This is the appalling experience I have had with Etsy:
I opened an account with Etsy about 3 weeks ago. Within the first 7 days I sold 3 items, which, considering I had only about 50 items listed at the time was great and I thought a good start. Being a seasoned online seller the first thing I checked out before starting with Etsy was their prices. Etsy does not display their actual prices honestly and sells on etsy can cost more than 30% if the default setting for the promotions is not disabled (they take 15% extra for promotions alone). I managed to get through to their chat and asked the Rep more than several times what Etsy's fees were, he did everything not to tell me. I repeatedly asked him if I sold an item on Etsy for 100 how much does Etsy take and how much do I get. He again repeatedly failed to tell me. As this is an imperative to-know point and is a possible deal breaker after I asked him to shut down my account or pass me over to someone who could answer this simple question he did finally state fees were approximately 7% maximum, I also requested a copy of the chat discussion which he stated I would get automatically. Etsy fees have turned out to be more than they advertise and more than their customer service stated, I also never received the promised copy of the chat. A very bad start, sellers had put up with their rival eBay's dishonest practices for decades, they are now, I believe losing many of their long-serving sellers due to their extortionate costs and the fact that they are turning visibility of sellers stock off and on. After around 20 years on there (EBay) and being a continuous prolific seller with a great reputation and feedback our sells zero-ed out because of the crazy visibility. Sellers moving from EBay looking for a new home will not, I think, tolerate dishonesty from other sites, but in this upside-down world we live in time will tell? Despite the unacceptable lack of transparency regarding their fees, we were still on board. (P.S. We have tried to chat on Etsy several times now and could only find the chat link once). We continued to list around six items daily and then one night as we were doing this when we tried putting the listing live we got an error message, a few moments later we saw a red warning box appear stating that our account had been suspended. We tried getting through to Etsy via chat but failed, we sent Etsy two E-mails, that was 3 days ago, and have received no response. We have not been told what we have done wrong and I think when Etsy suspended our account they should have contacted us beforehand or at least informed us why. We are obviously not interested in building something with a company that like their main rival, operates in, a manner of draconian ideals.
We want to know why our account has been suspended and we want to be refunded for all the listings that we put live and have been charged for. We kindly ask someone from Etsy to reach out to us and resolve this ASAP so that we can draw a line under this situation. - Still have not heard anything from them. More than 2 weeks have now passed with me attempting to repeatedly reach out to Etsy, however, I have had zero response despite everything.
Update - 11 July 2023. Still no contact from Etsy: to be honest life is too short to be following up a refund of around £50, in my case Etsy has shown that their reputation is worth less than £50. Reading all the similar reviews, over multiple sites about Etsy, their clear criminal policy is deliberate, whether it's dishonest staff or something created at the top, who knows, particularly at a time when we are seeing similar craziness happening all over the place I am not surprised with anything anymore. The vast number of complaints against Etsy online leaves me wondering how are they still operating. Unfortunately, people do not check out sites like Trustpilot until things go wrong, perhaps we should all be training ourselves differently.
Why selling on Etsy is bad for your business, finances and mental health!
As someone who's been selling on Etsy for many years, I'm going to outline the many issues I've found, whilst lots of sellers probably have had no issues with Etsy I have and I will outline my experience with them.
Shutting down new shops.
This is so disheartening, especially if you've never had an Etsy shop before and don't know the process, to a new seller who's excited about spending their new shop and hopefully getting sales, to see your shop more than likely instantly suspended can cause alarm and make you not even want to bother with Etsy, but as this has happened to me I've learned it's the bots that do this, it could be cause you listed too many listings at once etc, but why doesn't Etsy tell you how many listings you can list from a new shop, also why go to the extreme measures of suspending someone why not put the shop of vacation with a message that they are verifying your account etc, this has happened to me before and the only way I knew my shop had reopened was cause I was randomly searching listings on Etsy and saw my listing back up, most new sellers might just forget about Etsy and not even check unknowingly that their shop has been reinstated, such a bad initial look I think to new sellers.
