I wanted to share my experience with a company called Big Resources, Inc. I feel I am doing a service to the community by advising of the horrendous customer service I have received.
Let me give you a little background so you will understand what happened here. I regret having to out a company, especially in these hard economic times, but when you get bad customer service, and I mean REALLY bad customer service, I think it is my duty to share it with others so they can use this information to make an informed decision about choosing a company to purchase website templates from.
On July 29, 2007, I purchased a year membership to BoxedArt.com which is owned by Big Resources, Inc. I paid $99.99 for the service which is the ability to download website templates and related items.
On July 29, 2008, the subscription was renewed, but I never noticed it.
On July 29, 2009, the subscription was renewed again, but this time I did see it. I immediately contacted support@boxedart.com and put in a support ticket. I was advised that I would not receive a refund as it was my problem and my fault for not cancelling the subscription. Well, I did not even realize that it was a subscription, as I stated I never even noticed the charge made to me in 2008.
Anyway, they would not refund me, so I disputed the last transaction dated July 29, 2009 on July 30, 2009 with PayPal. They sided with BoxedArt.com and therefore I did not receive a refund. So, I figured I would go ahead and use the service that I paid for, so I logged in and was greeted with a message that my subscription was NOT ACTIVE. So, now not only am I out $99.99 but I cannot even use the service.
On October 1, 2009, I put in a support ticket, to ask why my account is inactive when I have paid for this service for one full year, meaning it would not expire until July 29, 2010. Here is the reply I received (in bold):
Hello David,
Thank you for contacting us. To respond to your email, your account was not activated because of the dispute that you initiated. As such, additional time cannot be provided on the account, because we do not provide extended access for attempting to dispute an authorized transaction and making false statements about the nature of the subscription and the renewal payment processed by PayPal for our company. That being said, you may easily renew your account to access our new enhanced and expanded collection via the link below:
https://www.boxedart.com/phpshop/renewal.php
Michael
BoxedArt Support Team
************************************************
Now, as you can see from the email above, they deactivated my account because I had the audacity to dispute their payment with PayPal. My goodness, PayPal sided with them and they have MY money!
When I emailed them back that I want the service I paid for OR a refund, I received the following email (in bold):
Hello,
To respond to your email, if you review your EULA, you will note that any dispute initiated against our company or in relation to your account will result in the suspension of your membership accordingly. As such, this is precisely what occurred in your case and you only contacted us 15 months after you first initiated the dispute and 3 months after that renewal expired and we had provided enhanced and expanded materials to our collection. This does not entitle you to the reactivation of your account and the action taken on your account is in precise accordance with your service agreement.
The above being said, at this point, our licensing department and legal departments have been informed that you have made threats concerning this authorized renewal and have verbalized intentions to make false statements about the unauthorized nature of this subscription and they therefore must handle this matter directly from this point forward, as any attempted dispute would be considered fraud and fall within the purview of a perjured statement by you to PayPal and your credit card company accordingly. This is because you made an explicit agreement authorizing this transaction, which our licensing department is required to submit to PayPal and your credit card company, which details your personal authorization for, and acceptance of, this subscription and service agreement. All of this documentation, including your digital signature affirming the same, and all details outlined that you agreed to and were explicitly provided to you would be required to be submitted to negate any attempted dispute and demonstrate your false statements asserting anything to the contrary.
Thus, this matter is now closed by our support department and all further communication will need to take place via our licensing and legal departments accordingly.
Sage
BoxedArt Support Team
***********************************************************
Now, as I am sure that most people do NOT read these mile long legal things when you sign up for something online. Plus what kind of a company refuses you service that you have PAID for just because you disputed them? I could understand it if I was given a refund, but for them to refuse me the service I have paid for just because I disputed them, is ridiculous.
The company information is as follows:
Big Resources, Inc.
Their sites are BoxedArt.com | BigResources.com | ThemeStock.com | StockedPhotos.com
Their contact information is:
Resources, Big and support@boxedart.com
Big Resources, Inc.
PO Box 140813
Gainesville, Pennsylvania 32608
United States
775-490-8702
Your mileage may vary, however, if they did this to me and they have also done this to others, then trust me, they will do it to you. They childishly seek revenge on someone by refusing the service you have paid for.
Katherine said,
October 4, 2009 at 1:46 pm
Wow, I could have written this very same thing myself. I had the same experience. They never sent me an email reminder about renewing me automatically and took out money I really could not afford. I also did a dispute over at Paypal and they deactivated my service too. These people are up to no good.
boxedartsucks said,
October 4, 2009 at 1:52 pm
Hi Katherine. Sorry to hear that you’ve had the same experience, as I checked the internet, there have been many others making the same complaint. It’s really too bad that a company can rip people off like this. A real shame.
Boxed Up Fraud said,
October 15, 2009 at 3:49 am
So how did the dispute go? Did paypal refund you? They surely should have. Boxedart.com renewed me as well. I really didn’t want it, but accepted it. I went over to sign in and nothing. I contacted them and nothing. Looks like boxedart.com stole my money I guess. I’m going to do a dispute if they don’t let me sign in, and I’m wondering how that went for you guys.
Also, when you canceled your subscription at paypal, di that work? I mean, did they still try and take more money. I wouldn’t think you could after you cancel like that.
Barb said,
November 19, 2009 at 9:03 am
Sorry you had such a rotten time with Boxed Art. They do have a legal argument, however they are totally lacking in customer service. We do thousands of transactions a week (using Paypal) and if a customer wants a refund we just give it to them. It is not worth it to our company to have blogs and people all over the internet unhappy with our service. Some companies just don’t know the importance of good customer service!
Greg said,
November 19, 2009 at 10:16 am
As you can tell by their fine print, policies, and e-mails, they seem to be very familiar with these complaints and have very aggressive responses to them. And as you seem to have found my blog post about my dealings with them, you can tell they’ve been screwing people for a while.
It’s too bad that they feel it’s better to screw people over in this way, deny service, and generate such negative word-of-mouth rather than provide a quality product and good customer service.
By the way, PayPal ALWAYS sides with the merchant. There was another site that was selling copyrighted material they had no right to sell and promising that it came with full redistribution and resale rights. Basically it was an outright scam.
I complained to PayPal. They contacted the merchant who responded that they delivered the product. That was it. PayPal sided with them. PayPal refused to look at the evidence that they were selling content they had no legal right to and refused to investigate the claims that they did not deliver what they promised. As long as they claimed they delivered something, PayPal ruled in their favor and let them keep my money.
PayPal is NOT on the consumer’s side at *all*.
Greg said,
November 19, 2009 at 10:55 am
BTW, I just cancelled an auto-renewed subscription with Skype (for their service to dial out to non-Skype phone numbers). When PayPal notified them of the cancellation, they sent me an e-mail **VOLUNTEERING** to refund the unused portion of my subscription if I wanted to cancel immediately instead of waiting until the latest renewal ran out.