Hey Everyone,
As some of you may or may not be aware, we have had some issues refunding customers in the past 2-1/2 months and I would like to take this time to explain it to the totallyamaha members...
Some of you may or may have not noticed that our website has gone under some major cosmetic changes in the past 3 months but it has also undergone major administrative changes.
Back in August/Sept/Oct we had some customers who had purchased some gear from our website that was not in stock. I called these customers and notified them that either we did not have the item or their size or whatever the case was in stock. At that time, I gave them the option that we could either refund them or that I would give them the 09 gear at the same price for the inconvenience. The only catch was is that the 09 gear was not going to be in stock until end of October...These customers agreed that was ok as they would not be riding until well after that...Well end of October came and we did not receive every single item to complete these orders and we again gave them the option to wait or get a refund. Some elected to wait and long story short it got to be the middle of December and they decided it had been long enough and wanted a refund. I personally processed the refunds and thought everything was good to go. Less than a week later, on xmas eve as a matter of fact, I got a letter stating we had just received a $3000 chargeback from an order that was from October. Unfortunately it turned out to be an order that someone placed who had stolen someones credit card info and used it on our website. Since they had entered correct information into our website, the order did not give us any redflags at first. After we got this letter we have found out many things about internet fraud etc...
A few days after xmas, the people I had just refunded a week or so prior called me and informed me that they had not yet seen their credit and so I though maybe with xmas, it was taking a few days longer for them to see it...This time, I emailed most of these customers a confirmation showing when we refunded them, the amount of the refund and also the approval code...A week later, these customers started calling again say they had yet to see their refund. At this time we were into the first week of January and so I called our processor and they informed me that due to the large amount of the chargeback, our account was on hold and that by the end of the week, it should be resolved. At this point they told me that all of my money was on hold and that the refunds were not going to go through that I would have to mail checks. Unfortunately at that point I could not mail out more than a few as they had everything locked up. Well in the end, our account was on hold until first week of February and all of the money that was processed between mid december and beginning of february was on hold...Over $40k was on hold. At the end of January they finally took our account off of hold however they informed me that they would not be sending me my $40k + back until a period of 6 months had passed since the last transaction...In addition to this, I used every dime I had to ship out the orders that were coming in and even then, I could not afford to ship every single order so a few more chargebacks also came in. In the past month, I have been mailing out refunds to people as fast as I can but there still remains a handful of people who have not yet gotten a check.
I just felt that this needed to be addressed as some totallyamaha members have complained to admin and I can understand that. Unfortunately it has been a big mess but we now have more policies in place to prevent this from happening in the future but if you have any questions regarding this, please post it or send a pm and I will address it.
Thank you for your time.
As some of you may or may not be aware, we have had some issues refunding customers in the past 2-1/2 months and I would like to take this time to explain it to the totallyamaha members...
Some of you may or may have not noticed that our website has gone under some major cosmetic changes in the past 3 months but it has also undergone major administrative changes.
Back in August/Sept/Oct we had some customers who had purchased some gear from our website that was not in stock. I called these customers and notified them that either we did not have the item or their size or whatever the case was in stock. At that time, I gave them the option that we could either refund them or that I would give them the 09 gear at the same price for the inconvenience. The only catch was is that the 09 gear was not going to be in stock until end of October...These customers agreed that was ok as they would not be riding until well after that...Well end of October came and we did not receive every single item to complete these orders and we again gave them the option to wait or get a refund. Some elected to wait and long story short it got to be the middle of December and they decided it had been long enough and wanted a refund. I personally processed the refunds and thought everything was good to go. Less than a week later, on xmas eve as a matter of fact, I got a letter stating we had just received a $3000 chargeback from an order that was from October. Unfortunately it turned out to be an order that someone placed who had stolen someones credit card info and used it on our website. Since they had entered correct information into our website, the order did not give us any redflags at first. After we got this letter we have found out many things about internet fraud etc...
A few days after xmas, the people I had just refunded a week or so prior called me and informed me that they had not yet seen their credit and so I though maybe with xmas, it was taking a few days longer for them to see it...This time, I emailed most of these customers a confirmation showing when we refunded them, the amount of the refund and also the approval code...A week later, these customers started calling again say they had yet to see their refund. At this time we were into the first week of January and so I called our processor and they informed me that due to the large amount of the chargeback, our account was on hold and that by the end of the week, it should be resolved. At this point they told me that all of my money was on hold and that the refunds were not going to go through that I would have to mail checks. Unfortunately at that point I could not mail out more than a few as they had everything locked up. Well in the end, our account was on hold until first week of February and all of the money that was processed between mid december and beginning of february was on hold...Over $40k was on hold. At the end of January they finally took our account off of hold however they informed me that they would not be sending me my $40k + back until a period of 6 months had passed since the last transaction...In addition to this, I used every dime I had to ship out the orders that were coming in and even then, I could not afford to ship every single order so a few more chargebacks also came in. In the past month, I have been mailing out refunds to people as fast as I can but there still remains a handful of people who have not yet gotten a check.
I just felt that this needed to be addressed as some totallyamaha members have complained to admin and I can understand that. Unfortunately it has been a big mess but we now have more policies in place to prevent this from happening in the future but if you have any questions regarding this, please post it or send a pm and I will address it.
Thank you for your time.