Storesonline.com - paid $ 7,000 - poor experience - hasn't worked out as hoped and expected

# 29 for April 15, 2003

December 19, 2006 - Business Reply:

StoresOnline is committed to customer satisfaction and is constantly improving its products and services. StoresOnline is eager to satisfy its customers by fixing problems and overcoming misunderstandings. If StoresOnline has problems with its software or its services, then a detailed complaint about what is wrong is necessary for StoresOnline to remedy the situation. General postings made about StoresOnline’s products or services are often unclear as to what consumers want StoresOnline to do. StoresOnline’s products are constantly improved when customers identify specific glitches in the software or shortfalls in its services. Indeed, the latest version of StoresOnline software, introduced earlier this year, is a result of detailed and clear feedback from StoresOnline customers. We urge you to contact StoresOnline and identify your concerns. Please provide your full name, address, telephone number, and StoresOnline product license numbers. StoresOnline will respond to your email and will find a resolution to your questions and concerns. Other useful information about StoresOnline can be found at its website at www.storesonline.com. StoresOnline provides small business owners and entrepreneurs with eServices to help their customers successfully market their products and services. Whether a company wants to extend an existing business to the Internet, or launch the next big idea, StoresOnline's eServices are there to help each step of the way. From education, to training, to eCommerce-enabled websites, StoresOnline seeks to be the best in the business. StoresOnline's software platform has continuously developed over the past decade, evolving to fit the needs of the dynamic, global economy. Today, the development platform (StoresOnline Pro) sets the precedent as small business owners and entrepreneurs offer their products and services to the world. You should not only consider what StoresOnline is claiming about its commitment to customer satisfaction. Consider the recent report written by Ed Magedson, founder of RipoffReport.com, detailed below. Please visit www.ripoffreport.com to confirm this report. Through exhaustive research in conjunction with RipOffReport, StoresOnline found that only 12% of complaints filed on that website were true StoresOnline customers. In that report Ed Magedson - Founder, Rip-off Report, stated: “Rip-off Report discovered disgruntled ex-employees, competitors and persons who have taken a "short position" in StoresOnline Stock have tried to victimize StoresOnline repeatedly. Actually, Rip-Off Report's investigation reveals that many of the complainants are not StoresOnline's customers at all, but some of the aforementioned miscreants instigated others to file complaints without even first contacting StoresOnline customer service.

…

Rip-Off Report's investigation of StoresOnline shows that StoresOnline is fulfilling its commitment to provide excellent customer service.” StoresOnline has researched this consumer’s complaint and has determined this customer received a full refund. Sincerely, Customer Service

Complaints.com received the following on April 14, 2003:

From: Abe Email User

RE: Storesonline.com - paid $ 7,000 - poor experience - hasn't worked out as hoped and expected

Storesonline pressured us to buy now, making claims that you did not have to be computer literate or even have

a computer.

there sites are malfunctioning low quality and out dated with bugs/flaws, Not a user friendly site building program though they have upgraded it since I bought the sites.

Also after I sent them the letter below, I was called on 4/14/03 and was told I could not receive a refund

because there was a "third party" involved which they said was the finance institution that they had

availible at the seminars, even though the loan was paid in full in one months time. At the seminar they

checked everybodys credit and the only way to buy the sites was with cash up front or through the financial

company that they worked with, which seems very suspicious to me.

Here is a copy of a letter I sent them. To: Stores Online Management,

I am writing to request a refund for the six stores that my parents had purchased in hopes of starting our own family business in May of 2002.

Though I know I will never be able to recoop all the long hours, weeks, months, almost a year of time and

money that I've spent trying to make something happen, either on hold for customer support, trying to get

accurate info on chat, reading or getting stumped over program bugs that I had no control over and could not

repair, I have encountered program flaws on more than one occasion.

I'm not one to give up easily but I can honestly say that I've tried.

I am also very leary about the honesty of your company.

Making it sound like a piece of cake, and that you could make money in as little as two to three weeks!

I have been published for about 5 months and I haven't had a single order since I've been online. We can't risk putting more and more money into this without seeing any results. We believe we have a good product at a very resonable price and we have never had a sale. We've spent well over $7000.00 with nothing in return but credit processing bills and pay per click and advertising bills. I had high hopes for these web sites and though they were not all they were talked up to be at the work shops, I was patient and willing to give it a try and work with it.

I have also had a hard time with customer service after being on hold for long perids of time, one rep

would tell me one thing while another would tell me something different which makes it very confusing and frusterating. On the 13th of March, 2003, I had told support that there was a problem with my site and I was told that

it was a program bug and that they would let me know when they solved the problem. It was well over a week and still no response, I kept calling and they had not yet fixed the problem. Finally on March, 21, after calling and asking again and again they fixed the problem. If this is how long they take to fix this problem, how can I trust them with my site! I have little or no visitors and I am not on any search engines except for pay-per click sites, even though I have placed adds and customer service said they have submitted it twice to the search engines. I am also very frustrated that I would have to pay extra for quality help, which you make sound free in the missleading letter that was mailed to us. I can not trust the performance of your sites and I believe that if you are selling sites at such high prices they should be bug free, trust worthy, dependable, and user friendly sites, with a substantual amount of customer support reps at all times.

Thank you for taking the time to read this letter I hope to recieve a response from you shortly. If this is not taken care within 7 working days of date recieved, I will pursue this with a lawyer, the

BBB and I will spend time alerting as many people as possible through e-mail forwards and any and every other means possible.

I have contacts TV stations and news reporters. The only resolve at this point is a full refund. Sincerely, Abe

If anyone knows what can be done, please reply to me and let me know if there is any action that can be taken or that you will take to resolve this. I belive this is a scam and that there are many others that are in this same situation and don't know how or what to do. Here are some web sites that may be of help to you. www.msnbc.com/news/684778.asp

www.graysarge.com/beware.htm

www.ripoffreport.com/reports/ripoff30398.htm

www.storesonlinesucks.com