This is what I sent to Almond Dream:
My Almond Dream Mint Chocolate Chip non-dairy ice cream had ONE chocolate chip in it. One! The picture of the scoop on the front has a dozen chocolate chips in it. I don’t think you should call it mint chocolate chip unless you’re going to put chips in it. Or maybe the name is literal? Chocolate chip is not plural because there will only be ONE chip in the pint? If that’s the case, the photo should match, and show only one chip rather than 12.
Thank you.
Something weird has happened. Maybe it isn’t weird. Maybe it’s normal. I don’t know. In any case, it used to be if you searched the internet for Pure Med Spa, Brite Smile, et al, my blog would come up and people could see the number of people harmed by this company. There are hundreds of comments on my posts from people who have been robbed or injured by them. Now you search these terms and my blog doesn’t show. In fact, it brings up all the current locations where these thieves are still operating. Want a burned face? How about some severe skin damage on your legs? Better yet, how about having a lot of your money stolen? If you do, head on down to your local Pure Med Spa/Brite Smile,GRF Medspa et al. Free pain and stealing awaits you!
To see those previous posts that have virtually disappeared, here are the links:
You Be Sorry You Mess with Me, Pure Med Spa!
Pure Med Spa, Brite Smile, Crooks All
Order By Bankruptcy Court for Pure Med Spa
Pure Med Spa/Brite Smile is Now Pinnacle
I have been very busy lately. I have to use a PC for work because the software I use in my job is only windows-based. As is the case with PCs, the damn thing started running really sluggy and slow. I knew it needed a cleanup and defrag and all that crap, but I just didn’t have time to sit around and stare at it while it wound its way through all that stuff.
One day while in Staples purchasing my latest round of toner and paper, I saw a circular advertising PC tuneup services for $9.99. Ah, I thought. Good deal. I’ll let them stare at the stupid thing for two hours. It would be worth it not to have to. I called and was told that if I dropped it off on Wednesday I could pick it up on Thursday morning. Even better. Wednesday after work I headed on over to leave my non-trusty-computer at the store.
It should have been clue one to me that there would be problems when, contrary to the information I had been given over the phone, I was informed nearly immediately that it would be three days to get the computer back. Oh no, that won’t work, I told them. If it was going to take three days, I was going to have to do this another time. The salesman hemmed for a moment then said it could be done the next day.
Clue one, Lara. Clue one. You weren’t paying attention…
I then said I had to get going because I had an appointment.
Clue two, Lara. Clue two. Mr. Computer Fixit guy kind of sauntered over to look at something else another Computer Fixit guy was doing, then went behind the counter and got a little widget to insert into my computer. He inserted it and stood there talking to me, telling me how my computer was the nicest he had seen come through the tune-up station in a while. He looked like Napoleon Dynamite, only without glasses. He kind of sounded like him too. In the end I spent a half an hour in there, in spite of my constant assertions that I needed to get going.
I explained that my computer had been running slowly. I explained that on vacation, my colleague had used the computer and claimed it had been infected with malware, but our office computer guy and she had removed this malware with some program from the web. I explained that in spite of this, the thing seemed to be running slowly.
Do you use Norton? No, I don’t like Norton. I have BitDefender. Bit Defender? Never heard of it. Well, it was top-rated on PC Magazine’s choice for virus protection, and I bought it based on that review, and I haven’t had any problems with it. (Incidentally, since all this went down, I perused the web and saw that PC Magazine had again rated it in their top three.)
Well, I have never heard of it. Okay, so that makes you a superstar. Can you just take my computer and let me go now?
They told me they would call me when my computer was done and sent me on my way. I wasn’t kidding that I needed the thing the next day for work. It is all I have for work and all my work is on it. Without it, I can’t do 99% of my job. Well, more like 85%, but you get the idea.
The next day, Staples had not called me by 7:30 p.m. I was beginning to worry, because I had a big response due on a file in less than five days and could not afford to be without my computer.
I called Staples and was patched to the computer center. The guy on the phone informed me that he hadn’t been able to get it to update. He had tried two times and it failed at the end each time. Okay, yeah well, I need my computer. I don’t care about the updates. I’ll get to them later. I need my machine. He said I could come pick it up. It was late and baby was going to bed, so I said it would likely be in the morning. Okay, fine.
