1WayPhoto.com Fraudulent product claims, inflated prices, unauthorized credit charges etc Brooklyn New York

What can I say? My experience has been HORRENDOUS with this company. This has easily been the WORST online sales experience of my life.

I originally contacted them to purchase a Canon 40D SLR camera and a Canon 24-70mm 2.8 L lens. The salesman told me that the Canon 24-70mm L lens came in two models - a cheaper one with a plastic mount (which was a lie - I later contacted Canon and they confirmed that there is only one Canon 24-70mm 2.8 L and it does not have a plastic mount) and one which has a steel mount which was hundreds of dollars more expensive. He went on to say that the lens with the steel mount is overpriced and that Sigma has a new lens that has yet to be widely released to the American public - an upgrade of their older 24-70mm Macro EX lens and retails for $1499 (another lie - there is no such 'new' or 'unreleased' lens - the ONLY Sigma 24-70mm Macro lens has an MSRP of $600 and usually sells for about $400!).

He went on to offer me a package deal on a Canon 40D, the sigma lens, 5 year warranty on both lens and camera, 5 hour battery, rapid charger and a filter kit for $2199 + shipping and cited that the "new and unreleased" Sigma lens alone was worth $1499 and that I was getting over $3000 worth of merchandise for a great deal.

Based on the information he gave me, I agreed.

I gave him my billing info and the guy charged my card. That was the end of the day on Sunday. After getting off the phone, I went on line and quickly realized something wasn't right.

When I called back the next day to cancel the order, the sales rep was rude and immediately got off the phone by connecting me with "customer service". That couldn't me more ironic. The "customer service" rep tried to talk me into putting the order on "hold" until I decided what else I wanted. I told him I simply wanted the order cancelled because I didn't feel that they were being honest with me. At that point he became insulting and rude and told me that he was going to charge me almost $400 just to cancel the order (a 15% cancellation fee). I began to explain that I only authorized the order based on information that representatives from both Sigma and Canon have confirmed is fraudulent. He then literally asked me "Why are you talking out of your a*s? Huh?" At that point, I realized it was going nowhere fast so I terminated the call contacted my credit card company to proceed with a fraud/dispute claim.

Of course, Visa will not prevent the pending transaction from going through. They need to wait for the charge to post to my account at which point the dispute will commence. Realizing that this could go on for a month or longer, I decided to call back 1wayphoto.com to let them know what was happening and that Sigma already offered to put in writing they were making fraudulent claims about the product they were attempting to sell me. I told them that I was also aware of a lawsuit that is pending in the state of New Jersey based on their fraudulent business practices and they will in no way benefit from continuing to try and scam me. I told him to just "drop it and cancel the charges". So after about 5 minutes of going back and forth the guy tells me.. "Ok, I just credited your account without the charge. It's not worth it to deal with you. I sent you a confirmation email."

Well, guess what? No email. I called back AGAIN and someone else told me that it would take a day to process the credit. But after reading the feedback on this site, I'm sure that they are simply sending the gear to me anyway in hopes that I will accept the package. Obviously I will not accept the package if it arrives and will continue with my fraud claim which I am sure will be successful.

I am also filing a complaint with the Attorney General and Better Business Bureau.

STAY AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY. It's not just bad customer service. It's LITERALLY a SCAM OPERATION.

You've been warned.

Bill
Ukiah, California
U.S.A.