Lengthy, generic bot responses.
Half the time I don't know if I'm speaking to an actual human or a bot, which is pretty bad considering Etsy is a handmade company who used the tagline keep e-commerce human, I've had responses from "support" that has one name at the top of the message and a completely different name at the end of the message, with a generic response, if you want a human response on most occasions expect to have to respond to the bot at least 3 times to get a human and this is a lengthy process as it's not a chat bot it's an email bot so they take days to respond
Political alignments
As a moderate liberal myself who watches all news channels, I find it strange that a company like Etsy which is a marketplace, would pick and choose which networks to advertise on, if you're going to advertise on a new network advertise on them all especially the one that gets high ratings inturn attracting a bigger audience, I personally don't care what your political views are a customer is a customer, why is Etsy only advertising to a more liberal base, I'm sure most sellers are more interested in sales than who you vote for but obviously Etsy management isn't.
They have banned store owners from minority countries from opening an Etsy shop.
So much for equality etc, a few years ago Etsy stopped accepting sellers from pretty much all the minority countries in the world, only first world countries with the exception of India can sell on Etsy now, sounds pretty biassed to me, even Amazon which is a much larger company accepts sellers from pretty much any country as long as you meet their requirements.
DON'T put your future in Etsy.
As I've stated they will shut your shop down at the drop of a hat, don't put your future in Etsy, look to having your own website and getting organic customers that way, there are horror stories of sellers having shops for 10+ years on Etsy and waking up to it being suspended with no reason why, imagine you've got a mortgage,.made future plans on the basis your Etsy shop will continue on the trajectory it's on just to have Etsy shut your shop down.
No protection for sellers.
Sometimes Etsy sellers get abusive messages from buyers, there is absolutely no way to block them, or to block them from buying from you, marking the message as spam doesn't actually report the message, and if you report a buyer for being abusive that will more than likely cause Etsy trust and safety to review your shop and look for a way to suspend it, which is what an Etsy employee told me via LinkedIn.
Knock offs from AliExpress.
I've seen so many shops selling generic products on Etsy that are definitely not handmade the images are on Amazon and AliExpress, I report it and nothing happens, so much for handmade and vintage which is what Etsy was meant to be about, how can handmade sellers compete with this, sometimes looking through Etsy listings is like looking on dhgate or AliExpress.
High fees, forced onto you.
I feel Etsy purposely complicates fees, why not just charge a set fee like Amazon a percentage and be done, when I make a sale there is at least 4 separate fees connected to that sale, which is so confusing I think purposely confusing.
When Etsy started it was a handmade COMMUNITY while companies grow and become more corporate they can still have some sense of what they started on, but how I see it is Etsy has nothing to do with what it started on, you'll be lucky to get a human to talk too, the site is full of mass produced knock offs and they treat sellers really bad, I think Amazon is more human that ETSY.
I've been an online seller of various goods throughout the years, and I thought about trying Etsy a few years back, but decided against it. Well, a couple of weeks ago, I decided to finally try to create and run a successful Etsy shop. Etsy is supposed to be for handmade goods, and I get that. I listed items that were made with production assistance, but they were MY original designs, not copied from someone else, and I was including the proper disclosures in my listings!
So I signed up and went though the whole process, entering and verifying various details, thinking of a name for my store, designing a profile photo, and of course posting my first few listings (I only posted 3). This process took me a couple of hours, the better part of an afternoon. I became quite excited at the idea of selling on Etsy.
Suddenly, the excited feeling faded and then blossomed into panic when I saw a red banner at the bottom of my computer screen saying that my account had been suspended. I was shocked, after less than a day of being open, my store is suddenly closed? For what reason? I quickly checked my account for any signs or notifications about the suspension, scanned my email inbox and spam, there was no communication from Etsy at all. I thought, this had to be a mistake, and surely they'd fix it.