The next day I got busy with a bunch of other things and since I didn’t have the computer, I waited to pick it up until after picking Milla up for school. When I went in, I was told it had three viruses, and that if I wanted them removed, I would have to pay $200. I asked what the viruses were and was told that they didn’t know, but it would cost $200 to have them fixed. The guy told me that the Staples tuneup hadn’t even detected BitDefender (See? It’s such a horrible program!) He said I should have gotten the Norton antivirus software, and was told that Norton had picked up the three viruses on my computer.
The worst thing though, did not appear until I sat down to finish drafting the response due in five days. My Adobe Acrobat did not work. Every time I opened it I received an error message letting me know the registration had been corrupted and I needed to uninstall and reinstall. I ran an uninstall repair, but this did not fix the problem.
Frantic, I called my office to see if they had a serial number. The only serial number they had for me was one for Adobe Standard. I had Pro and needed Pro. The Standard would not work. I kept trying to do my job around the error, but it wouldn’t work. I optimize scanned text. I insert and delete pages. I enter in text boxes and rectangles. I used Acrobat. A lot. No more. Finally today, up against the deadline and sobbing in frustration, I uninstalled and reinstalled a trial version. Unfortunately it doesn’t allow the user to do any of the functions I use. In tears, I called my friend Debbie. She took my documents, made them into PDFs, stuck in the Exhibit words, and bundled them all together, then emailed it back to me to file. I wasted so much time on this problem, the response wasn’t nearly as tight and good as it could have been, and I filed it near 4 in the afternoon.
During this, I called Staples. I have a salesperson online who helps me with purchases. I had written him an email on Sunday after wasting two hours slogging through computer problems. He called me Monday. We played phone tag until today. He said the store had told him I said the computer had viruses. No, I never said that. He wanted to three-way call with the store to get this straightened out, so we made an appointment for tomorrow, after the big monster response was turned in.
Today, during my frustration, I called the store and asked to speak to the manager. He knew my case. He said the techs told him I said the computer had a virus. I never said that. He said my computer was “riddled with viruses.” That’s funny, because that’s not what they said and if their “tune-up” was supposed to clean viruses, why didn’t they do it? Why did they say it would be $200 to do that or give me any information at all? He said the “tune-up” had failed. That’s interesting, because my receipt says it worked just fine, that only one update failed. Well, your computer is riddled with viruses. So you’re telling me that my computer, which worked just fine and dandy until the day I got my computer back from Staples, magically developed viruses that only affected Adobe after I got it back from you? No answer? And are the viruses the reason the internet hookup icon on my taskbar is disabled and that no amount of tech support with Costco will bring it back? Yes, it must be. No apology, only an offer to bring the computer back and let the trolls get their hands on it again. Not on your life. Kick me once, shame on you. Kick me twice, shame on me. I’m not G.W.
What a load of horse pucky. Seriously. These yahoos want me to believe that my computer was riddled with viruses and that these viruses worked their magic only after my computer was left in their store. That, my friends, is a pile of steaming poo, a lie, a foulness, a thing most unclean.
I decided then and there to tell my story. My hope is that even one other person will read my words and decide that staples are for staplers, not a place to shop in. Take your business elsewhere. I’m going to. Office Depot is right across the parking lot.
After several commenters noted that Groupon in Dallas is giving out a Groupon on Pure Med Spa (aka Beauty Med Spa–same name, no difference), I sent them an email saying that they really ought to reconsider promoting a company that has done so much harm. Here was Groupon’s response:
Hi Lara,
Thanks for your feedback and sorry for any inconvenience this has caused. We do our best to feature businesses that see Groupon as an opportunity to gain loyal customers as well as advertise their services.
We stand by all of the businesses we feature and the deals we offer, but if you ever feel let down in any way when using your Groupon, we’ll be more than happy to work with you towards satisfaction! Also, thanks for the information! I will be passing this on to the right people.
Please let me know if you have any other questions.
Regards,
Sarah M.
support@groupon.com
I told them that I am not going to be let down, but others will be. Who wants to be a loyal customer to a business that has stolen thousands of dollars from customers, burned people with lasers, caused one woman to require surgery because they damaged her legs, and on and on. They are being investigated by several state attorneys general and have been profiled on many television news programs for the harm they have caused.
