Complaint Review: FPA AGENCY - Reno Nevada

We approached Family Productions Agency seeking a service they offer of booking talent for our event. The agency said that they could book "Far East Movement" for us in exchange for a fee. They said that they needed a fee upfront before they would start contacting the artist to arrange a booking. They sent us a retainer contract that states as follows

Jan 18 ,2011

Please be advised that upon the receipt of the deposit of $9,000 ( Nine thousand dollars), Family Productions will secure Far East Movement (Herein after Artist) for your engagement in Denver,CO April 2^nd 2011 for the following terms:

Full Contract fee: $13,500

Provisions: Full rider requirements to include sound, lights, backline equipment,

balance due, security, tour manager, hotels and local ground transportation.

Family Productions can secure Far East Movementfor you and once the artist is secured, the deposit will be applied to the artists guarantee and the contracts will be issued accordingly. The deposit must be received via bank wire and is nonrefundable with the following exclusions: If Far East Movementis not available or does not accept your offer, your funds will be applied to another artist(s) or returned to you in full. If the artist(s) declines your offer and is willing to accept an offer at a higher fee, you will have the option of paying the higher fee or having your funds returned.

We then wire transferred the deposit as requested keep in mind that this was Jan 18, 2011. After this we kept contacting them through email and telephone hoping that they would tell us the deal was sealed and we could start promoting the event. 2 1/2 weeks later we are still getting the run around and struggling to either book the artist which though our own research have found is NOT available for our date because they are confirmed to be playing an event in Chiba, Japan. We want to withdraw from this agreement completely and are being manipulated, denied and given the run around. After getting a hold of the agency and asking if we could simply get our deposit back they are denying us for no legitimate reason saying that they're willing to refund half of it and keep their booking fees. We have evidence that the artist clearly isn't available for our event and in this retainer agreement is clearly states that if the artist is not available or does not accept our offer the funds will be applied to another artist or returned in full. We have pressed them to either move forward with trying to secure the act and live up to their end of the agreement or refund our money... but they won't budge and keep throwing unethical explanations our way. We've been told that they are willing to refund some of it but keep over $5,000 of the deposit as a booking fee. What booking has been arranged? And how can they justify this and break their own agreement? And what have they done on their end FOR US like they said they would? We find it strange that this organization is registered in Reno, Nevada yet on their website and "retainer" they are based out of Santa Monica, California. FPA is not registered in California who knows if this is true and hold licenses to operate there, they are registered in Nevada. The wire transfer was sent to Nevada... red flags are being thrown up all over the place, on their website it says you can contact them via [email protected] ... but in all of our e-mails none of them are addressed from the same email host "@fpaagency" but rather gmail accounts which have been linked to a lot of fraudulent activity because they are one of few email hosts that keeps their customers confidential. We want our full deposit back as stated in their contract which has clearly been broken and they have proven that they are no longer working in our best interest or showing any effort of making anything happen. Over phone calls they say that they're this huge multimillion dollar a year organization and have been in business for over 20 years and are masters of their trade... but the secretary of state proves otherwise... I don't understand how this agency has supposedly been around for so long treating clients like s**t and possibly engaging in conflicting interest situations and keeping people's money after making a deal that says if we can not deliver on our end then you will be refunded....

This agency is in our opinion a rip off and extremely unprofessional... who knows what they engage in and if it's legitimate or if its fraudulent or ethical for that matter. All we care about is FPA sticking to their end of the deal and either booking the talent or refunding our deposit....We are not slandering or throwing unjust thoughts or random statements out there... we are stating the facts that we can support and believe that the public has a right to know how these guys operate and have treated us... their "client".