Any lawyers on the list?

I'm not aware that any major retailers do this, although it happens at the flea market.

It doesn't seem quite rational, as if there were no overhead or barriers to handling cash.

The USPS?

Ok! Gotcha! :-)

Harold

Lets see now, they offered you a full refund (minus shipping) until you got pissy with the man's wife. Since shipping is paid to the Post Office, how exactly would they have been profiting?

Of course *now* that you've gotten into a pissing match with them, they want to make you pay for your insolence. But the initial offer of a full refund wouldn't have yielded any profit for them.

You'd have been out the shipping, same as you'd have been out gas expense if you'd driven to a physical store front to buy and return an item. Ever had anyone at a store front offer to pay for your gas and time? Neither have I. Why should you expect mail order to be any different?

Gary

Give it up, Gary, he spent the money on shipping based on their description, if it had been accurately described he wouldn't have spent the money!

Tom

They SAID they offered a full refund. You apparently believe them. We know better. We have all the records. The offer for any kind of refund, which was NOT a full refund, was on the table only long enough for me to ask about shipping. Moments later it was gone, as was any chance of a return as far as the Michael was concerned. Tell me this wasn't fraud, gary.

But a sure loss for us, yes? They not only expected us to pay the shipping to us, but back to them. Which one of us lied about the condition of the vase, gary? Which one of the parties did everything right, and which one violated their own published terms?

Damned right I have. I bought a router that a HD had banded closed. Got home and the wrench was missing. I got a $25 gift certificate from them because they'd screwed up. But then, they weren't trying to screw me by misrepresenting their wares, were they?

???? Makes no sense when I HAVE!

Why should you expect mail order to be any

Because they care about their customers and would treat them as they'd care to be treated. Don't know what kind of uncivilized society you live within, but mine is apparently different.

My God, gary, what the hell has happened to your sense of decency? Are you related to this crook? Maybe his buddy?

Oh, hell, Tom, it's OK. I'm sure gary's brain is just rusty. He was wrong about natural gas not being lighter than air some time ago, too.

I expect it to be different because they LIED about the piece. Tell me that if you went to a store of choice and bought a sealed package that was supposed to contain a specific item that you'd be happy to drive back, perhaps a couple hundred miles, and return the item with a smile, at your expense, when it was something unlike that which you had purchased, based on the description the store provided. Gary, you have your head straight up your ass. There's simply nothing less than that I can say.

How would they profit by shipping? How about the $10 more than it cost to ship, and, if you knew the whole story, they also wanted us to discount the amount they'd return by the settlement that came from eBay for their indiscretions. Yeah, gary, eBay paid under their fraud insurance. Even they think we were screwed. We also were to pay for the return of the vase, insured. They wanted us to take a loss of $200, and them end up with money and the vase? When they lied? Oh, yeah, that makes sense.

They cause us to travel extensively, paying for a report to substantiate that the item was, indeed, repaired, still insisting that they had no obligation to properly describe the piece, and you find fault with us? Thanks, gary. Maybe some day I might run across you in the desert with a broken down vehicle. I'll be the first to help, gary, I really will. ;-)

I made mention that there's a very kind hearted attorney on the list that just lurks, who contacted us on the side. He states clearly that we have cause of action based on fraud. Prevailing and collecting is another matter, of that there's no doubt, but the very idea that someone sells a misrepresented item, especially when they stand to profit unreasonably, like in this case, has committed a crime. I'm not nuts about criminals, gary, and I'd like to think that you'd pull your head out of your ass and quit supporting the position of those that commit crimes. How's that for insolence?

I think I'll go back to reading the mindless comments from Brain Damage. At least they're entertaining.

Harold

I might get out to Washington someday. A good friend in the service transferred up there last year and shipped out to Iraq shortly after. He made it home last week in good health and spirits.

Back when we were dating, my wife got scammed by a company on the east coast (we are in Omaha NE). She is very intelligent, and lest someone suggest she had it coming, she didn't. At the time I worked for a business information research company. I even tracked down his neighbors' phone numbers (business neighbors: he rented an office in a business plaza). Unfortunately there really wasn't much I could do, as he had done nothing documentably 'illegal'. So I can empathise with you, though it sounds like you have a much better case against your art dealer's fraudulent activities.

Best wishes,

StaticsJason

Have you asked? It has worked for me at, to name just a few places, Circuit City, Lowes, my local Ace Hardware store, even on ocasion at Sears. Often a manager has to be called over to get it approved, but many places will do it if you ask.

The credit card company skims 4% off the top. By accepting cash, which they have to do anyway (legal tender for all debts public or private), they save that 4% while their only extra cost is counting more cash at the end of the day when they empty the till.

Gary

Sez who? I'm a little guy and only pay 2.47 pct. Big guys must pay something like 1.xx. Not insignificant, but less than any other arbitrage fees (ever changed money in a foreign country?).

No, they don't.

Handling cash involves quite an overhead. Look at all those pneumatic tubes at Home Depot, and the armored counting room hidden in the back. Cash registers, cash drawers, cashiers counting, cashiers trading rolls of quarters, cash getting stolen (mostly by employees). It is easy to think that cash is cheap to handle, because businesses have to hide much of the handling of it..