Complaint Review: Iowa steak company - Internet

Be very careful with these rats!

We paid $320 for a set of boxes purported to contain "beef" steaks and sea food from their door to door sales reps on 3/15. We did not know that this purchase was the beginning of a nightmare. 

On 3/16 when we first cooked some steaks, we found the meat did not taste like beef at all. My husband said it tasted like pork, one son said it tasted kind of like chicken, and another son said it didn't taste like pork or chicken.  The second son didn't know what kind of meat it was but hoped is was "not rat meat"!. We then called the number on their business card but nobody answered. We left a message asking them to call us back. 

Two days later we tried a bag of fish, and everybody almost threw up at their first bite, and we threw it out. The fish had such a strong taste of ammonia! This time we got a little concerned. Was the fish poisonous? We called again, and this time somebody picked up the phone and hung up right away. We couldn't even leave a message. 

Then a few days later, we tried the shrimp. This time, our kids wanted me to taste it first and I did. It had the exactly same ammonia taste and we threw it out as well. 

We kept calling the number on the business card they left us, but got no answer and nobody called us back. So my husband went online and found their 800 number, finally got a lady on the phone and was told that somebody would contact us soon. Of course it did not happen. At this point, we finally realized that we'd became victims of a scam!

We then contacted our credit card company, who got someone from Iowa Steaks on the phone.  We were promised a swap - the remaining fish and meat for some frozen crab legs, the only part of the previous order that was not bad.  They apologized on the phone for the problems we had and promised that they would give us a full box as long as there were still something left in it.  But they couldn't exchange for the empty boxes.  We agreed.   However, once the deal was struck, it took 2 weeks of hounding the company for them to actualy send a rep.  When he arrived, he claimed he could only gave us 3 boxes even we showed him that we still have about 5 boxes left.  He said he could not exchange for less than a full box.  Plus he only had 2 boxes of crab legs and we had to take a box of meat again!!  We explained that we had talked to his boss Doug yesterday regarding the swap, and was promised that we could exchange for anything we like.  He called Doug and then left without any exchange.   

This is an experience I have never had before.  I'm surprised that this kind of company can stay in business for so long and nobody can do anything about them. The first sales rep didn't even want to give me a receipt.  I insisted that I should at least have something to prove my purchase.  He finally gave me a copy of my credit card payment slip and it didn't have any of his company information on it.  And now I realized why he did not want to give me a receipt, because every time we talked with them on the phone, first thing they asked was "do you have a receipt?".  And when the second guy came to my house, first thing he asked was to see our receipt!  I could imagine that if you don't have a receipt, you are finished.  They would not even talk to you and you would never get any refund or exchange whatsoever!