I thought, surely this is just some bot or algorithm they use that mistakenly suspended my account, and that they'd likely fix the problem. So, I waited to see if I received any communication from Etsy about the sudden suspension of my account. I never received anything from Etsy, yet my account remained suspended.
Etsy provided me with ZERO reason for this suspension, and definitely not any way to fix it. I nervously skimmed the help center to find a phone number or chat function to speak to someone about my account, that's when I found out that Etsy only uses email to communicate with those who need help with their website. That was very aggravating, not being able to actually talk to someone about my issue.
The only option I had was to email them and attempt to appeal the suspension, so that's what I did. I graciously asked for an explanation and a resolution for my suspension. I waited around a day and a half for their first response to my initial inquiry. Much to my dismay, the email I received was just an automated, generic response stating that they were going to do an "in-depth" review of my account and it could take up to 7 days to complete. I was very unhappy at this point, and I thought surely it won't take that long to review my brand new account with hardly any activity on it.
While it didn't take them a full 7 days to eventually get back to me, it was close. The next email I received was another automated, generic email stating that my account had been permanently suspended. The email didn't give specific reasons, but gave around 8-10 vague reasons that MAY have caused the permanent suspension. I read all of their policies in their entirety, so I'm aware of how my shop and listings measure up. Nothing that I did warranted a suspension. It also stated that I am no longer able to sell or buy on Etsy ever again, and any other account I create on Etsy will be terminated.
The cherry on top, they would have put a 180 day hold on the funds in my account, if I had any funds, which thankfully I didn't, as I hadn't made any sales. I can't imagine how awful it is for people who do have money tied up in an Etsy account for 180 days after getting suspended for no reason.
Even if I had committed some minor infraction, I believe an automatic permanent suspension is a bit drastic and unfair. They say we can appeal the decision, but truthfully, we're just fed the same auto emails without someone actually looking into and resolving our problem, or at least giving us a chance to fix whatever we did wrong.
So, that's my experience. My account that was only a few hours old gets suspended, Etsy gives no reason, no way to speak to someone to get it resolved, and just sends copy paste emails over and over again. Yes, I'm still receiving those same emails telling me I'm permanently suspended, repeatedly, and I have no idea why they keep sending them. I guess they just enjoy rubbing it in. My advice: run far away from Etsy, whether you're planning to buy or sell. They're just another corporate business out for themselves, they don't care about the people whole make them money.
If you're a buyer, beware! Though I'm certain there are some amazing sellers on Etsy, it seems that Etsy deactivates legitimate accounts and does nothing about actual scammers or cheap drop shippers selling low quality products. Buyers should also beware that Etsy deactivating sellers accounts on a whim will affect them because that seller will then have limited access to assist buyers throughout the process.
Sellers shouldn't keep money in their etsy account, it could be held for 180 days!
I didn't use any products, nor did I sell any products on Etsy, I never got a chance to because Etsy banned me from their website for no reason, which is the reason I'm writing this review.
Even using specific search terms, results will be full of ads and items irrelevant to you. It used to be easy to find what I searched for.
Every other seller appears to be a "jewelry artist" these days, and then there are the resellers who drop ship manufactured goods but call them handmade. Overpriced items of inferior quality abound.
Many "handmade" sellers provide items made of mass market brass and bead components thrown together with glue and cheap wire or chain. They may look good in enhanced photos but in person, not so much.
To name but one disappointment, I gifted two jewelry items made by Pamela Diegert of Pamelia Designs. (Receipt provided to Sitejabber). They were very poorly constructed causing me great embarrassment in having given them as gifts. Diegert refuses to accept returns, which says a lot.
On the other hand, I've had some truly excellent experiences, such as ordering rings from Birka Scandinavian. The vendor, Marie handcrafts minimalist high quality sterling silver crown set jewelry.
It would be wonderful if Etsy had fewer "crafts made at summer camp" junk sellers and more trained jewelry designers.
