I needed some tiny (roughly 1/8") stick-on vinyl lettering for a project that I have been building. After finding that absolutly no one in the U.S. sells such lettering, I was forced to order it from the U.K.
The online store I dealt with took over 3 weeks to get it to me, so I tried a different online store, Barry's Model Lettering, which processed my payment immediately (on August 23, 2013).
A day later, I received an email asking for a shipping address. (Anyone who has ever shopped online knows that you cannot submit any order form without completely filling out every line, including the address). I thought this was unusual.
Three days later, I emailed him asking if the order had shipped yet as I did not hear anything. He replied that it was the weekend, the following Monday is a holiday, and he would ship it Tuesday (I guess the U.K. doesn't have mail service on Fridays & Saturdays?).
September 3, 2013, I again emailed to ask if it had shipped. After not getting a reply, I emailed him on September 4 asking for a refund.
On the 5th, he finally replied that it had shipped, but he was not given any type of receipt for tracking. (I routinely order from all over the world and ALWAYS get a tracking number). He offered to refund my money if I want, but I replied that I will wait.
September 10th, I again contacted him to say I want a full refund.
September 11th, I received a 'refund notice from PayPal' which did not look authentic.
I contacted PayPal and they said that it was a fake email and that they were alertng their fraud department.
When I contacted him about it, he told me he had refunded my money to my 'other' email address. Having my own business, and using PayPal exclusively for credit card transactions, I know this is not possible. You simply click the "Issue Refund" button and PayPal does the rest - they would not make such a mistake. Period.
An hour later, their fraud department emailed me that he committed fraud and that the money was back in my account.
I have to say Thank God that I paid with PayPal, they were fantastic! Had I used another payment method, no doubt I would have never gotten my money back. It appears that they will be pursuing criminal charges against him in the U.K.
Barry's Model Lettering Reviews
I needed some tiny (roughly 1/8") stick-on vinyl lettering for a project that I have been building. After finding that absolutly no one in the U.S. sells such lettering, I was forced to order it from the U.K.
The online store I dealt with took over 3 weeks to get it to me, so I tried a different online store, Barry's Model Lettering, which processed my payment immediately (on August 23, 2013).
A day later, I received an email asking for a shipping address. (Anyone who has ever shopped online knows that you cannot submit any order form without completely filling out every line, including the address). I thought this was unusual.
Three days later, I emailed him asking if the order had shipped yet as I did not hear anything. He replied that it was the weekend, the following Monday is a holiday, and he would ship it Tuesday (I guess the U.K. doesn't have mail service on Fridays & Saturdays?).
September 3, 2013, I again emailed to ask if it had shipped. After not getting a reply, I emailed him on September 4 asking for a refund.
On the 5th, he finally replied that it had shipped, but he was not given any type of receipt for tracking. (I routinely order from all over the world and ALWAYS get a tracking number). He offered to refund my money if I want, but I replied that I will wait.
September 10th, I again contacted him to say I want a full refund.
September 11th, I received a 'refund notice from PayPal' which did not look authentic.
I contacted PayPal and they said that it was a fake email and that they were alertng their fraud department.
When I contacted him about it, he told me he had refunded my money to my 'other' email address. Having my own business, and using PayPal exclusively for credit card transactions, I know this is not possible. You simply click the "Issue Refund" button and PayPal does the rest - they would not make such a mistake. Period.
An hour later, their fraud department emailed me that he committed fraud and that the money was back in my account.
I have to say Thank God that I paid with PayPal, they were fantastic! Had I used another payment method, no doubt I would have never gotten my money back. It appears that they will be pursuing criminal charges against him in the U.K.