It’s a shame that this is Groupon’s response considering the negative publicity associated with this company. Groupon is promoting thieves and hucksters. Send Groupon a letter letting them know if you have been harmed and what happened. Maybe if enough people contact them, they will change their policy.
Below is the text of the order by the bankruptcy court in the Northern District of Georgia for Pure Med Spa:
On the 17th day of December, 2009, came on to be heard the Motion to Dismiss Chapter 7 Cases of Non-Operating Debtors (the “Motion”) filed on behalf of Edwin K. Palmer, duly appointed Chapter 7 Trustee (the “Trustee”) for Pure Laser Hair Removal & Treatment Clinics Inc. (“Pure”), John Street Holdings LLC (“JSH”), GRF Medspa Broadway Plaza, LLC, GRF Medspa Redmond Town Center Mall, LLC, GRF Medspa Santa Ana, LLC, GRF Medspa Santa Clara, LLC, GRF Medspa Southcenter, LLC, GRF Medspa Washington Square Mall, LLC, GRF Medspa Village at Corte Madera, LLC, GRF Medspa Clackamas Town Center, LLC, GRF Medspa North Town Mall, LLC, GRF Medspa Alderwood Mall, LLC, GRF Medspa Bellis Fair Mall, LLC, GRF Medspa Fashion Show, LLC and GRF Medspa Sherman Oaks, LLC (collectively, the “Jointly-Administered Debtors”).
Pursuant to the Motion, the Debtor has represented that the Chapter 7 cases for each of the Jointly-Administered Debtors are to be dismissed, other than the Chapter 7 cases of In re Pure Laser Hair Removal & Treatment Clinics, Inc., Case No. 09-62038, and In re John Street Holdings LLC, Case No. 09-62039 (collectively, the “Remaining Cases”).
After reviewing the Motion and the pleadings on file, the Court is of the opinion, and so finds, that no written objections were filed with regard to said Motion and that good cause exists to grant the Motion. At the time the Motion was called for hearing, no parties appeared to object to the Motion. Accordingly, it is hereby ORDERED AND ADJUDGED as follows:
1. The Motion is GRANTED as set forth herein;
2. The above-captioned Chapter 7 case of GRF Medspa North Town Mall, LLC; Case No. 08-85315 is hereby dismissed.
3. Upon entry of this Order, the Remaining Cases will no longer be jointly-administered and any future pleadings, motions or other filings that relate to either of the Remaining Cases must be filed in the applicable Remaining Case unless and until such Remaining Cases are jointly-administered or substantively consolidated by a future Order of the Court.
4. Notwithstanding this dismissal, all orders previously entered in this Chapter 7 case or any of the Chapter 7 cases of the Jointly-Administered Debtors shall remain in full force and effect.
I finally started the article I have been planning to write for over a year. Every two or three days another comment comes in on the company detailing further bad acts. Over and over people tell stories of failed treatments, closed doors, lost money, and injuries. I have been called by Jeff Nourse. I have spoken to employees and customers. An attorney general called me to ask what I knew about the company’s practices. A local Portland television station profiled a victim of Pure Med Spa and called to get my input. A financier in New York called because the CEO and CFO had contacted him to borrow money. Basic research led him to this site and to me. Along the way Pure Med changed to Brite Smile, and the stories continued. More money lost. More people harmed.
It is time to get the word out that this company is a public health hazard. When another story popped into my inbox tonight, I stopped reading my book, pulled out the computer, and started working on the story. The words are flowing. I am going to write about this disaster of a company who steals its customers’ money, disfigures and scars their bodies, and runs rampant over its employees. Then I am going to submit the story to every major woman’s magazine in this country. Hopefully one of them will realize that this story is a big one, and that in order to protect consumers, the story needs to be told so that no one gives them another penny and nobody else gets hurt.
Some people have asked me Why aren’t these people in jail? They are crooks! They hurt me! They stole my money! Why indeed. Something needs to happen to stop them before someone else gets hurt. If we can’t jail them, at least I can try and stop them with my words.
See my previous posts on Pure Med Spa here and here.