The vintage category has been largely disappointing. Sellers frequently misrepresent items and do not pack them with much care, particularly porcelain pieces. One exception has been April's Luxuries, a top class vendor. But for every one like her, there have been twenty bad ones.
In fine, there are some five star shops but there are a hundred times more that sell trash. If you don't know a shop by name that carries what you want, you won't find it easily and are at risk from deceptive sellers.
Additional: There are many sellers who "can't take the L" when they get a negative review for selling substandard, badly made, or misrepresented items.
IMPORTANT: If you leave a less than stellar review, it will be aggregated instantly on an extension called EtsyCheck.
You may also be called a Karen and screenshots of convos may be posted on the Etsy subreddit.
You may be discussed in the Etsy community forums where dishonest sellers go to whine.
This did not happen to me but I have seen all of these things as they are readily visible online. Be aware of this if you leave a review.
Sellers so fragile they have a breakdown over a review have no place in any business of any kind.
March 24,2024 experience update.
It keeps getting worse at Etsy.
I ordered 12 digital download files from a shop with over 5K sales. The thumbnails and preview images were perfect. The images in the zip files were trashy AI.
Etsy is full of these shops which do not in any way disclose they are AI because Etsy allows it.
This shop was ForeverCuteUS.
See the fingers that look like sea anemones and the chopped off fingers on the images of the Virgin Mary. Sacrilegious and vile, not to mention unusable for prayer journals.
Below are just four of the monstrosities featuring weirdly uncanny faces, boneless hands, strangely green skin tones, excessive feverish coloring, and grainy textures,
Some shops use enhancements with great skill. For example PixieDustFiles and NostalgieGrafikland. Sadly, if you're not familiar with a legit design shop, you may get AI horrors.
Etsy will not reply to customers and ForeverCuteUS did not reply to my messages nor to three one-star reviews. This is what Etsy is now. Be aware of it.
1. Unless you already have some shops you’ve used and trusted in the past, there’s little point trying to find things in searches due to excessive ads and irrelevant promotional results. 2. Be aware your screenshots of convos will end up on Reddit and your reviews aggregated in an extension called Etsy Check. You may be whined about on the Etsy community forums. 3. The marketplace is a free for all of Chinese drop shippers, undisclosed AI “artists,” and other risks. Be careful.
Jewelry, porcelain, art supplies, and most recently, digital download zip files.
A very website about Ansuri from the Arabs. It closes accounts because...
A very website about Ansuri from the Arabs.. It closes accounts because of
A very website about Ansuri from the Arabs.. It closes accounts because of
Where do I even begin? When this company first started, it was an excellent marketplace that offered a wide variety of handmade and custom items. NOT ANYMORE!
My experience as a BUYER: I enjoyed buying from there frequently, it was nice to support small businesses and independent artists. Back then, the items were actually handmade and unique. Now, the marketplace is flooded with mass produced garbage from China. And that's not even the WORST part. The site allows perverted merchandise involving CHILDREN! There are inappropriate items that should be in a private, adult only category, and then there's also this sick merchandise exploiting children and promoting incest! And you can't get away from this sort of disgusting trash! Etsy keeps throwing it in your face. I've reported the ones exploiting children for abuse, and guess what? Etsy decides it's best to just leave it up! As a buyer, I have to try to sift through this sea of mass produced dollar store junk and perverted garbage! And then there's other listings that are such obvious SCAMS. Those get to stay too! And other "sellers" that illegally copy legitimate sellers' hard work (COUGH China COUGH!)
My experience as a SELLER: What can I say? When Etsy wasn't off their meds, they used to be a cool marketplace. This inspired me to sell my own handmade goods there. And for awhile, it was great. But then came a slow decline, and then finally Etsy hit rock bottom. Here's a list of problems:
*They have little to no protection for sellers from bad buyers. As a shop owner, you supposedly set the rules. That's a lie right there. Etsy overrides your rules and rewards bad buyers and scammers. Which means you lose money. They also do nothing if a customer displays harassing or threatening behavior. Harassment and threats run rampant on this shameful platform!
