Bouncer Rentals 4 You

Review: Items ordered did not last to agreed upon time. When asked for a partial refund, guests and myself was accused of being a thief and a scam artist.

On 8/5/2013 I ordered a BounceHouse combo slide with a Sno Machine Rental in the amount of $205, that included the generator for 8/11/13 for my daughter's birthday from a man named [redacted]. The agreed upon time was 10:00am dropoff to 5:30pm pick up at Elk Grove Park. The morning of, I receive a confirmation phone call at 9:15am. Once I arrived at the location, an elderly man and a younger boy (age 11) was in the process of setting up the bouncer. I approached the man, introduced myself and he directed me to fill out the paperwork with the boy. At that time I signed the contract stating that items were to be rented for 10:00am-5:30pm and that no silly string or water would be used. I paid in cash $205.00.

I then approached the elderly man who was still filling up the machine. I validated that the generator would in fact last until 5:30pm. He stated that it was a 5 gallon machine and would last 8 hours or more. I was satisfied with this information and proceeded with the rest of the party prep.

At approximately 1:55pm, the bouncer started deflating while the children were still inside. Parents reacted quickly and began pulling kids out of the bouncer to safety. Two male guests as well as myself approached the generator as it had ceased making noise. One male pulled the string approximately 2-3 times to no avail. At 2:07 pm to 2:13 pm I began calling the company to tell them of the situation. I called 8 times to phone numbers XXX-XXX-XXXX and XXX-XXX-XXXX. Not until 2:32 pm did I receive a call back. And when I did, it was the young boy on the phone. I explained what had happened and he said they would be on their way. They did not arrive until shortly after 3:00pm.

During this time of waiting, I had to move all activities of the party up thus ending it 3 hours earlier than scheduled. Once the elderly man and boy arrived, I approached the man about the situation. He immediately had an attitude with me saying that the generator should have lasted. His tone was very aggressive and he offered no apology or empathy. I asked him for a refund for the remaining of the time and he said that I would have to deal with the manger [redacted]. I asked for the number and the little boy gave it to me.

I spoke to [redacted] at 3:08pm at phone number XXX-XXX-XXXX. I explained the situation and my request for a partial refund for the remaining time. He stated that he would need to speak with the man before we finalized any refund and he would call me back. I agreed. I went to inform the man (who was putting more fuel in the generator) of what [redacted] said and he went to his truck to call him immediately. When he exited the truck he said that no refund would be issued due to me siphoning the gas out of the generator. I was appalled at this accusation. He said if it was not me then it was one of my guest. Which would be false. I immediately began calling [redacted] again at 3:08pm and 3:09pm and received no answer. I left a voicemail regarding my complaint about the statement made and asked for a call back. I did not receive one. I approached the elderly man with my dissatisfaction of his statement and how the situation was handled. He again stated that someone siphoned the gas. However, he asked if I still wanted to keep the machine until 5:30pm. I told him no, as there was no point since the party was over thanks to the bounce house being down. He said fine, and began packing up everything. I went back to open my daughters presents and cake.

At approximately 4:00pm, the man and young boy returned stating that they were going to call the police as I was still in possession of their items. I stated I thought they removed everything when they were there an hour previously. They wrote down my license plate and stated that they would see me in court.

Not until Monday 8/12/13, after I made a complaint on their facebook page and yelp did I receive a response. I received on fb, yelp as well as text and was accused of being a scam artist and a liar.

Desired Settlement: At this point after the slanderous statements that were made toward my guests and I on public social media sites by [redacted], his wife as well as via text message from [redacted] am I now requesting a full refund of the $205 and an written apology. I have screenshots of all of the statements that were made on these sites and can provide them if necessary as well as the text messages that I received. I also have statements from several guests at the party who witnessed this and whose children were in the bounce house at the time of the collapse. If this proposal is not accepted by the company, I am more than prepared to take this to court for a full refund as well as punitive damages for the slander.

Business

Response:

