Reporter Pays Double MSRP For G1 Phone, Uses Flashmob To Get Revenge
A Time Out New York reporter paid nearly double MSRP for a new G1 phone she bought off Times Square from Cellular Stop. After she realized she'd been had (internet access and texting were sold to her as "add-ons"), she went back to the store asking for an explanation. Instead, she says, six clerks began circling her and her friends, screaming and cursing and threatening to "break" their "fucking faces." Her friend was tossed against a wall and another clerk tried to smash her camera.
She then tried six different ways of solving the problem, from filing complaints with various bodies to trying to track down the elusive store owner to including having 25 TONY staffers come into the store and screw with the staff to calling the T-mobile media relations line and getting an investigation launched. None of them worked. T-mobile did end up "terminating its relationship with the store," the reporter still never was able to return the device and get a refund.
That's a lot of work with little to show for it. Try this order of events instead:
1) Pay for item with credit card
2) Realize you way overpaid
3) Ask to return item for refund
4) Get cursed and thrown out of the store
5) Call credit card company and do a chargeback
6) Get money back
7) Watch Scrubs
This is a test using rich text formatting and html links. It's the generic "company" ad that should appear on all posts with the Company category if they don't have an ad attached to a specific company.
Post a comment
Comments:
@Incognito: Although it's great she's a reporter, she can write nasty stories about them. Arg, why did I chose engineering... Oh yeah, that's right, I have the grammar of a ten year old.
I used to work in advertising in NYC. A lot those cell phone stores are crooks. They advertise great prices on phones that they don't have, they lose/forget your rebates.
I'm glad these jerks are getting in trouble with a carrier at least.
Police don't work? If they threatened her and threw her against a wall?
@Incognito: 10-year old? Well then you are perfect for USA Today! Isn't it written for a third-grade reading level?
huge fail on this reporter's part. documenting such fail should be a massive embarrassment, but clearly isn't.
When they did the revenge it sounded like they stole 7 MP4 Players, I think that is what "racking up" means. Thats nice...
A Time Out reporter should know better than shopping at Times Square. That said, when I backpacked thru Europe I used many different types of travel guides and Time Out was the worst. Their guides were next to useless.
@TheSpatulaOfLove: I have yet to find Goofus and Gallant on their website, where are they hiding it?
So the reporter did "her homework" yet still was ripped-off? As a "member of the press" she contacted other media people who couldn't do anything. The she attempted to flash-mob the joint with co-workers and managed to do nothing more than perhaps steal some stuff?
Sorry, but it appears this "member of the press" is screaming "I can do gonzo journalism too."
It read more like someone trying to abuse what little powers they had and failed miserably at it...
The first home theater system I bought from these guys was from some brand called "Fujigawa." They swore it had "Sony guts" in it.
I knew I was being had when they tried to sell me a phone that had supposedly had a one-button free HBO feature.
If anyone sees Yossi in that store, spit in his face for me. ;)
one of us, pretending to speak little English, asked to buy an iPhone. Taken into a back area of the store, he was told it'd be $600, plus an extra $100 to unlock it ("so it will work in your country"), and an extra $50 for "Internet, YouTube, the works." Total cost: $750, or $450 more than the manufacturer's suggested retail price. Our man presented a Visa gift card. When it was denied, the clerk refused to return it until "you bring your passport and come back."
These Cellular Shop people should be in jail.
Nothing about these guys is honest.
There is NOTHING that prevents a retailer from charging whatever the market will bear on items like a G1 phone. The MSRP stands for Manufacturers SUGGESTED Retail Price. A manufacturer can not force a dealer to charge anything . McDonald's owner operators do not have to charge $1 for the dollar meal (in NYC they do not). She paid what she thought the phone was worth, and then had buyers remorse.That is on her, not the retailer.
first of all, I wouldn't buy a cell phone off or anything from any of those shops down Broadway or thereabouts on Times Square. They are so sleezy with their bright lights, swarmy sales people, etc. Geez, go on ninth or on Park Ave, at least it's away from sleeze. Or, er, um, maybe not.....I do know of a good dry cleaner by Grand Central though...
@johnnya2:
You are 100% correct. Then she tried to get out of her buyers remorse by abusing her so-called media job. Even then she failed at doing so.
@johnnya2: I disagree slightly. When a salesperson tells you that you need to spend additional money for them to activate the internet and "youtube" on your phone, they are being completely dishonest.