*Randomly shutting down legitimate shops. Lately, Etsy has been on a tirade, closing MANY, MANY seller's shops and KEEPING THE FUNDS! I've witnessed this as both a buyer and a seller. Quite a few of my favorite shops have been shut down by Etsy, without so much as a reason. These sellers had excellent ratings, great customer service, and abided by Etsy's rules. Some have been selling on there for YEARS. And then one day they wake up and their shop is gone. Years of work and money flushed down the toilet.
*And this leads me to my next point. THEY'RE PRETEND HUMANITARIANS. Etsy claims to support women owned businesses and black owned businesses, but they LIE. That's just why businesses they've torn down have been mostly women owned and black owned businesses. Sad to say, but Etsy doesn't care about these people. The company just uses these causes to promote its company and paint a pretty picture, not because it practices ethical business. I'm egalitarian, it's disgusting to see a company that preaches a love for small business owners, women owned businesses and black owned businesses target this EXACT SAME DEMOGRAPHIC for deletion! Destroying their income and livelihood while sucking the money out of them like a starved parasite. Can you say hypocrite? My favorite sellers (many female and black) have suddenly been deleted, meanwhile obvious con artist shops remain open for business!
*The new Seller review standard. You now have to have less than 1% negative reviews or Etsy screws with the algorithms, making it more difficult for customers to find your shop. This means if you received several four star reviews, your shop can even tank from that. Etsy makes sure less people find you.
* The fees. God, the fees! You're charged multiple expensive fees for items that just sit there! Other sites charge a fee when a customer purchases your item. Nope, not this pea brained site. So items that aren't selling effective immediately are subject to these fees. Believe me, they add up quickly, and before you know it you're at a loss rather than a gain. Which leads me to my next point, the breaking point for me.
*Etsy takes your money and runs! I've run other shops and have been successful. I know how to manage my finances. Then I go and check my Etsy finances. I see where they've deducted fees, shipping, taxes, etc. I still have a good profit left over. NOPE! Not according to Etsy! The money I have earned is GONE (no they did not put a reserve on it) and my balance is -0.20. So in their mind, I STILL owe them money!
*BAD CUSTOMER SERVICE FOR SELLERS: I have sent a message to customer support about my missing funds, and surprise, surprise... crickets. I have looked into this matter, and it turns out they are notorious for stealing your funds away. Many other shop owners have had this problem, which seemed to start in 2021 and is still continuing.
*Forced ad participation. Yet another pea brained idea some corporate suits came up with while they were too busy twiddling their thumbs in an office. If you run a successful shop, they forced you to participate in this program. Your items get promoted via Google ads (Whom Etsy is in bed with). A customer buys your product, and the ad costs 10 to 15% of your product cost. Now combine that with multiple listing and processing fees, bad buyers who Etsy rewards for scamming, and the cost of materials (and time) to make the items, and you're already at poverty level. The hole is dug and you're just falling in deeper. Etsy claims this is to "make it more fair" but in reality they are perpetuating a Communist's dream! Sellers are punished for reaching successful levels and are being dragged back down by this forced participation. It's costing them money, it's impossible to profit, the ads you are paying are not just for yourself, some of that money goes to unsuccessful shop owners (your competition) so THEY can have Google ads. You're paying to advertise your competitors, con artist sellers, China, sellers that steal YOUR WORK, and perverts who exploit children in their merchandise! All while Etsy profits from ALL listing and processing fees! Don't forget, in the process you're paying to advertise the Etsy company itself! And you're forced to give your money to equally corrupt Google!
*Randomly tearing down listings that adhered to Etsy's rules. I've seen this quite a few times, especially recently.
