So, I was going to buy a cell phone from wirefly.com. I was trying to be cautious, but the company seemed legit, so I submitted my shipping and billing info ONLY because they said it was for their records and I would not be billed right away. I would be subject to a credit check first, and then they would email me. If I was approved, I would have the choice of going ahead with the order or cancelling. Any decent company I've ordered from online does not bill you until the order has been at least authorized, and usually not until it's been shipped.
I discovered, before any email came to me, that they'd debited $100 from my account for the phone. When I got the confirmation email, I saw that they also wanted to charge me a $300 activation fee. Heck, no. There were two options: ship it now, or cancel. I clicked cancel.
I had a sneaking suspicion (brought on primarily by the fact that there was no invoice for any of this activity) that I wasn't going to get my money back without some effort. I searched and searched for a customer service number, with no luck. I did however discover that they wouldn't cancel any order unless I called. Awesome!
I managed to dig up a phone number for "phone orders, " since this money is great at taking money. After a long recorded message from someone with a Texas accent, I was transferred to... india! She was perfectly nice though, and her supervisor told me the order was cancelled, I'd receive an email about it, and "the funds would be released immediately" (when I asked about the cash.)
Well, they weren't, and the next day the bank told me they hadn't released anything. I called Wirefly and they said it would take 5-7 days. When I pointed out a part of their webpage where they said the funds are released immediately and it is the bank that takes up to a week to reassign funds, they said sorry for the inconvenience. An inconvenience is when your Fedex delivery is delayed. A precalculated deception is not an inconvenience. But whatever. I doubt I'll ever get my money back.
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