Re: ripped off
It seemed like a good deal. Not too good to be true[*], but for $15 I'd get a cheapo camera, a $10 grinder, some coffee, and they'd get me to try their product. I'd heard about the coffee before and was curious. I went to GrinderCam.asp and hit all the "Click here" links and authorized the $9.95 charge. The confirmation didn't mention the camera, so I wrote back. (Also thanked the party who referred me, grumbled about the back-end fee but said "If this package were $14.90 up front I'd still take it", asked about a particular coffee I like.) Went in circles for a while ("We can't find your subscription" "You found it fast enough when you charged my account!") eventually they say "The promotion you want costs $19.95, send us $10 more." (To be fair if instead of clicking where they say to click you read the bottom of the page, they've hidden that there; GrinderCam funnels to the same order-entry page as the regular Grinder promotion.)
*About 3 years ago I got a cheapo digital camera from EarthLink, in return for trying out their service at $19.95 per month for 3 months. The same camera was selling for about $85 then.
I said "Forget it -- I was in for $15 but not for $25". Box has arrived while they were messing around. They write "Cancellations can only be done by phone, not email." I'm getting ticked, but what the heck, cell phone calls are free, so I call them. They go around in circles some more ("We can't give you a refund." "Why not?" "Because it's policy." "Who made the policy?" "We can't give you a refund." "Sure you can, you are merely choosing not to.")
I contested the charge with my bank. They credited me the $9.95, but then allowed the charge for $4.95. I waited a few weeks for them to make a final judgement and have now asked for the $4.95 to be reversed. Bank so far has said "You authorized the $4.95; by the way please send us certification that you've mailed back the product." I've just told them "I authorized both the $9.95 and the $4.95 in expectation of getting something that they didn't send; I have the box ready for pickup, or they can send me a return shipping label, but since it costs them $9.95 to ship and handle it, and I don't have their economies of scale, it would cost me at least that much to mail it back. I'll be throwing it away in a month."