*WITHHOLDING FUNDS. Putting ridiculous reserves on seller's funds! Etsy will hold 75% of your earnings, sometimes 100% and expect YOU to sustain your shop with measley pennies! Can you say DELUSIONAL!
As you can see, Etsy has turned into a Communist's dumpster fire! If they keep going they are going to lose more buyers and sellers. Like I said, this used to be a nice marketplace but now it's just as good if not worse than selling your items fresh out of a smelly dumpster in the Slums! The dumpster is actually looking more reasonable.
My advice: Abandon Etsy. Start a small brick and mortar business, use another platform, heck, start your own if you're motivated enough! It can't POSSIBLY be worse than what Etsy has become!
ETSY blocked me from "opening a case", against a shop owner, who has a list of rules, so long, you'd decide to cancel.
She did not have any actual conversations with me either.
She updates her rules to suit her narrative, then shoots it to you.
You HAVE to like the item. You are not allowed to write a 1-2 star review.
You have to "ask permission", to return an item. NO CANCELLATIONS.
You have to get the item first, then return it, AFTER asking permission? Its 100% BS.
SHE can talk to ETSY anytime, but I had to wait 2 weeks, and now I'm blocked.
I sent the bracelet back, paid $5.00 to ship it WITH TRACKING, plus I paid for her to ship it, 8 days after ordering.
The bracelets I bought with free shipping, arrived the day, she shipped. I ordered ALL the bracelets the same day from various sellers. No issues with the others. I am a repeat buyer for one order.
Her rule when I ordered, was 3-5 days to ship. Ordered on June 28, so ship date should be 7/2/2021.
She waited until the following Tuesday 7/6/2021... and I PAID extra for this slowness?
Once I received it, I noticed the tassel on the bracelet, was too long. I bake all day and it would get caught on things. That was my reason for returning it. I actually wanted to like it, so I wouldn; t spend $10.00 on shipping to get nothing. That is exactly what happened, because I can't open a case.
The leather on the bracelet isn; t a true brown... its more like baby-poop from breast-fed babies, brown.
"Elizabeth", contradicted her own rules and ETSY does not understand, that I called her names to get her, to get them involved... and it worked.
They are involved, but it's all onesided.
There is no link for me, and 2 weeks went by... so... now WHY CAN'T I OPEN A CASE?
She told her side, and they blocked my messaging.
They demanded I reply to the email they sent me, AND I DID.
I shipped it back, the day it arrived, I put the tracking in the email, ETSY REFUSES to respond to, after ORDERING me, to deal with them via email.
I spend $10,00 on this BS, and now they are balking on giving me a refund of $27.10.
BTW: BETH added a "shop discount code" to make it be on sale, as a tactic, to not allow me to send it back... I SENT IT BACK/FullStop.
GUESS WHAT?
Every state has a "3 day contract cancellation" rule, and Elizabeth has no authority to override it.
Nor does #ETSY
Now, "crickets" from ETSY, so I am telling "MY CASE", on every "review" website I'm able to.
Its very unfair since I was on ETSY for 2 decades, and I never had any issues with sellers.
ELIZABETH from Arizona is a narcissist/control freak.
0 customer service and I'm giving her 0 star review, WITHOUT asking her permission.
#ETSYSUCKS
Buy from sellers who don't have a Thesaurus of rules and "outs" for them at every turn.
I shipped the bracelet back due to an overly long tassel that would be a danger in my daily life of baking. I spent $10.00 on shipping to get 0.
If you think Etsy is some amazing marketplace to generate quick bucks and be rich overnight, you have serious rethinking to do mate.
It doesn't matter how much money you're earning, how well you've done or how well you're projected to do. Etsy will single handedly be able to shut down your store without any warning or explanation.
I understand if it was a copyright infringement issue or a store which has a bad reputation, but from my experience and the tons of others sellers' experience, we ran very lucrative businesses on Etsy for years and were legit sellers in the game.
