How to get a Refund from a Scumbag Company
 

I was recently trying to a get a refund (out of principle) from a well known company, one of the biggest on the Internet, it was for my Dad, he'd had his card banged for $200 despite having already uninstalled the software.

1. Nice friendly email = FAIL

2. Nice friendly letter to CEO = FAIL

3. Go around 10 of the largest and most relevant Internet forums writing "CompanyName is a SCAM", then post a message in their official forum displaying my hard work in front of all of their customers, with links to all of the places I've been posting = REFUND

I don't like having to do things that way, but sometimes it's the only way.

Chrageback.

It was about a year after the event by the time he mentioned it. I assumed it was too late for chargebacks

What do you mean by "already uninstalled the software."

I am a bit confused...

He was subscribing yearly for some software, he uninstalled it, then emailed them to cancel, he assumed that it was cancelled at that point, nobody replied to the email. He's a dinosaur, but the company deliberately made it complex for him to cancel.

yeah sounds about right

i mean theres no chance you and your dad are at fault is there :1orglaugh

He's an old dinosaur, which makes him vulnerable, but at the same time he's paid for something that he hasn't had installed, so they should be willing to refund him if they are fair. If not I like to make sure that they lose hundreds times more in future sales than they would have had to pay back. I manufacture karma

Though I know you're just trollin, the main point for all who are reading is that this technique has worked against one of the biggest companies out there, one well known for not giving refunds

With all these webmasters not getting paid by different programs it's funny nobody does this to them.

It's a relatively small community, many people shy away from it, but when they do speak out I certainly appreciate it

You forgot something:

4. Go back to those 10 largest and most relevant Internet forums where you wrote "CompanyName is a SCAM", then post a message and say "Sorry I was mistaken, they have refunded me and actually are not scammers, but good people as although like normal business people they continue to rebill until a customer completes the cancellation process, they still refund 1 year later when it is somewhat crudely brought to their attention that a customer's son is unhappy....."

I wonder how many people here would have refunded you if this had have been a porn rebill........

If the check clears for my father, I will update the threads to say that a refund was eventually given.

no im not trollin im rollin


name the company and exactly what happened

Prefer not to, they're worth $Billions, but it's not about the story, just about the technique and the fact it works; sharing valuable tips

T-Mobile was trying to fuck me, filed a BBB claim and Big shot called me and squared shit up.

Don't see the logic in this? If you buy a DVD and hold onto it for a year should you be allowed to take it back if you didn't watch it? Of course not. A sale is a sale.

Good work! Always nice to hear of more people fighting back, and hence making it less worthwhile for these companies to pull this shit

If you had come with this to GFY 1st it would have been taken care of faster.

;)

He tried to cancel via email, they had this in their records. They have a special page hidden away for cancellation, takes a while to track it down.

Rosetta Stone?

haha..the Power of GFY

Did the same shit and my free promotional flat screen was in the mail a week later...go BBB!

Someone else, but I heard they are bad with this too

It's true!


:winkwink:

This reminds me of two times I got my way by not giving up.

Maybe a half dozen years ago, I noticed the Sprint bill jumped by almost $10 for no reason. Buried in the bill was mention of a new tax. I figure no way, I'd have heard about this. I called Sprint, they say it's a new federal fee/tax and nothing they can do. I call T-Mobile and they say they never heard of it.

Call Sprint back and say I want out of my contract because others aren't charging it. They tell me the others will soon, it's real.

I call the FCC, they've never heard of it and opened a case. I called the FTC, they've never heard of it and opened a case.

Call Sprint back and tell them what I did. Nothing.

Call the investigative reporter of the news station, who happened to be a tenant of mine. He calls them. Next thing you know, executive response team is calling me; their general counsel is looking into it.

A few days later they call and say it was a "limited error" and bills will be corrected and I'm allowed out of my contract. No thank you (of course not). I still don't know if Sprint had to refund for millions of customers or a few.

Fast forward a few years...

Bank of America is dicking me around. I can't get anywhere calling.

I have a gay news blog that is indexed by Google News, so it looks like it's pretty big to the unassuming eye.

I find the email address of their VP of communications. I email her explaining how the bank is wrong or a story is going on my extremely popular site.

She emails back within 10 minutes saying expect a call from someone in the CEO's office. Someone in the CEO's office calls 10 minutes later from a blocked number.

Problem immediately fixed, extra money put in my account for all of the trouble I had to go through.

There's another story similar to the Bank of America one with a smaller regional bank. Branch manager wouldn't budget. I tracked down the email address of the executive assistant of the CEO. She immediately fixes my problems.

Always try to go to the top if you can. It's easier than you think.

Nice work epitome! I'll need to get myself a news blog for the future, I like that idea

With other companies in the past when I wrote to CEO's the problems were always immediately sorted, but this one was different, so I took the nuclear option

sounds like you've now spent more than $200 of your time chasing it. life is too short, tell your dad you sorted it , give him $200

You're right that it wasn't worth it for $200. I have this thing where if ever I feel like a company is cheating me (or my family) I ensure that I cause it damage in a perfectly legal way, I'm trying to ensure that their negative energy comes back and chips away at them. I don't want to encourage them by making it too easy to get away with treating people badly, it's just a moral thing, doing my bit to make the world a better place.

fastest and best way I guess

You have to actually keep it up though. That blog hundreds of new posts that looked like actual articles with a few new one's each day with different "authors" (aka me)... it looked very legit, even had a semi-custom newspaper theme.

I couldn't figure out how to monetize it enough and let the domain expire, but it looked cool as fuck.

Sometimes it's about principle if you or someone you love is getting fucked.

You care more about the satisfaction than the money.

Can't let it always be the case but sometimes it's fun to fuck with people back.

I remember back in the day, we got a vcr. My dad never did know how to use it. He would try to tinker with it and end getting all frustrated.
Things got all out of control when he tried shoving his credit card in it.

You go to Mcdonalds, buy a cheese burger, it gets made for you and you decide not to eat it. should you get a refund? No...

On the other hand you should have 28 days (at least in the EU) to decide if you want your purchase or not so I am stuck on this one.

only applies to "remote sales" (internet, phone, stranger at your door) and (under the new EU directive) it doesn't apply to digital goods (downloads).

</for the sake of completion>

I had to do exactly that to get 30k from First Data from an old (non-adult, offline) merchant account. All other avenues failed (chased them for 2 years) until I hit the internet with their agents names, email and phone numbers and details of the situation. A couple of weeks later they paid me.

Those companies do read the complain forums. Hammer the shit out of them if someone is screwing you and you are in the right.