On Monday June 10th I had an in-home presentation from the Colorado Prime Foods salesman Moe Zaghlonl. I had to go to work, the presentation had already lasted about 2 hours, so I asked him to come back and finish the next day. He came back on Tuesday July 11th.
During the whole presentation he kept using the words savings, savings, savings. The presentation sounded good, and I really was led to believe that we would get 6 months of groceries, not including soaps, shampoos, eggs, milk, and cheese. During the actual signing of the contract my husband noticed one of the terms as being 18% interest on all appliances.
He questioned Moe about this, as we were signing to buy a commercial, supposedly frost-free Whirlpool freezer to hold the food. Moe said Don't worry about that it only applies to people buying gas grills, and televisions. So, stupidly we believed him.By the way I should mention that we are dealing with the York, Pennsylvania office at this point. WE signed the contract, and proceeded to give him a $399.00 check for down payment. After looking at my bank account I realized we would be short, and bounce if that check went through. On Friday June 14th (within the 3 day cancellation period allowed by law in PA), I called the York, PA office and spoke with Nick who never gave a last name.
I tried cancelling letting him know that I could not afford the down payment right now. He made me an offer that he would waive the down payment and give us an extra 20% discount on our food which made it a 40% discount in all. I stupidly took his deal, and he never once sent anything in writing. 3 weeks later my bank account is $399 short and I never recieved my down payment check in the mail like he said I would.
I called Nick, and he said he would talk to his boss he couldn't refund anything without his boss's approval, and that he would call us back. The next day I called him, as we had not heard anything from him. He said he still hadn't heard from his boss yet. The next day after that I received a bill from Concord Financial Services for my freezer with 18% interest. I called back again yet another day, at this point he still never heard from his boss. I proceeded to tell Nick about the interest, and how Moe had told us there was only interest on the grills, and televisions.
Nick said No, there is interest on all appliances, and that he doubted Moe ever said there wasn't interest. Nick got Moe on the other line where Moe lied and said he never told us that. Basically there was nothing we could do but pay the interest. At this point I told him he could come pick up his freezer, and not bother to send any food. He said once we got the freezer we were stuck with it, even though both the contract, and the salesperson said it is returnable.
Angry that I did not get an answer on when my money would be refunded, I called the Corporate Headquarters to let them know my situation where I also got the answer we're working on it there is nothing we can do immediately. This was Friday, I made up my mind I was not waiting until Monday for an answer, so I called Nick back, and finally he told us he had approval to refund us and that he would send a check 3 day airmail. A week went by still no check, so again I went to the Corporate offices. At this point we had recieved our food on July 3rd.
Our order was supposed to be for 6 months, and was only for about 2 months. The groceries, (rice, macoroni & cheese, toilet paper, paper towels, and laundry detergent-fabric softener), were only a weeks worth, the meat was about 2 months worth. I also told the corporate office about this, and the fact that half of what we ordered we did not recieve. They said they only give you 1 weeks grocery items, enough to get you started, and they would credit us for the meat items we did not recieve.
Finally talked to a Kristin who transferred us to Karen in accounting who tried to help us figure out where our refund is. She said she couldn't find the paperwork she would call us back tomorrow. I had to go out and came home to find a message on my answering machine from Karen this is tomorrow, now that the accounting person who was supposed to take care of the refund is on vacation and Karen was sending a check out right away. We finally recieved the check 3 days later.By this time I had already paid my mortgage $400 short 2 weeks ago. I wrote a letter to the attorney general, who referred it to the Better Business Bureau of New York.
At this time I no longer wanted anything to do with Colorado Prime. Upon recieving the letter a corporate person named Agnes called us. Her solution was to let us out of the contract, but we are stuck with a freezer costing us $888 when in the store it costs $500. That is also with $100 knocked off for early payoff, and $399 knocked off for a service agreement I don't ever remember signing. The 2 months worth of food is going to cost us $795. I agreed simply because I never want to have to deal with Colorado Prime again!
I am not happy we were ripped off I'm not saving a dime, and to top it off they charged me New York sales tax on the freezer which to agree to their settlement my husband told them they had to remove the sales tax from the cost of the freezer, which they will not do. Please if they ever cold call, or come to your door think twice! MSNBC Dateline has done a story on them, and if you search the internet you will find numerous complaints, and newspaper stories about them. I hope you will do the research before it it too late. I unfortunately found out too late.
Lisa
harrisburg, Pennsylvania
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