Business' Initial Response

First and foremost the statements made by [redacted] are blatantly false and nothing has been said on the part of our company that is slanderous. If anything, the comments made by this customer about our business are slanderous. Ms. [redacted] called us and ordered a bounce house with a sno cone machine for $205 for August 11 at Elk Grove Park. We confirmed the order with her on the day she called to reserve with us. We called her again the day before her party to confirm that we would be delivering the rentals the following morning prior to 10AM. She was scheduled to use the rentals from 10AM to 5:30PM. We are a family owned business and on this particular day we were booked out and my father and son went out to make [redacted]'s delivery and some other deliveries. There were two orders at Elk Grove Park that day, one order used a generator with a 4 gallon tank and [redacted]'s order was given a larger 5 gallon tank generator. Both were delivered within an hour of each other. When the driver arrived he ensured that the generator was filled with gas and oil. We have the receipt from the gas station for the gas purchase just prior to set up. Before leaving, the customer was walked through the contract and shown the unit to allow her to see that everything was clean and in order. We had several other deliveries and pick up scheduled on Aug 11 and we were shorthanded as we had one driver call in sick. Around 2:15PM the driver received a call from the client. He was in the middle of picking up a bounce house near downtown Sacramento and had to wrap that up prior to returning to Elk Grove. We can provide that customer's contact information for verification. Therefore we did not intentionally delay responding to her. We returned back as soon as we possibly could. When the driver arrived at approximately 3PM to the park he was immediately encountered by Ms. [redacted] yelling at him and waving her arms in the air. She was very aggressive and hostile and instead of asking the driver if he could find out what happened she demanded a full refund. The driver told her that he could not authorize a refund and that she would need to speak to the manager, [redacted]. She called [redacted] and again immediately began yelling with hostility and bad mouthing him over the phone. She claimed that the generator stopped working in the middle of her party. He repeatedly asked her to calm down and told her that he would need to speak to the driver and determine what happened before he could discuss refunding her. While she was on the phone with [redacted], the driver investigated the bounce house and generator to determine the cause of the deflation. Right away he noticed that the choke button and the gas switch were turned off. He opened the gas tank and saw that there was absolutely no gas in the tank and it was bone dry. To ensure that there wasn't a leak or any other problem, he refilled the generator with more gas. The unit came back up and there was no sign of any gas leak. The generator tank had been full upon delivery and when full generators provide at least 8-10 hours of use. What was odd is that the other customer in the park had a generator with a smaller tank than the one [redacted] was using and their unit was still up and running. When the driver went to pick that unit up at the end of the day, there was still gas left in the tank. Given the hostility of the customer and the fact that when she called [redacted] and the driver she immediately asked for a full refund (not a partial), and given the fact that the choke and gas button were turned off (if the generator had run out of gas on its own, those buttons would have still been on) it was determined that the customer removed the gas from the generator in an attempt to use the bounce house for the majority of the day and then be given a complete refund. After [redacted] spoke with the driver to find out what had happened, we determined that there was fraud involved and we could not provide a refund. The customer would not accept a partial refund. We also offered to allow her to use the unit longer since we had refilled the tank but she refused that offer as well. The driver then began to deflate the unit back down and pack up the equipment. All the while the driver was collecting the supplies, [redacted] stood there arguing and badgering him about how stupid we are for not giving her a refund. She also called [redacted] several times yelling at him so afterwards he stopped taking calls as he did not want to argue with her. After packing up, the driver then went to another area of the park to pick up the bounce house from the other customer that had a rental there. While he was still at the park he realized he forgot to pack up the sno cone machine from [redacted]'s party. When he returned he saw it sitting on the picnic table while her guests were also packing up to leave. He pulled the truck a bit closer and when he got out, he witnessed Ms. [redacted] loading the machine into her car and covering it up with other belongings so as to hide the fact that it was there. The driver approached her and asked her for the machine. Initially she told him that she did not have the machine and that she thought he had taken it with him. He told her that he had forgotten it on the table and that he saw her take it to her car. When he told her he saw her take the machine she told him that she did in fact have it and that we were not getting it back until she got a full refund. He told her that we could not provide a refund given the circumstances and that the equipment belonged to us and she needed to return it. She yelled that we weren't getting the machine until she got all of her money back and that there was nothing we could do about it. The driver then took down her license plate number as she got in her car and left. We immediately filed a report with Elk Grove Police Department for the stolen merchandise. The following day Ms. [redacted] started posting slanderous messages on our Facebook page and Yelp account. She had about 10 of her friends or she used multiple accounts to post nasty one star Yelp reviews bringing our 5 star average down to 2. In the posts she claimed that we accused her of stealing gas and never mentioned the fact that she stole our sno cone machine. She also claimed the driver never came back to retrieve it, which was a lie. She then went so far as to say that we were racially profiling her which was another blatant attempt to destroy the good reputation that we've worked so hard to develop. I have a report number from the Elk Grove PD that I can provide if needed. In all honesty our company is the one that deserves an apology and we also want our son cone machine returned. EGPD is currently performing an investigation. I did text Ms. [redacted] on my personal phone that same day asking when we would be getting the machine back but she avoided the question and went on to claim that we owed her money and that I was a racist. Some of the Yelp reviews that she left were removed and filtered but I printed every correspondence out and saved it for my records. One Yelp post that she posted claimed that she had the machine because the driver left it behind and that she took it as a courtesy so it wouldn't get stolen. If that were the case I would like to know why she refused to give it to the driver when he came back? Why did she avoid setting up a time for us to pick it up when I texted her the following day? Another interesting fact was that the Friday following this incident I received a call from a blocked number on my personal number which is unlisted and not affiliated with the business. Ms. [redacted] had my number from when I had texted her earlier in the week. The person from the blocked number had a somewhat muffled grumbly voice and claimed that they had a reservation with us that evening and that we didn't show and that he would be leaving a bad review on Yelp. It was not a customer as they do not have my personal cell number and we had no reservations that evening. Once Ms. [redacted] stole the machine I lost all faith in the customer's honesty and any remote possibility that there could be any other explanation for the missing gas in the generator and therefore I will not be providing a refund and will be taking the matter up with the police department. It is unfortunate that Ms. [redacted] chose to be dishonest about our services as we strive to provide excellent service to all of our customers and we did everything we could to make her party a pleasant experience. Had we determined that there was anything other than fraud going on that day, we would have been more than happy to provide her with a partial refund. Unfortunately that was not the case and now we have an incident of customer theft that will need to be dealt with through legal channels.

