Complaint Review: Luna Bella Skincare

I received a pop-up notification in my email that I had won a free offer of a skin care product, Luna Bella Serum.  It says you only pay for the shipping and handling.  I thought, why not?  It's only $3.99 for the shipping, so I ordered it with my credit card.  

When that transaction was done, another immediate pop-up came that said "for just $4.99 shipping and handling we will also send you the cream/moisturizer, as well.  So, I thought "$8.00, ok".

After ordering, I thought it odd that I did not receive any sort of confirmation of my order in my email, which is what normally would happen when ordering anything online...and they did ask for my email address.  First sign that something was off.  I shrugged it off and thought "it's only $8.00".

A couple of weeks later, I received a small box in my mailbox and had actually forgotten about the product.  Opened to find a very tiny jar of the moisturizer, which was damaged and dented, along with a very tiny cylinder shaped bottle of the serum.  The moisturizer had only a very small amount of the product in it and the serum would not even dispense out of the pump and after inspection, I saw that they did not even include the little tube inside the bottle that would be what actually dispenses the product to the pump.  Both products appear, look and smell exactly the same.  There was no difference.  Once on your skin, it acutally has a smell similar to sour milk.  Again, I thought "lesson learned $8.00, no great loss".

I did not even use the product, just tossed it aside in a drawer.  Fast forward 2 weeks after receiving this bogus product and I am shopping for groceries on a Sat a.m. and go to pay with my card, same card used to pay the shipping and handling on the bogus products, and my card is declined.  I am stunned, as I know there should be plenty of funds to pay for my small purchase.  

Confused, I pushed my grocery cart over and made a call to my credit card company.  They informed me that 2 charges were made, about an hour prior to my calling.  One for $97.41 and one for $98.41.  I am stunned.  I asked "who made these charges", as I certainly had not charged anything.  They gave me some crazy names for the 2 charges, both different, but said "one of them has a phone number, would you like that number"??  Yes.  

So, I get the phone number and call.  844-937-2832;  I female answers and says "may I  have the zip code of where you are calling from and your first name"?? I gave mine.  She said "can I verify your address"?? Now I am saying "what is this company, someone charged information using my credit card without authorization".  She said "can you tell me your address"?? Sure, I gave it.  She said "yes, the charges are for your Luna Bella Serum and Moisturizer"??  I am yelling now!  As I am trying to tell them they absolutely had no right to make an charges to my card, etc.. etc...she is talking over my, by script you can tell, and saying these are really great products, blah blah blah and not even listening to me.  It was bizarre!

I finally got a supervisor on the phone and the lady told me "you agreed to accept the products on a "trial" basis and now you have been charged, BUT, we will offer you a 50% discount on them today, or you can send them back for a full refund!!

I was so angry I could not even think straight.  They charged me $200.00 for these 2 tiny samples of cream, both being the same product and not even functional or usable.  I told them they needed to reverse the charges immediately or I would sue them.  The supervisor continued to speak over me and not listen and then finally she said "I am sorry we could not come to a resolution with you today, thank you" and hung up on me.

I have never been so angry in my life, nor mad at myself for being taken by such a scam.  These people clearly do this all the time and they have a script ready for angry callers who suddenly find $200 in charges on their credit cards.

I received an email, shortly after, stating they were "cancelling my order and giving me a 50% refund on both products and I would receive the credit of 50% back in my account within 5-10 business days. Still, I am out over $100 for nothing but a bunch of garbage they sent to me.

Do not ever, ever, order this free sample product.  It is a total and complete internet scam/fraud.

I hope this company will be shut down and forced to stop what they are doing.  It's really unbelievable.