Eleven Consignment Boutique

Review: I consigned a leather messenger bag with this shop June **, 2013, signing and receiving a receipt with terms that bind the store and the signator (me) in a contract. Among the terms identified on the receipt / contract: consignors are instructed that (assuming of course that their item sells) they can pick up the check for their percentage of the sale on Thursdays only; and that they require 24-hour notice, which, according to their website, is so they can prepare the check. That is all. Therefore, for there to be a check ready for pickup on a given Thursday, you must call on the Wednesday before.

I called on a few different Wednesdays to check the status, and finally was notified that my item had sold, and that my percentage would mean a check for roughly $48. I was told it would be ready the following day, per the terms of the contract. I was not told I must pick the check up that particular Thursday, nor is there anything on the receipt / contract to specify - Thursdays generally are clearly meant.

When, after a few weeks, I found myself in the store's neighborhood on a Thursday, I brought my receipt out, told them I had called some Wednesdays past, and asked for my check. Now I was told that I could not receive my money unless I called exactly the day before I came to pick up the check. So what they were telling me was that, instead of requiring my phone call to give them 24-hour notice to prepare a check, which I took to mean I could not pick up a check before 24 hours had elapsed from my notice by phone, they changed the written policy on the spot to mean that only exactly 24 hours later can I pick up a check. When I questioned this, I was told that they don't prepare the checks ahead of time, but wait to see who shows up on Thursday after calling the Wednesday before - again, not previously expressed to me, and not in alignment with their written policy.

So then I asked why they don't prepare the checks ahead of time, or in other words, why are checks not available anytime after the required phone call gives them their 24 hours notice? The policy seemed to me only to make sense if they need that time to prepare the check - after all, if they only issue checks on the spot on Thursday, what difference would it make if you call on Wednesday? But on the other hand, if the reason is because you need the 24 hour notice to prepare funds to be available, or to physically cut the check, then why isn't that process completed during the 24 hours so that a check is there waiting and available as a result of the process 24 hours later? I was told this: it was in case someone stole the check! That's why they don't want the checks sitting around. This makes no sense generally; but also, it goes against yet another express term on the receipt / contract, which gives the lie to this justification.

That other term says that "uncollected checks will be issued on following Thursday." Again, this is so obviously worded that I don't see how they can avoid paying me my percentage.

So I asked what that clause means, and pointed to it and to the other language that mentions 24-hour notice, trying to show that by the language of their own contract, a caller on Wednesday should have a check available certainly no sooner that 24 hours later, but that nothing in the language limits the check collection for any time after 24 hours have elapsed (this policy opens the window, in other words, but nothing closes it).

And further, I tried to explain that, since according to their own writing (the terms of the contract), if the check that first Thursday (after a phone call Wednesday) is uncollected, it would "issue the following Thursday", then I felt I could expect payment on any Thursday after the phone call was made. No sufficient answers were given to these very basic questions about policy; but it was made clear to me that payment would not be made.

Instead of abiding by their own wrtiting, they rudely made it seem that I was making it a problem for them by asking them to explain how they dare change this clearly written policy on the spot; in fact, the man I spoke with told me he wasn't going to say anything else, after I pointed out these two terms on his own receipt, which I took to mean that he saw he could not get out of what the contract said, but did not wish to pay me, and wanted to say nothing to incriminate himself, to catch him out further in his dishonest dealings with me.

Now I am not even certain that he wil make good on this contract at all, for example if I call next Wednesday and show up the very next day - what's to stop him from coming up with some other manufactured reason to avoid paying what he owes me in that instance, as he changed his very own contract terms wihtout notice once already?Desired Settlement: I want the business

1) to issue me a written admission that the behavior and "policy" I experienced today is inappropriate and outside the terms of our contract as I signed it the day I consigned my property with them - an admission they attempted intentionally to push aside the terms agreed upon for their own benefit and my detriment;

2) I want the business to receive a warning that there can be criminal consequences of withholding a consignor's payment against the terms of the contract. And;

3) of course, I want my money!

Business

Response:

this person who wants their money can receive there money , we only ask that the person who wants to collect money call us on the wednesday before the thursday they are coming in , we need 24 hrs to prepare checks , we do not keep checks if they are not picked up as we would have endless amounts of checks laying around uncollected and amounts changed weekly as more items can be sold. our contract clearly states that you call wednesday and pick up checks thursday if you don't show up that thursday we distrore the check and you can call again the following week or whenever you like to collect it , as most people do it weekly and sim bi yearly n monthly we do everything on a week to week basic because we never know who will come and who won't come , this man should cal wednesday and show up the next day to get his check not 1 year latter , if he calls wednesday and comes thursday he will glady get this check .