The Great Hardware Store ,Dean Vander Woude ,Grand Rental Station Credit Card Scammers Posing As An Internet Retail Store Chesterton Internet, Indiana

First off, I should have known not to buy from them. Their site looks very amateurish, hardly any of the items have any pictures, and the names of the items were strangely written. It looks VERY sketchy. However, they were the most legit looking place that carried the ant killer that I needed. Besides that, their "warehouse" is just a little over an hour away from me (not that it helped me on the cost of shipping, to the tune of $40 to ship 10 pounds), so I figured I'd give them a try.

BIG MISTAKE!!

My ant killer was supposed to ship within "1 to 2 business days", so I figured I'd have it in a week, tops. NOPE. Two weeks go buy, no ant killer. I sent an email asking for the status of my order. No response after two days, so I sent another, slightly angry email. NOTHING. Now I know I've been scammed. I call the number listed on the site (NOT an 800 number like a legitimate business would have), and no one answered. I was going to leave a long message asking where my stuff is and why haven't you answered my emails, but the voice mail was full and wouldn't take my message. I tried calling two or three times a day for the next several days. Finally I was able to leave a message after nearly a dozen calls. So I wait and I wait and I wait. NO RESPONSE!!!

Three weeks now, no ant killer. I was at the point that I was just going to file a complaint with my credit card company. That's when the first email response came, telling me how sorry they were that they couldn't ship that product to me due to some wacky restriction their vendor has. I responded, asking why they don't make that information available on their site, and to kindly refund my money. No response, NO REFUND!!!!

Trying to contact them about this issue is a rehash of my first attempt at contacting them. As the 30 day mark passed, I went ahead and filed a complaint with my credit card company. THAT sure got their attention. I got an email accusing ME of fraud, and a phone call from 219-405-3327. A guy named "Dean Vander Woude", claiming to be the owner of the business, accusing me of the same. How anyone in their right mind could think that I was scamming them is beyond me. After going ten rounds with him on the phone, I just couldn't belive what I was hearing, so I hung up. The same number called my phone eight times before giving up.

Shortly thereafter I receive a response from my bank, telling me that the "merchant" is disputing my claim, and claims to have package tracking information that clearly shows that I received my bug juice. WHAT?!!?!

I sent them the email from The Great Hardware Store telling me about why they couldn't ship the stuff to me in the first place. After over a month, I got my money back.

The long story short is that they held $200+ hostage for nearly 55 days!!! I've filed a complaint with the BBB and both the Indiana and Illinois Attorney General's office. Who knows if it'll do any good, but this place is insane.

Unhappycamper
Chicago, Illinois
U.S.A.