Just recently I ordered a dress. Actually two dresses, but it was the same one just in different colors. You might wonder why? So, my sister is going to get married in August and I just fell in love with this dress at first sight.
It all started with a simple Instagram add and well, I just thought that nothing like this would ever happen to me, because I am way too smart and well educated for stuff like this (haha got a good reality check there). To be honest I was a little bit naive for believing that Instagram would do background checks on adds. Guess, what that is no happening! So, after clicking on the add I got forwarded to another page which seemed nice at the first sight.
I didn’t really read anything i just picked out the green and the blue variant of the dress and was super happy about the price, which should have been a broad hint, but well whatever. The next hint should have been that my credit card was declined three times, but hell I really wanted this dress. So, long story short, I asked my dad about his credit card and et voilà it worked.
Throughout all this time I did not even realize that something might be off about this page. I just was just wearing the so-called rose-colored glasses. The first time I got a bad feeling was when I did not receive an order confirmation, but still I really really wanted this dress so I just ignored it. Also, I told myself that this might be my own fault because I was deleting millions of e-mails like a crazy person this week and so maybe I just deleted it by accident.
However, after seemingly never ending three to four weeks of waiting for my holy grail I started suspecting something. Also did my father, who guess what, was not really happy about all of this. So, I decided to contact the customer support. Still hoping that there has just been some kind of mistake, but after receiving the first answer I kind of knew that something was just not the way it should be:
Dear customer,
Thanks for your support and concern on our store.
Sorry for the inconvenience caused. The items are out of stock before, we have gathered some back and they arrived our warehouse today , we have wrapped it and will send it out within 3-5 days. The tracking number and tracking link would be emailed after shipment. Thank you for your patience.
Do., 22. Apr., 04:11
A week or so later, still no tracking number, no order number, no nothing. I wrote them again. This time I told them I would cancel the order and the payment and surprise surprise I got another answer from them including a tracking number and a site where I could track my package.
Once the order was shipped out, the tracking status will take a few days to be updated online by the shipper.
Therefore, please hold on for 3-5 business days and try again later.Tracking number is UF850430075YP, this is tracking site: https://www.17track.net/en , you can follow it easily.
Very sorry for the inconvenience caused to you.
05.05.2021, 04:33
If you click on this link you will get redirected to another page and if you then try to search for the tracking number, guess what, it will not be found. This was the point where my father and I actually tried to cancel the payment via the credit card institute just to find out that because of entering his 3D secure code the company can not do anything at all. As we learned, as soon as you enter you 3D secure code somewhere, you release the payment and there is no turning back.
Despite all of the previously mentioned stuff, I got another e-mail today with another tracking number etc.
As you probably already thought, there is still no validation.
Long story short, I got scammed and now I have to find another dress for the wedding. Shit happens…
Correction: The dresses arrived, but guess that’s what feeling scammed feels like.
