Halloween and I wanted some really special pictures. I bought the costume and matching headband for a total of $69. I paid with my mastercard and it was debited the next day. I received an order confirmation that said shipping takes 4-6 weeks.

   Six weeks later, on October 1st, I emailed the company address and asked for a status and the expected ship date. I received a response from Lauren Bergmann, owner, that said "our turnaround time is 4-6 weeks so very soon." At the 8 week mark on October 15th I emailed Lauren again and asked for the expected ship date. She did not respond as of October 18th so I called the phone number that was on my credit card statement. It was obviously her cell phone because there was a ringback tone and I was surprised that she didn't even have a business line or any other employees working for her to check orders. I left her a message explaining that I just wanted to know the status of my order.

   Lauren emailed me back within an hour of my message and said "I have it going out the end of the week. Our turnaround time is 8 weeks." Well the "end of this week" would have been October 22nd and NINE weeks after the original order. I emailed back on the 21st and asked if my order was still on schedule and I got an auto response that said "our office is closed this week do a family emergency." Yes... she spelled "due" incorrectly.

   I emailed Lauren immediately and asked for a refund. I got a response that said "I'll make sure yours goes out." On Monday October 25th I had enough. There was only 4 business days left before Halloween and it had been over 9 weeks from the original order. I was irritated. I contacted the BBB and filed a complaint. I emailed Lauren to tell her I expect a refund and she responded that day and was very upset with me. She told me that I was hasty for filing the complaint because she had my outfit ready to go out "tomorrow by priority mail." How could I even believe anything she said at this point? Even if she was telling the truth, 4 days for USPS mail from TX to IL is cutting it too close. I told her she was out of time and I just wanted a refund. If she didn't come through for me and the promise of "tomorrow" was just another empty promise, I would be without a costume on Halloween.

   Lauren replied that she had a death in the family the previous week and her father-in-law was in the ICU. Of course that made me feel guilty (until I saw that apparently she used the same excuse on someone else in August) but I explained to her that regardless of her personal situation, my order was placed well within her stated time limit and should have been mailed out the beginning of the month.

   I have not received a refund as of this date and I still don't have anything for my daughter's Halloween costume. I filed a dispute with my credit card company and between that and the BBB complaint, I'm hoping to get a refund and put this mess behind me. This teaches me never to shop out of a basement operation again.