Dispute kronos/glow/sensa/"intelligent beauty" charges on your credit card!
Im a very savvy consumer, but the Kronos false advertising about the nature of theIR free trial fooled me. Actually, they simply committed fraud; the "must return products" requirement was NOT in their advertising online or on paper in the product package.in July, I ordered the trial set of shampoo, wash-out conditioner and leave-in conditioning spray. The trial product set offering/ad said that the cost of the trial was for the shipping and handling only, but the products would be charged to your credit card after 30 days unless you called to cancel the order, with no statement about having to return the trial products. Only the leave-in spray worked for me, so I called to cancel the order, threw out the products that didnt work, and ordered another bottle of the conditioning spray that did work. The agent for that call didn't mention returning the other products.
In mid-October, I received a call from the collections department of Intelligent Beauty. The very polite and professional collections agent mentioned Sensa hair products. No, I said, Id bought a trial of Kronos products, and canceled the order well within the 30 days. She nattered on (politely and clearly) about there having been a statement in the materials about having to send the products back. No, I said, there was not! She asked whether Id received a DVD with the products. No, I had not. Well, she was sorry, but that was the deal, and if I wanted to put an end to the collections process, they could accept my payment via check over-the-phone (for which there was a fee) or via credit card (for which there was a fee). When I asked why they hadnt just charged the products to the credit card on which Id charged the trial fee, she said that that card number had come back as terminated. Aha! I had upgraded my card in July and changed card numbers in the process. If they'd charged it in September, I would have disputed it then.
So I knew what to do. If you pay by check or debit card, you have no recourse, but you can dispute a credit card charge. So I got escalated to her supervisor and gave him my new credit card number AFTER I got his name and direct phone number/extension. I told him what I was going to do and why. Im sure that his bonus is unrelated to recovered payments that are later disputed and lost, so he was fine with that.in response to my questioning, he said that Sensa is Intelligent Beautys primary product, but Kronos is also on their website. I ended up charging the $98.50 for the trial products plus $9.00 for the collection fee, which would appear separately on my statement as RGS Collections.
I then Googled all parties. I couldnt find Kronos on IBs site, which pushes Sensa weight loss products prominently, but I did verify that RGS Collections is a legitimate collections agency. Too bad for RGS that their charge will also be disputed as poisoned fruit of a fraudulent tree. I called my credit cards customer service, who told me that as soon as I see the transaction on my online statement, I can call and dispute it. You can bet I will!
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