The other day I was on Twitter when I saw I got a new follower. When I went to check out who it was, their username was CelluliteSolution or something (I don't really remember). I assumed it was a company/person that was all about cellulite remedies. They had different tweets ranging from links to the new hottest cellulite cream on the market to exercises that bust cellulite. The most recent tweet was the one about the newest cellulite cream that everyone is raving about. I'm instantly excited. I clicked on the link and it took me to the Cellulean homepage. The page is filled with all sorts of talk about mentions in the press. I noticed you can try it for free and pay only for shipping ($4.95). I did a quick google search on the brand to see if it was a scam or anything, looked at a couple of pages in the search results and then felt it was safe to proceed. I wanted to believe I had struck gold. Well, after putting in my order, I had time to continue researching the product calmly. I clicked on the links in their tweets and each one - "10 ways to bust cellulite with exercise" or even "Take the Nivea Goodbye Cellulite Challenge" were all links to the same Cellulean website. Uh-oh. I clicked on the tab to learn about its mentions in the media...they all seemed to boil down to one video of some news anchors that may or may not be real.
I did a couple more searches on google and saw a couple of sites reviewing the product and saying it was really no better than most cellulite creams. Well, I thought, thats not so bad. I'm only paying $4.95. In any case, I decided to write to their customer service email asking them to cancel the order I had just placed. I didn't get a return email. The next day, on my lunch break, I decided to call to cancel. The girl who answered the phone said they had already sent out my package but that she can just cancel me out in the system and I can return the package to them when I receive it and they would only charge me $4.95. Ummm...thats all I paid... $4.95. "Yeah," she said. "We already sent out the package so we have to charge you the $4.95. But I already canceled you out of the system so you can just send it back when you get it. Just reject the package." "Ok, so how does that make sense? If you're going to charge me the $4.95 for shipping anyway, why would I send it back to you? I might as well keep it, for that."
"Well, because if you don't send it back and cancel within 12 days, we automatically charge you the remaining balance of $16.(something)."
"Oh!" I said. "Where does it say that keeping it for more than 12 days will result in a secondary charge?"
"Its there in our terms and conditions" she answered.
What a sweet little trick they have in the super small print. I got the package. I rejected it. But I am so annoyed that I was sucked into this shit. If possible, I hope I can prevent anyone else from making the same mistake. I basically just paid $4.95 for air. Awesome.