Consumer's Final Response

(The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)

This business claims that their statements made in their complaint were accurate and honest, however this is impossible since they were not present at the event and basing their responses off of lies told to them by their employee.

The yelp posts in question were in fact removed after the business filed a complaint with yelp. Due to the fact that some of the reviews were written by guests of the party and not an actual customer like myself. However, I also have copies of their initial reviews and the unprofessional responses made by the business. And although the reviews made by the guests were taken down, mine still stands.

The friend in which the business is trying to involve in this situation was not there during the entire event, and made a hypothetical statement based on the business responses to the other yelp posts and facebook comments.

Although the business continues to blatantly lie over the exchange between myself and their employee, I will state again that my behavior was in no way aggressive or hostile. And it was actually the behavior of the business that is my main concern.In addition to what I would want any other potential customers to be aware of before they do any type of business with them where children and money are involved.

Again for the record, the employee never saw me place any of the business' property in my vehicle nor did I drive away threatening to keep it until I was refunded. When the employee came back with the child, and did not see what he believed he left he threatened to call the police and to take me to court. If this employee felt that their property was in my possession why would he not call the police immediately, instead of leaving the scene while I was still present. I never mentioned my partial refund again after the initial response time at approximately 3:00pm. Because of the disrespect that I received from this employee I felt that he was already set in what he "thought" what was the truth instead of trying to listen to the facts. As well as the ridiculousness accusation of siphoning gas.

The business keeps insisting that I supposedly had taken the machine because I did not receive a partial refund however the person "authorized" to even discuss this was not present at the scene, did not return any of my phone calls and till this date still has not contacted me.

I have also been in contact with Elk Grove PD, and was told this will be considered a civil matter and not a criminal one. As I have not had possession of the business' sno cone machine outside of my scheduled booked hours.

The business also states that my video proof I have is staged, but what the business fails to realize is that the event was a child's birthday party and therefore pictures and video were taken. The video of the employee returning was captured as my daughter was opening her last gift. So therefore it is impossible to stage or recreate in an attempt to scam a company who based on their customer service skills will probably not be in business for much longer.

The business also states that they have proof of the events but proof of the receipts for gas purchased does not prove the generator in which they gave me was the accurate one. Or that is was not a flaw on their end. Also, they stated previously that the employee blew the bounce house back up to its entirety to validate their were no leaks. But that was also false, it was only blown up 1/4 of the way before it was taken down again.

Although the business has continually made false statements regarding me and the facts of the case, I continue to standby my initial complaint. I have over two dozen reputable witnesses to these events, in addition to video and picture footage. I am prepared to not only continue to respond to the Revdex.com claim until it is closed, but also settle this in small claim court seeking damages for defamation of character and slander.

A reputable business no matter how small would not attack their customers online or via text messages over a complaint about their services. The way they handled and continue to respond to my concern with the treatment I received is something that I feel should be not only reported but taken seriously by anyone reading.

I am a huge contributor to local small business' in my surrounding area. I understand the importance of establishing a strong customer base, especially in this economy. As a mother of a school age child, word of mouth is how many of us find out where to go and what to buy for our children. This company ruined what was supposed to be a great and fabulous day for my daughter because of their product and lack of customer service skills.

With so many guests present, they had the opportunity to not only satisfy myself, but gain additional customers. The business foolishly responded negatively and unprofessionally on both yelp and facebook regarding this matter, which allowed even more potential customers to see how they treated me and viewed the guests at the party.

I sincerely hope that Bouncer Rentals 4 You, humble themselves and admit their mistakes. My request for this claim will also be the same if this does in fact go to court. Which is a full refund of the $205 that I paid and a written apology.

Business' Final Response

In my previous response I honestly described the events that occurred on 8/11 accurately and honestly. I have printed responses to the Yelp posts that have since been removed by Yelp for violating their terms of service. Within those posts, one friend of the customer admits that the sno cone machine was taken but she claims it was taken as a courtesy because it was left behind. Although the driver originally forgot to take it with him because he was so distraught over the customer's behavior, when he returned for it while the customer was still there, he witnessed her putting it into her car and he talked to her about it and she specifically stated, "You'll get your machine when I get my full refund." This case has been assigned to Elk Grove PD and I will not be able to negotiate further on this matter due to the fact that a crime was committed. Had the customer not taken the machine, we would have considered a partial refund. Even so, the first time the customer contacted us she was highly aggressive and yelled that she would accept nothing less than a FULL refund so at that time we believed that a partial was not going to satisfy her. It sounds fishy to me that the customer is claiming to have video of our driver returning in his truck...it sounds like a staging to me. Who does that? Who sits in a parking lot with a video camera waiting for a driver to arrive in his truck? With that said, I have my own proof of events that I would be more than willing to supply if needed. We will not continue to discuss this further with the customer until the machine is returned and the police investigation is closed.