I am writing an article on Pure Med Spa. For info, please click here.
Last summer, I stopped into a local spa to inquire about Botox treatments. After being told the price, I asked to schedule an appointment. I was informed that I would need to provide a $50 deposit to hold the appointment, and that if I did not cancel within twenty-four hours of the appointment, I would forfeit the deposit. Seeing no problem with this policy, I scheduled an appointment for the following week. The company was Pure Med Spa, also known as GRF Medspa.
That afternoon, I decided I no longer wanted the appointment. I called to cancel the appointment and to request a refund of my deposit. I was informed that Pure Med Spa does not provide refunds. I asked to speak with the manager who was not available. I left a message and waited angrily for her to contact me.
In the meantime, I did a little statutory research and discovered that my state has an act to protect consumers from shady spa practices. Among other things, the act allows for full refunds of any procedures if they are cancelled within 72 hours of making an appointment. To comply with the statute, it is necessary to send a letter stating the intent to cancel and requesting a full refund. I immediately wrote such a letter and sent it to Pure Med Spa.
That afternoon I spoke with the manager. After haggling for twenty minutes, I informed her that I had written her company in compliance with the statute and that if I did not receive a refund, I would be filing suit in small claims court. I also told her I was a writer and would write about my experience on my blog. I did not think Pure Med Spa would like the negative publicity.
The manager said she would try to get me a refund. After another wait, she called me back to tell me the fifty dollars would be refunded to my debit card. I thanked her and hung up. I did not stop payment on my debit card because I thought the matter would be handled and the cost to stop payment would have been twenty-five dollars. It seemed a steep price to pay.
Twenty-five dollars would have been better than the nothing I have ever received from Pure Med Spa. I honestly believe the manager in the store thought her company would refund the money. Every time I spoke to her she was even more apologetic and her apologies were genuine.
The timing of this situation was not great for me. I left to move to Hawaii a month afterwards. I was tracking to see if the refund arrived, and would call to speak to the manager, but because I was not in Portland where the spa was located, I could not go in and work something out in person.
In September, frustrated by the entire situation, I wrote a blog post about my experience. I stated my intent to sue in small claims court. I received a lot of responses from other people who had much worse situations than mine.
Through my blog I am able to track the searches people use to find my blog and to see which posts are read the most. By far the posts on Pure Med Spa get the most attention. Dozens of people read these posts every day. I have gotten several comments from readers whose experiences were terrible. One woman has a droopy face from improperly administered Botox. Another was an employee who spoke of their terrible treatment of her and other employees. A graduate student writing on Pure Med Spa contacted me to see if I would forward her information to people who contacted me. The posts continue to get tons of attention.
I was planning on suing Pure Med Spa in small claims court when I returned to Portland next week. Unfortunately, I heard the company filed for bankruptcy under the name GRF Medspa. I looked up their case. They filed chapter 11 in the district of Georgia. Their case number is 08-85038-crm. Their filing date was December 4, 2008. Also unfortunately, they have not yet filed all the required paperwork. It is not due until December 19, so I could not view the details of their case. If they do not file the necessary paperwork within the alloted time, their case will be dismissed.
If you have a potential claim against Pure Med Spa, I urge you to contact the Bankruptcy Court and ask to be listed as a creditor. When you are notified to file a claim, do so. It is not difficult to file the claim paperwork. In some districts it can even be done online.
Also contact the bankruptcy trustee assigned to the case and tell your story. His name and address are: Thomas Wayne Dworschak, Office of the U. S. Trustee, Room 362, 75 Spring Street, SW, Atlanta, GA 30303, (404) 331-4437 – ext. 145
Email: thomas.w.dworschak@usdoj.gov.
Write clearly and concisely. Be sure to him all the information related to your case including dates and the amounts you paid. Maybe if enough people provide this information, the trustee will pursue a class action claim against these crooks. In this way perhaps the trustee can collect more to distribute to all their creditors.
Pure Med Spa should be put out of business. Its CEO and any other associated with ripping people off should go to jail. I am going to be here writing anything I can to work towards that end. If you have a story you would like me to post for you, I would be happy to. A company like Pure Med Spa does not need to be in business. Let’s do what we can to get rid of them.
