An early draft of my letter to the credit card company...
On Good Friday, March 29, 2013, I took my three children to Sears Portrait Studio for an appointment to take pictures. During the photo session, the photographer
took Easter pictures of my son and two daughters together and separately, and
then she took birthday portraits of them using the numbers: eight, six, and five, in celebration of their
birthdays. The photo session was
something we had been doing since my now eight-year-old son was
three-months-old, celebrating his first Easter.
At the conclusion of session - Sxxxxxxxx, the
photographer took me to the computer and had me choose which of the portraits I
would like to purchase. She had me write
down the numbers of the poses I wanted to purchase. She then sat with me once I had selected my
poses and entered into the computer the sizes and quantity of the poses I
wanted. She informed me of the best deal
based on the quantity of photos I was buying, I agreed to the package deal she
was selling and she rang me up at the register. I was
told my photos would be ready in four to six weeks. I thanked the photographer and my children
and I left.
On May 9, 2013, the Friday before Mother’s Day, my
eight-year-old son and I went to Sears to pick up our Easter and birthday
pictures from the portrait studios so we could put the photos in the Mother’s
Day cards we were giving out on Mother’s Day, which was two days away. As we walked through the automotive
department and headed towards the portrait studios I noticed the lights were
off in the portrait studio. I thought
that was odd since I knew they stayed open late on Fridays. As we got closer, I noticed something on the
portrait studio’s counters, when we arrived into the department I realized the
something I had noticed were envelopes and loose pictures. There were hundreds of loose pictures laying
on the counter in piles next to Sears Portrait Studios envelopes. I realized the portrait studios must have
gone out of business. I was in a time
crunch because my children had a church activity they had to get to, so I
quickly stopped the first Sears employee I saw and asked him to call a manager
for me. The employee agreed to the
request and I quickly turned back to the counter.
I told my son to look for pictures of himself, his
sisters, and the three of them together, in the loose pictures on the counter,
while I went through the envelopes.
My son found three photos of himself, but none of his
sisters or group pictures of them. While
I was unsuccessful in finding our Easter/birthday pictures in any of the
envelopes. A female manager arrived and
explained to me that she came to work one day and the portrait studio
department had gone out of business. She
said they had given no advanced notice that they were closing, they just
closed. She informed me all the pictures
they could find and where in the portrait studio’s drawers were on the counter.
I told her I couldn’t find my Easter/birthday pictures of
my children and asked what would happen if I couldn’t find them. She told me she would find out. She made a call and explained my situation, and
then she turned to me and said I could receive a full refund with my
receipt. I told her I had more than
likely thrown the receipt away because I couldn’t return the photos once I
received them and that all I had given the photographers in the past was my
name and phone number and they gave me my pictures. I asked if a copy my credit card charge for
the photographs would be enough. She
told me to bring it in.
I instructed my son to go through the envelopes and I set
him up on the floor to search for the pictures.
The manager offered to help me look through the pictures and asked what my
children were wearing in their photos. I
told her my daughters were wearing matching teal tank top dresses and my son
was wearing a brown suit with a vest and a teal color shirt on. Upon saying that, I looked at the photos my
son had found and realized the photos were the non-purchased extra copies of
the school picture I had him take at Sears Portrait Studios in late November of
2012. I told this to the manager and she
nodded her head. She told me the photos
she had seen were mostly Christmas pictures and she suspected that my Easter/birthday
pictures had not even been developed or printed. She told me they would not be receiving any
more shipments of photos from the main Portrait Studios office. I thanked her for her help. She told me to take the photos of my son’s
school picture free of charge. I thanked
her again and I left.
On Tuesday, May x, 2013, I returned to Sears with a copy
of my credit card statement where I was charged for my children’s
Easter/birthday photo session. I went
into the garden/tools department and asked to speak to a manager regarding the
portrait studios. The sales associate
called a manager and told me one would be with me shortly. Fifteen minutes later, Mary L. introduced
herself as a manager. I explained the
situation with her and she took my credit card statement to give me a full
refund since I was charged for merchandise I had never received. She tried giving me a refund, but told me she
couldn’t; because she needed the salescheck number in order to issue a refund
because she could not override the cash register. I asked would my credit card company have ht
number she needed and she said possibly.
I told her I would go home, call my credit card company, and then call
her back with the number. My son and I
left the store to do what I had just said.
Immediately when I arrived home, I called my credit card company and
spoke to a customer service representative.
I explained the situation to the customer service representative and he
told me the exact time my card was swiped, the day my credit card was charged,
and the authorization number for the sale.
He told me if Sears did not resolve my problem to call back and Capital
One would handle it because I couldn’t be charged for merchandise I never
received. I thanked him for his help and
the information. I called Sears and
asked to speak to Mary L. She came on
the line and I gave her the number and information I had just received. Mary L. told me that was not the number, she
needed. I then gave her the portrait
studio’s session number to which she informed me that number was solely for the
purpose of the portrait studio to differentiate amongst themselves. She told me she needed a number that started
with 10. I asked her if my credit card
company didn’t have the number who would, she had no response.
While Mary L. was very nice she was not helpful in
solving my problem or coming up with a solution to keep a customer, who had
spent over a thousand dollars over the past eight years purchasing photos from
their portrait studios, satisfied or happy.
We hung and I immediately called Capital One back. I informed the customer service
representative of the situation and he began the dispute for me.
As of Thursday, June 27, 2013, I have not received the
photos of my son posing next to the number eight in celebration of his eighth
birthday. I have not received the photos
of my youngest daughter happily posing next to the number five or my eldest
daughter next to the number six. I do
not have in my possession and based on what the first manager I met upon my
first visit on May x, 2013, said I will never possess the pictures taken on
Good Friday of my three children dressed in their brand new Easter outfits
laughing out loud because the photographer did all she could to make sure they
looked at the camera while smiling as big as they could.
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