On February 28 we signed a wedding contract/service agreement with Gary Fiorelli (Videographer) to video tape our wedding and on April 7 for a fee of $650.00 with $350.00 due now (2/28) made payable to Shirley A. Fiorelli and the balance of $300.00 due on April 7. This fee included titles and after-event editing. He said the video should be done approximately 10 weeks from wedding date, give or take a week. He also stated that he wanted to come to the rehearsal on April 5 to check out the chapel and reception area since he had never video taped a wedding there before. He did come to rehearsal and said everything looked great, never letting on that he knew then that he would not be able to get us our video. (Something he reveled to me at a much later date)
He was hired only for the 2nd location, but he did come to the lst location and shot video.
1st Photo location: 2:00P @ Holiday Inn / 7000 Beach Blvd./ Buena Park, CA
2nd Photo location: 5:00P @ The Garden Room / 12777 Knott Ave. / Garden Grove, CA 92841
During the reception my husband and his best man went around to make final payments to the DJ, Minister, two other photographers and Gary Fiorelli for the balance of $300.00. Before leaving at the end of the evening Gary Fiorelli approached my husband and my self saying that he was leaving, got some great shots and that we would hear from him in about 10 weeks.
I mad my first call to Gary Fiorelli on May 12 approximately 5 weeks after our wedding and he said it would be at least 10 weeks. Between the months of May and September I made numerous calls to Gary Fiorelli, leaving messages, which he never responded to, or hearing promises of getting my video soon.
On September 24 I filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau for non-delivery of our wedding video and still continued to make calls to Gary Fiorelli and still getting no response to my messages or promises that I would have it soon. On October 29 I was contacted by the Better Business Bureau stating that my complaint was closed, company did not respond to my complaint.
I then decided to go to his business address' that were listed on the Better Business Bureau's web-site and finding either he had move, he had never lived there, or the address did not exist or he was doing business under a different name. (Which I tried to report to the Better Business Bureau, and they responded with that case has been closed) Feeling very frustrated at this point I continues to call his number's until he answered on day and I let him know how I was feeling about him lying to us and giving us the run around and he told me to back off, that I wasn't the only one on his back and that there are other couples he has not been able to deliver wedding video's to, due to a problem with some equipment. I asked him if he knew this was going to happen when he shot my wedding and he said yes. I then asked for my money back and he said no.
I decided to get on the Internet and do a people search, business search, number search, anything that would help me find where this guy was staying. On July 11 I ended up finding the address and phone number to Shirley A. Fiorelli, who turned out to be his mother and I gave her a call. I explained to her what was going on and she said she had nothing to do with it, and I told her she did, since the check was made payable in her name, so she said she would call Gary and get back with me. She did call back that night and said that Gary lost the tape and is looking for it and will call me soon.
I did get a call from Gary Fiorelli later that night and he said I could come pickup the raw copy of my video now and that he would five me half $325.00 of my money back, but not until December 31. He told me to write something out and sign it agreeing to this or he would not let me have the raw copy. I asked him what exactly was a raw copy and he said that I could take it home and pop it in my VCR and watch it, it would just not be edited. Wanting to get my hands on it, I agreed and went to pickup the video and signed the paper he asked for, but when I got the video home and put it into my VCR like he said I could and there was nothing but a blue screen. I tried to call; him but of course there was no answer.
Due to medical reasons I was not able to pursue this too much more after that, but still feel that he owes us money for not fulfilling the service agreement.
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