See my post on the Pure Med Spa bankruptcy here.
I am writing an article on Pure Med Spa. For info, please click here.
Because I have received so many messages in response to this post, and since it seems not many of these commentators have read my later piece on the Pure Med Spa bankruptcy filing, I have included this paragraph to inform any readers of that filing. Effectively, if you received your treatment or they stole money from you BEFORE they filed their bankruptcy case in 2009, this means you may NOT file a lawsuit against Pure Med Spa, except through the bankruptcy court, and there only for certain causes of action. You may NOT contact the company in any way about the money they owe you. You may NOT call the CEO and harass him. In short, you may not do anything to them. That is the point of the bankruptcy stay, to protect the company from creditors, and I absolutely support this, even when the filer is as abominable as Pure Med Spa. The same laws that protect Pure Med Spa protect you if you ever had to file, and speaking from experience as a bankruptcy attorney, that relief means a lot to people who are being harassed night and day by creditors. Don’t think this means you don’t have options, just follow the rules to ensure you don’t violate federal law.
Original Post Let’s Eliminate Pure Med Spa:
I admit it, I do make my title statement without actual and personal knowledge of how well they perform their spa services. I have only my customer-no-service experience with them stealing my money to go on (I am planning to sue here in a couple of weeks once I get the paperwork together). However, Pure Med Spa needs to be run out of town on a rail.
In spite of my lack of spa services, I can glean from the feedback I get here that Pure Med Spa has a lot of people really upset. See my previous post on them here. By far, I get more hits on my blog because of Pure Med Spa than any other. WordPress has a feature where we can see the searches people use to find us. Every single day, without fail, someone connects to my post on Pure Med Spa because they searched for it with some derogatory descriptor like Pure Med Spa complaints or Pure Med Spa sucks or Pure Med Spa steals money or Pure Med Spa ripoff. These are all actual searches and the list is by no means complete. I received a comment from a woman asking me to contact her about her horrible experience. I received others describing their horrible experiences.
Here is a quote:
I paid Pure Med Spa thousands of dollars, in return received cancelled appointments, broken equipment, refusal to honor the packages I purchased, and overbooking, in addition to extreme difficulty and delay in even getting an appointment due to overselling and short staffing…. hat really bothers me is the company’s indifference and arrogance. It seems to just be an effort to take money from clientele without accountablity to perform the services people pay for. Michelle
Here is another:
I’ll kick Pure Med Spa’s ass too. They are liers (sic). They sold me a treatment which they had known that the machine will burn my skin because of my skin type. But they still talked me into buying it. Then later, they told me the machine would burn my skin, and they are trying to give me some other more expensive treatment which I do not need at all. They have a stupid ‘no-refund’ policy, they would not give my money back, that is for sure. Lucy
Considering the number of people who are searching for Pure Med Spa because of problems with the place, I would suspect there may be enough people out there who could file a class action lawsuit against them. That said, even though I’m an attorney, I know very little about class actions, especially since the feds made them harder to file. I do think though, that someone ought to look into it. That place needs to have its ass kicked straight out of business.
See my post on the Pure Med Spa bankruptcy here.
I am writing an article on Pure Med Spa. For info, please click here.
Because I have received so many messages in response to this and my other Pure Med Spa post, and since it seems not many of these commentators have read my later piece on the Pure Med Spa bankruptcy filing, I have included this paragraph to inform any readers of that filing. Effectively, if you received your treatment or they took your money BEFORE they filed for bankruptcy in 2009, this means you may NOT file a lawsuit against Pure Med Spa, except through the bankruptcy court, and there only for certain causes of action (which include fraud). You may NOT contact the company in any way about the money they owe you. You may NOT call the CEO and harass him. In short, you may not do anything to them. That is the point of the bankruptcy stay, to protect the company from creditors, and I absolutely support this, even when the filer is as abominable as Pure Med Spa. The same laws that protect Pure Med Spa protect you if you ever had to file, and speaking from experience as a bankruptcy attorney, that relief means a lot to people who are being harassed night and day by creditors. Don’t think this means you don’t have options, just follow the rules to ensure you don’t violate federal law.
Original Post You be Sorry You Mess with Me Pure Med Spa:
I kick your ass little med spa stupid place.
