GREENSBORO, N.C. — 'Tis the season to look online and find outdoor decor. When one of my WFMY News 2 co-workers found these ads on Facebook, she hit the buy button. It wasn’t that the product wasn’t delivered, the issue was that it was….miniature.
For $40, she thought she was getting an outdoor nativity set that was shown in the pictures as being about waist-high on an adult. As it turns out, it was about knee-high.
The issue of big holiday decorations being ordered but then being delivered in miniature size started becoming an issue around Halloween and the Better Business Bureau issued a scam alert.
“You find the perfect holiday decoration through a social media ad or the internet and the pictures look great the website looks legitimate and it's the dimensions you're looking for, but when the package actually arrives it looks nothing like what you ordered. It's usually a cheap miniature version of the item that you ordered,” said Lechelle Yates of the Better Business Bureau.
The first step of course is to go to the company, but Yates says most of the consumers who have made complaints to the BBB received no response from the company. Others got responses that reverse shipping would be double the cost of the item or that the refund would only be 1/10 of the price. So, what do you do?
“Hopefully, you used your credit card,” said Yates.
Disputing the purchase with the method of payment used is the next step. Credit card companies typically offer purchase protection and disputing for 60 days after purchase.
To prove your claim, anytime you buy something online, take a screenshot of the ad with the promised dimensions and
also have picture proof of what was delivered.
Unfortunately, banks and payment apps don't work the same as credit cards. Yates says you shouldn’t be surprised if they don’t help get a refund of your money. She says your best bet is to always shop online with a credit card.
This story is a reminder for all of us, to research the site before we buy. Look it up on the BBB website.
“You can go to Google and in the search bar type in the website name and the word scam and see what info comes back,” said Yates.