Complaint / Review
Specialty Merchandise Corporation Or SMC
Ripped off gives the runaround rather than a refund

In December 03, I joined SMC, shortly after joining my mother had a stroke and I had no time to do anything else except take care of her.

After my Mother had a stroke, I had to take of her and tried to get a much needed refund from SMC. Their cancellation paragraph does not state that you can not get a refund after 30 days. They now want to keep my money in limbo or on account as they say. What good does that do me? I was not able to take advantage of their training and was told this not available to me any longer.

I tried to get a refund of $264.25, the amount that I have already paid in, but was told that I needed to do this within 30 days. Because of my Mother's stroke and the time I have had spend with her, I did not even get a chance to read any of the materials sent until sometime in May. This was not a very important part of my life, but the people at SMC don't care.

On the Standard SMC Membership Rules, cancellation rules read as follows: "You may cancel your membership at any time. If you cancel within 30 days of joining SMC, you may call toll free 1 (877) 523-9088 for easy return instructions on how to return you membership materials and request a full refund of any membership fees you have paid (excluding shipping and handling)." Nowhere does it state that you cannot get a refund after the 30 days or when you cancel your membership.

The only help I get from their representative via e-mail, who comes across as "cimendoza", is that they will cancel without a refund of any kind or they will hold my membership in limbo forever. What good is this, in short the money is lost forever. I guess they need my money more than I do.

I also missed out on any help in the beginning, because of my lack of time to deal with this, they don't allow any assistance after 60 days. They do show that you may go to arbitration, but it also states this is done by a retired judge in California, who they in all likely hood have on their payroll. I just hope no one else gets ripped off by this company. It almost seems that you also need to have mortar and brick businesses in order to succeed.

Also, in there speal they don't tell you that there is also an added expense to setup a web site or to have it monitored every month. I have offered to return all the membership materials in order to get a refund, but they don't seem to care whether I return them or not. Actually they are a very uncaring company and hard to deal with.