I have lots of lawyer girlfriends. Because I am a lawyer, of course I have lots of lawyer friends. It goes with the territory, you know? What I find amusing is how often my lawyer girlfriends have to pull out the lawyer card as part of their ass-kicking when some stupid company fucks them over. My lawyer boyfriends do not seem to have this problem, and I mean friends who are boys, not actual boyfriends. I only have one boyfriend and he is not a lawyer, thank GOD…anyway, I digress. I think sometimes us girls get hassled by companies who would not hassle boys just because they think us girls are pushovers. Small problem. We are not all pushovers, especially lawyer girls. Lawyer girls in my experience have a little extra something that likes to kick asses, if you know what I mean. Something of that ass-kicking mentality pushes us to do things like go to law school and become lawyers. I am sure there are other professions like this as well, but as a group, my lawyer girlfriends are ass kickers.
ANYWAY. So my friend Kathleen has had many instances where she has had to kick company ass. It’s fun to listen to her because you can tell by her story that she is always right and the company is always wrong and I am not being facetious here, she really is. Like the time the bank told her she could have her deposit in 7 business days so she deposited a rather large sum based on that assertion, then the receipt the bank gave her after the deposit said she could not have that money for like two or three weeks or something. Um. NO. Bank wrong. Kathleen kick ass. Or another time, I don’t remember the details, but she was bidding at a furniture auction and bid on a piece of furniture and the auction people gave the furniture to someone else who bid earlier. Kathleen kick ass again. I think she lost on that one but the company was sorry they had crossed her and her husband looked sheepish. The company was wrong, no doubt in my mind. Fuckers. I would have kicked ass too. Kind of like when the bank in Hawaii thought I was a terrorist and would not give me an account even with a very large sum of money, a valid driver’s license, a social security card, and a passport. Very large ass kicking there. I ended up at another bank. Upset Lara. Oh, and then there was the time the air filter company tried to mess with my lawyer friend Sara. Their ad said Free In Home Estimates. So they came and did their estimate and it was too high so of course Sara used another company. Then they tried to charge Sara. Um. No. Sara pointed out the various laws their attempts to collect violated. Needless to say, they didn’t get the money they did not deserve. Jerks.
ANYWAY. So the point of this rambling diatribe is that I gave this med spa fifty bucks to hold my appointment back in July. They said We need a fifty dollar deposit to hold your appointment. If you don’t show or cancel within 24 hours of the appointment, we keep the fifty bucks. Okay. I can deal with that. Well, I called to cancel the same day I made the appointment.
Oh, we don’t do refunds. This isn’t a refund. I didn’t get anything. It is outside the 24 hour period, I want my money. Well we won’t give it to you. Okay then. Have you heard of the Oregon Health Spa Act, ORS 646A.030? It allows the right of rescission of any spa service within 72 hours of requesting or paying for service. Um, let me get my manager. Yeah, you do that. So the next several conversations were not pleasant. I described all the things I would do to them, including writing about their spa on my blog (doing that now), calling the Oregon Attorney General’s office, and telling Clackamas Town Center, the mall where they are located. During all this, I also promptly sent off the written notice requesting the rescission, as required by statute. Finally the manager spoke to someone who would allow a refund. She told me the money would be in my account by the end of the day. Nope, not there. I called again. Within three days. Nope, not there. It is now three and a half months later and still, no refund.
So I’m going postal on their asses. I filed my complaint with the Oregon AG. I am going to call the mall where they are located. And I’m writing about them here. I did some research and discovered MANY forums lamenting the many problems with Pure Med Spa. They are a terrible company. They have huge problems giving refunds or returning deposits. They also use technicians who are not properly licensed and forget to follow health regulations when performing spa services (this information comes from the forums, not my personal experience). Too bad I did not know this when I walked by them in the mall. They are counting on people not knowing this when they walk by in the mall. This is part of why I’m going to tell the mall. I don’t know if the mall will care, but there should be some public service message to let patrons know the company they might deal with is a giant crook who will steal their money and could possibly perform some atrocious health violation on them or something.
