Suddenly Slimmer

Review: On May 21st, I spoke to [redacted] to inquire about their mineral wraps and asked if I could stop by for info as I was only 10 minutes from them, she said she could give me info by phone (#1 strange response). After going over the different services I scheduled an appointment to have their Regular Strength Thermaslim & MSM Mineral Wrap w/ Free Chi Treatment for a total of $266.00 (not including gratuity). I specifically scheduled to take a half day off of work for Friday May 23rd, so I could have the treatment at 2:45pm. When I started to give her my American Express card number she said they do not take AMEX. I said that is the only payment method I have. She said she will check on this and call me back in 5 minutes. An hour passed and I called her back and she said that she will try it and see if it goes through (#2 strange response, either you take AMEX or you don't) . After a little while she confirmed over the phone that it went through and would send me a confirmation email which she did.

Then, on May 23rd, I receive a voice mail from [redacted] at just before 1pm saying that she has been looking for my phone number for the last 20 minutes (#3 strange thing to say) because her technician who was scheduled to do my wrap fell and injured her wrist that morning, is getting an MRI, and they need to reschedule my appointment. She also sent me 3 short, separate emails one after the other starting at 12:43pm (#4 strange responses):

Email #1: "Hello, your tech fell and might have broken her hand tnis am."

Email #2: "I just found out. I don't have your number to call you. Wont b able 2 get it cor couple hours. Hope u get this. I can take u"

Email #3: "Next week possible tomorrow. [redacted]"

I called her and emailed her back that I was sorry to hear this, but am also disappointed as this was the only time I had available to do this service (it is a 2.5 hour time commitment) and asked if they had another tech. I requested that if there were any charges or holds placed on my card, to please release them until I am able to call her back and reschedule. She said they don't have another tech and her response was very dissatisfactory and made me question everything about this business's ethics up to this point. We went back and forth by email several times (I have written record of all of the email correspondence if you need proof) because although I requested a refund she said they have a 'no refund policy' but they are available 6-7 days a week and the 'credit' will be good up to 4 months. I explained that I work a full time job that is very demanding and not easy to take time off, as well as having a toddler at home to take care of. I asked her to make an exception to her policy since THEY cancelled the appointment. I was not a no-show and I did not cancel the appointment.

I tried again to reason with her that good business practice would be to issue me the refund, but she would only continue to avoid this request and only repeat that I have 4 months to use my "gift certificate" (this is NOT a gift certificate, she charged me for a service I never got to use) and try to get me to reschedule and offer me a "free gift". My final communication with her today was that since she is giving me a hard time, I do not trust to do business with them and since she is refusing to give me a refund, I have now filed a dispute with my credit card to not authorize any charges form that company or her. I asked if she is the owner or manager she never answered.Desired Settlement: Although I filed a dispute with my credit card, they can't do anything right now because the charge is showing as pending, but is still credited against my available balance. I need [redacted] or the owner of this business to issue me a full credit amount of $266.00 back onto my AMEX card. In the future, if unforeseen circumstances happened where they have to cancel an appointment they should not hesitate to take the credit hold off or issue a credit. How is a customer going to WANT to even go there if they run business that way?!

Consumer

Response:

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and find that this resolution would be satisfactory to me. I will wait for the business to perform this action and, if it does, will consider this complaint resolved.

Dear Revdex.com,

I would like to notify you that I have resolved the above referenced complaint with the business. The situation only got resolved because the owner refused to issue a refund and my credit card company said they could not dispute the charges because the company was willing to reschedule the services.

Although I really didn't want to go there, after all that has transpired and filing this complaint, it was either reschedule the appointment and use the service or lose $266.00. So, I found time in my schedule and went there for the service on 6-11-14 which was performed as promised.

I still do not like the way this situation was handled and that she refused to refund the charges immediately when she cancelled my appointment and I said that I wasn't sure when I could come back in. I also think the service price is inflated in checking with other businesses that offer comparable treatments.

Thank you,