One should be cautious of the shady practices of The Book Grove. The Book Grove is an online Amazon book seller that purposefully sends out the wrong books and posts fraudulent products. That is, they lie about the product.
Further, they have a complicated and time consuming return policy, which makes it difficult to exchange for the right product. There have been reports (simply read the negative feedback on their amazon seller account: http://www.amazon.com/shops/thebookgrove) of total theft, where the seller has refused to return the customers money.
Even more, The Book Grove charges a 20% fee as well as a 2.00 dollar re-stocking fee for returns. This means, if a customer needs to return an item, she will lose money in the process. Something else which is also quite disturbing, if The Book Grove makes a mistake they penalize the customer for their mistake. That is, they treat the order as if the customer simply wanted a regular return. This means that the customer only has 7 days from the time of the dispute to collect his or her money. Might seem like allot, but its not. The Book Grove does this on purpose because they know that customers will not be able to return the books on time, thereby forfeiting their money. So, even if the customers reason for returning a book was that The Book Grove made a mistake and sent the wrong book, The Book Grove will still hold the customer accountable to their 7 day policy. This is deceptive and they will plead that they are doing nothing wrong, but by maintaining such a strict policy, they are able to avoid the majority of returns. And this is conscious effort on their part. Its kinda like breaking the rules by using the rules.
Finally, they tell customers to return the items first class, and to pay out of their own pockets for the shipping, they then tell the buyer to email the total cost and they will send a check. But there is no process of verification, no higher accountability. Thus, if The Book Grove decides to dispute the total cost of shipping the customer is left holding the bill, with no help from Amazon, The Book Grove simply gets away with it.
Also of notable relevance, they ship products without invoices because it makes it harder to return the products. [This has at least been the present reviewers experience, I am sure there are cases where they send out invoices.]
Conclusion: They have poor customer service, very poor, and shoddy business practices. They lie about their products and make returns so difficult that most people don't even bother. They are sly crooks and buyers cautioned to beware. If possible, purchase your book from another seller, after wall, why take the chance? Dealing with The Book Grove can be a very stressful experience.
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