The problem with stupid companies assuming customers are stupid is that their assumptions are often WRONG. Guess what? I know where to look for the statutes about stupid asses like you. I am happy to let others know there are statutes out there to protect consumers from shitty companies. Oregon and many other states have rights of rescission statutes in many areas (though not in car sales, as is often believed). Anyway, in Oregon anyway, there are statutes to allow you to change your mind about gym contracts, time share contracts, things sold door to door, certain home sale contracts, and other consumer contracts. Usually you just have to send them a letter. It’s not difficult, people just don’t know this is their right. It would be better if the statutes required these jackasses to post something prominently stating as much, but for now, at least the laws are there so if some crappy company like Pure Med Spa tries to rip you off, you can fight them if necessary. Fees to sue them and damages for causing you the trouble are often included in the remedies, so all you are out is your time. The next time a company gives you trouble, go look through your state’s consumer statutes, you might find you have certain rights. It is so empowering when some ginormous company who couldn’t give a shit about you tries to steal from you and you kick them in the ass.
Oh we are so small and insignificant. Oh the corporations in this world are so large and monopolistic. They are all the same. There are too many willing to put up with their business practices, too many willing to put up and shut up, that telling them we will not do business with them is meaningless. All I have is this damn blog and any articles I ever manage to publish. I am using this blog and this opportunity to tell anyone who cares or has a choice about my experience with Advantage RentaCar and First Hawaiian Bank.
I have nothing good to say about Advantage RentaCar. I rented a car from them. I paid them for a full tank of gas. They have this deal where you pay them like .30c a gallon less than what is on the street, then you can bring the car back empty and they don’t care. Well, I start out on the road after a LONG flight, made longer by the fact the airplane was broken and we had to sit on it for 2 hours before it went anywhere. Halfway down the freeway to where we were staying I realized the car had less than half a tank. Nice. I rented this car for a week. I brought it back a day early because I purchased a car that gets much better gas mileage. Upon arrival at Advantage, I was informed that the car would cost twice as much because I was returning it early. Excuse me? They have the car available to rent to someone else and they want me to pay them twice as much? They would not make it right. I had to take the car and I will have to bring it back tomorrow if I want to keep the additional $170. The airport is not near my house. The rental company is not easily accessible. I wasted almost two hours there and back today. I will have to waste more time tomorrow. I will never rent an Advantage RentaCar again, even if it costs me ten or twenty or even a hundred dollars more to rent somewhere else. If they wanted to charge me more to bring the car back early, they should have mentioned this would be the case, thereby eliminating my wasting my time going there today. Again, I will never do business with Advantage RentaCar again.
First Hawaiian Bank. Not only do they think I’m a lying terrorist who forged my driver’s license and social security card, not only will they not tell me what is on my credit report that makes them think I’m a lying terrorist (claiming it is a violation of privacy–HAH), now they will not return my forty thousand dollars until it has cleared my bank. Rather than just giving me my check back and returning all documents with my signatures, the greedy bastards took my money and are holding it until my bank clears the check. This could take up to ten days. I will never do business with First Hawaiian Bank. I urge others not to do business with them either.
Citizens, we have to stop putting up with this. The only way we will ever change anything is if enough of us say no. A few here and there will never make a dent. We have to fight for change. Every day our rights are eroded further. Every day we have fewer freedoms. The movement is miniscule on a day by day basis, so we do not notice that over time, we are so far away from anything resembling freedom in any sense of the word. This will only change if we stop putting up with all of the bureaucratic chaos we are forced to endure every day. We will only change corporations if enough of us hit their bottom line. This is important. I urge you to resist requirements pushed on you by businesses who are not interested in customer service. I urge you to stop doing business with companies who treat you poorly and then let them know why. Only then will we ever create real change.
The Customer is Always Right. I used to see this sign in businesses. The theory behind it is a pleasant one, although I usually only saw it invoked as a means for bullies to treat customer service representatives like crap. But today, it seems the idea has gone completely out the window. It’s like stores don’t give a shit anymore if we don’t patronize their businesses; 800 people will be standing in line behind us if we don’t like the service that we get. It’s this way with stores, restaurants, customer call centers, you name it.
I don’t eat out much. For one thing, it’s expensive as hell. For another, I heard Portland has had an outbreak of Hepatitis A and that it is often spread by restaurants. Since I had to get a shot in the butt in 1990 for an e-coli outbreak, and the thought of eating someone else’s poo is just more than I can manage, I avoid restaurants.