@johnnya2:
Agreed. I don't see how buying something and later figuring out you paid way too much is grounds for a chargeback. I certainly hope Visa/Amex refuses to process one. The stuff about being threatened in the store is another matter though, but one to be handled by the legal system. She overpaid for a phone, too bad, That's what happens when you don't do proper research before buying something. Demanding a refund outside their return policy unreasonable. Doing a chargeback is even more unreasonable.
If she could get 25 people to go there, why couldn't she get them to dress in suits, pretending to be FBI (but never say it), and scare the hell out of em that way?
@Pylon83: Did you even read the article?
the clerks sold me features the phone already comes with (Internet access, texting capabilities, a protective case, etc.)
Selling the phone for more money is one thing.
Selling features that the phone comes with and charging for them is another entirely.
I would concede your point if they sold her a G1 outright for $400. But no, they lied to her, making her believe she was paying extra to have these features.
I wonder why she would even attempt buying a cell phone from those stores. No TMO corp store in NYC?
Just because the store is in Times Square doesn't mean it's reliable and won't rip you off. Doing research online and in real life is the best way to find a deal.
Brilliant move. Everyone gets scammed sooner or later, and it must feel great to screw them back.
@dohtem: Usually this will happen in the grey market with cameras. The difference here is that it will initially be CHEAPER before the things that came with the camera are sold back to you and you're required to be upsold into lens packages.
Why is it every complaint I see about electronics-retail-related scams that isn't some Nigerian or Nigerian-like scammer is some shop in New York or New Jersey?
Christ, you'd think they'd have run out of suckers by now.
I lub me sum scrubs.
I'm not blaming her, but I can't figure out why anyone other than a tourist (especially a TONY reporter) even considers shopping at one of these sketchy Times Square-Broadway places for electronics, let alone phones (with all the corp stores on every corner). Or, just shop for a good price online as had been suggested already.
I have some Italian friends that have told me if I ever have any problems in NYC to just let them know. This would probably count.
There's always some dope that will buy something expensive from one of the shifty retailing shitholes of NYC.
@GuinevereRucker: I'm not arguing with that. You'd just think that everyone in the region would know about these sorts of scumbags by now, and that maybe word would have gotten around to tourists.
I'm amazed that they are able to find enough fools to stay in this business, and EXCLUSIVELY this business.
It isn't like Nigerian scammers where they have really low overhead. An electronics shop, even some fly-by-night bunch of scumbags, has some overhead.
The bigger news article should be about why she was so clueless in the first place about what she wanted to buy. Then the bully crap.
@Incognito: As an engineer you can do far more evil things to them than writing stories. Most of them are basically illegal though.
What specialty?
So, looks like the only reason she got any resolution to this problem (Verizon launching an investigation) was because she was a reporter who could call Verizons media relations line. Us common folk will have to deal with the CSRs who can't do anything about it.
As someone who has worked in the financial services industry for 11 years and has spent much of that time working with chargebacks, I have to call BS on the chargeback suggestion. No financial institution can process a chargeback because you think you paid too much. Unless they just credit your account as a courtesy, but I can almost guarantee would NOT happen in this case. It usually only happens in cases of true fraud (lost stolen cards, etc.), which this is most certainly NOT.
Well, at least she got to get her complaint out in public in a big way!
@johnnya2: Did you read the article? The author conceded that selling the phone at an outrageous price was nothing illegal or even worth arguing about. But she was also fraudulently sold made-up features that were already included with the device, she was promised a phony rebate, a defective battery, and the clerks even refused to give an itemized receipt.
@wtrwlkr: Umm really? Where did you pick up the Verizon mention? Was it all the T-Mobile references or perhaps the fact that G1 is exclusive to T-Mobile? Oh, I bet it was the prominent T-Mobile Authorized Dealer sign in the photo. A "reporter" (I do work for a newspaper, so I have a faint idea) who would buy something like this without having a clue and then whining about it on her publication is no better than a commenter can't read.
To ANYONE visiting NYC for the first time.
Every 5th Avenue electronics store is a ripoff. They are an embarrassment and a disgrace to every legitimate retailer in the world.
As a former Manhattanite, I am ashamed that these establishments are allowed to exist, but I suppose the russian mob has to launder their money and stolen goods somewhere.
Why is it when a "reporter" gets scammmed the merchants is lower than dirt.
Ooops, forgot, the merchant is lower than dirt.
So WTF was the reporter even buying something from the dirtbag? Gee whiz, doesn't the University that trained this reported install a bit of brains along with the liberal education?
My Gawd, I hate people. Can't she sue them for threatening her with physical violence?
It can't be said enough how important it is to purchase with a credit card, it makes no sense not to.