Ordered laptop 5/2/04, received it 5/7/04, returned it 5/19/04 with required return ID from Shop At Home (SAH), received at Ohio facility 6/2/04. I called to see if it had been creditied to my account and was told it would take two weeks.
Thereafter I noticed checks began to bounce in my account. My mortgage check from July and August bounced 4 times. I got my statement the beginning of August and found SAH had been taking payments out in June, July & August but had not refunded my original 5/2/04 payment or stopped withdrawls.
I called them again and was told I now had to supply them with the correct return infomation even though I told them it had been received. They would not follow up. I called several times asking for management but was sent 'round and 'round from one phone rep to another. No one would listen to me or make a decision to get my money back.
The middle of August I received a notice from my lender that my home was being foreclosed on. I frantically called SAH and argued with people to find a manager to no avail. I told them over and over my home was going into foreclosure because they SAH withdrawls had made the overdraft fees and returned check fees deminish my funds by several thousands. Then we had the 2004 hurricanes begin to hit one after another knocking out power and phones for days.
I finally found information online about SAH parent company Scripps and called the office of Kenneth Lowe, the CEO. His secretary sent me back to SAH to Tom Merrihew, Pres. And I was told he would walk the information over to the correct department and to let him know if there was even a hint that Ii would not get my money back. Well... Four days after the hurricane I got the principal of the purchase back in my account. They refused to refund all fees they had cost me bouncing my checks refunding only $552 which I told them did not begin to cover the expenses. I told him my home was in foreclosure since they had caused my check to bounce 4 times from July to the middle of September.
Even after I had called them repeatedly in August they took another payment out of my account in September! Now I was frantic. They had stripped my bank account of hundreds of dollars and were requiring me to continue to send faxes to prove what my bank statements showed them. It cost me $99 in bank overdrafts and another $30 to the post office for a $14.13 check I wrote to send back the laptop. They only want to pay me $33. Some checks were NSF 2 & 3 times, my mortgage 4! The mortgage now included foreclosure and attorney fees. SAH refused to pay the fees they had caused telling me I was asking for principal. They cost me over $7K being taken out of my account and only returned $1876 and $552.
I went back to the CEO of Scripps and his secretary again tried to reroute me to the SAH staff. I gave the SAH attorney George Phillips secretary a piece of my mind and hung up. My home was being foreclosed and this big company full of people on salaries sitting behind desks did not and do not care that I might loose my home! I live on commissions and the money becomes sparse between closings. I can not afford to have overdraft fees and NSF check fees to vendors. I live and work in a very small community. My name is out in the public and everyone talks about everyone else. To have checks bouncing at the bank and local vendors makes great gossip and damages my reputation through no fault of my own. I need every cent I have to pay bills and do my necessary advertising of property for my business. SAH has caused me to be short of funds because I pulled all I had out to get my mortgage reinstated.
SAH has damaged my reputation, my relationship with my lender and now I can not refinance next year to a lower rate because the property was in foreclosure. I also now have that on my credit. Yet SAH will not take responsibility other than saying they made an honest mistake. I do not think so! They were told over and over to stop taking out payments but kept on. They were told over and over my home was in danger and I had to prepare for hurricanes but they did nothing.
Now the VP of Scrips Mr. AB Cruz has condescendingly told me he will look at my situation and if he thinks it warrents further attention he will call the lenders attorneys and see if they really did charge me foreclosure fees. He sent it back to SAH to the attorney. I got a FedEx from the Attorney George Phillips saying they'll give me another $586 plus sign a release for them so I can't go after the rest of my money or damages. NOT!
I got a second FedEx after I spoke with AB CRuz saying I had called Scripps corporation "complaining" as if I have no right to do so. The "customer service" is non existant. If I was a man or a minority they would not have dared to try this stuff on me. They underestimate me and my background. I am now down to almost no money and I have bills to pay and a mortgage for next month. I had plenty of money in my account to pay what checks I actually wrote if SAH had not continued to illegallly remove funds from my account for months, compounding the costs.
What do they expect me to do? Tuck my tail and go silently off? I don't think so!!! SAH has wasted many days of my valuable income producing time, put undue stress on me time after time, jeopardised my home through foreclosure and hurricane damege and they don't even want to settle with me for hard costs. So be it. I will now go for damages too.
I believe there are many people this has hsppened to who either did not catch the error or who did not have the compounded effect because they had more money in their account at the time. I was between closings and then got hit with the hurricane, a tree through my roof which I have to pay for now. I told SAH I had to have my money the week before the hurricanes begn that I had toget my property secured and I needed the money back. Even if they had moved in early August to return my money I the house would not have been in foreclosure and I would not have had all that extra money to pay. Then even though the checks had been bouncing what they want to pay me would have covered it. Not after the foreclosure.
Aleta
Live Oak, Florida
U.S.A.
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