But sometimes you’re across town and starving as hell and ready to run people over your blood sugar is so low and you’re willing to eat all the things you wouldn’t normally touch from a mile away because you’re that hungry. That was me today. I recognized intellectually that I felt like a wretch and I didn’t care because I needed food. So I went to Taco Hell. Yeah, I know it’s gross. But it’s cheap and they have this burrito with rice in it and I don’t get cheese so I went. The service was horrendous. The charming “customer service” representative who took my order informed me that the burrito I like “cannot be grilled.”
Huh? I told her when I’ve patronized the Taco Hell by my house they always grill it for me. Well, she sneered, that’s another franchise. Uh, okay. Small problem. When I’m hungry, I don’t care how big a bitch I am, at least when I’m that hungry. And I was that hungry. But I’m working hard on living in the moment and I did not want to be the bully customer who makes a worker feel like shit. I sat there in my car waiting to pull up to the window and thinking how irrelevant all this is and what a waste of my energy, but I was still getting angry. So I decided to be calm, but I still wanted to know why can’t they just grill my fucking burrito?
I pulled up and asked the kind lady how come they couldn’t grill my burrito. She said it is just a store policy. I said that isn’t an answer, it doesn’t tell me why the policy is in place. She said she didn’t know. Across the way a man who was probably a higher up manager because he wasn’t wearing the fancy Taco Hell outfit but instead had on a cheap shirt and tie came over and asked the problem. I started to say there wasn’t a problem, I just wanted to know why my burrito couldn’t be grilled. He said they are not allowed to grill them, company policy. I said that I get them grilled at the Taco Hell by my house. He said they aren’t supposed to. Then the girl helping said something to him and he turned to me and said it was a health issue.
Huh? I said how in the world is it a health issue? He said it’s like giving them a cup and asking them to fill it. It has my germs on it. I was VERY confused at this point. My lack of blood sugar addled brain couldn’t quite muster what was going on. I said how in the world can it be a health issue to grill a freaking burrito? It’s in the restaurant, you put on all the ingredients. I never touch it. He just walked away.
At this point, I didn’t give a shit if my burrito was grilled or not. I just wanted to eat. I sat and waited until the girl handed me the bag. I asked for my water and drove off. I pulled to the side of the parking lot to eat it and it was grilled. Weird.
The main thing I kept thinking about after all this was that had I threatened to take my business elsewhere, they would have said fine, go ahead. We don’t need your two dollars. Companies have gotten so big that the customer isn’t right anymore. Everyone puts up and shuts up about crappy customer service because there is nowhere else to go where it will be any better. This is another byproduct of our one-size-fits-all one dimensional corporate society. Hate waiting on the phone on hold for 20 minutes when you call the phone company? Fine, go somewhere else. And while you’re at it we’ll charge you $200 because you’re in a lopsided bullshit contract. Hate the piece of crap you bought at the Dollar Store? Too bad for you. No refunds. Who cares if the state law allows you to return a defective item to a store with no refunds. You planning to sue us over a dollar? Don’t want to wait in line at a store with no employees? Fine, leave. Better yet, stand in line for 10 minutes, then leave. See if we care. Want your burrito grilled and we won’t do it? Go fuck yourself. We don’t pay our workers enough to care. We don’t hire enough workers so they’re all pissed off all the time. Go somewhere else. Again, see if we care.
I know this is a cynical bitchy rant. I shouldn’t complain without offering some solution. But I don’t know what the solution is. I go out of my way to avoid patronizing monster corporations, but sometimes it’s inevitable. Sometimes it’s just being so damn hungry I’ll eat a rat in the gutter or Taco Hell. Those are the times those places get my business. I never go to Walmart or McDonald’s ever, and I mean never. They could be the last businesses on earth and I wouldn’t go there. Maybe there isn’t a solution unless enough people say enough, and judging by the lines in SkankDonald’s and Taco Hell or the mass of cars in the SkankMart parking lot, that isn’t going to happen anytime soon. In the meantime I guess I’ll rant on my blog.
Random Thoughts on Everything and Nothing 