The money you've made just before the suspension will NOT be deposited into your bank account, and Etsy will hold HOSTAGE to your payment like a complete corrupt criminal.
Like the other sellers mentioned here, my store was in the top 3% on Etsy with thousands of sales and hundreds of solid 5-star reviews, with only 2-3 cases occurring in a period of 6 months.
I made serious 6 figures on there, only to have my shop shut down mysteriously one day.
No explanation was given, and only an automated bot email was sent in conjunction with the suspension which was AFTER the matter of fact.
I attempted to contact Etsy's customer service, which turned out to be a total joke. Keep commerce "human", when the bulk of your customer service agents are incompetent crooks who will not hesitate to disrespect and harrass and eventually end the call and cease further communication.
I've never been so disappointed and disgusted by this company's lack of ethical values. Their desire for profit over ethics and morals is genuinely shocking.
If you think you're indispensable and irreplaceable, think again.
Read about the rexburg seller who had 30k sales and five star reviews who were got unfairly terminated as well.
Recently, more innocent buyers AND sellers BOTH have been kicked off the site.
Most of the time this is due to a technical glitch, but even if it was an honest and innocent mistake, such policies have COST people's livelihoods and incomes.
Etsy will not give a TOSS about you.
If you're a real entrepreneur, start on your own website. LEARN how to do your own SEO (search engine optimisation) and drive organic or paid traffic to your OWN website domain.
Etsy isn't some American dream. Wake up. It feels exactly like working for a nasty corporate boss, because that's what it is. The CEO has utterly ruined and destroyed this platform. And it's shameful.
Always start off by building your own website, unless you have nothing to lose and you’re okay with Etsy shutting down your business any day. No matter how lucrative, law-abiding or profitable you are, Etsy will not hesitate to leave you high and dry and commercially abuse and exploit you. This is a corrupt corporate company that will soon be in liquidation in years to come. This is only the beginning
BEWARE: Oklahoma business Oliver and Olivia Apparel / Jill Snow-Ford and Trent Ford. They are now using the name "Buffalo Shirt Company" on ETSY under false names. Jill Ford and Trent Ford previously owned Oliver and Olivia Apparel which they filed bankruptcy on March 17,2021.
I never leave bad reviews, but I'm coming here to warn every individual I know about a company I've been with for the last few years and the couple who "operate" it.
On March 2nd at 9PM Jill sent her team of 35+ a text message to tell us we were all out of our jobs with no prior warning. We are now unsure if we'll get our final checks for the last 2+ weeks of work - her track record of blatant lies and deceit, and her mind-blowing financial oversights which caused the company's downfall precede this worry.
Leading up to this, she's been fraudulently listing products on Etsy, Amazon and Jane that she knew we could not deliver on. If we even had inventory of the items in the listings, they were advertised for production times that were drastically shorter than what we were able to accommodate. A few days after she let the employees go; Jill Ford and Trent re-branded "Oliver and Olivia Apparel" on Jane to "Printed Tees Shirt Company." Jane has closed the shop but it is still visible to the public. I attached a link below.
Real example: you see a Christmas stocking on Amazon that says "2-day shipping", when in reality you will not see the item for 90 days at least. Our shop then prints the shipping label without having the item ready, which makes it ineligible for a refund and allows her to blame mail carriers.
It doesn't make sense, right? It is more than accidental bad book keeping, and more than a crazy "holiday rush". She's been doing intentionally deceitful business for a long, long time. This is just the surface of it. There is SO much more to this story, and I will invite others to share their experiences in comments. The thing that made all of this tolerable is the team I worked with - in case you're wondering why we all stuck around.
At the time of operations closing, we were still catching up on pre-Christmas orders because she had refused to take the listings down in November, when we were desperately trying to tell her we were at production capacity for the Christmas season. Around the same time we were all watching her spend company money frivolously, having just closed on a million dollar estate for herself.
I have watched this woman use her managers as scapegoats for her own poor decision making, throw an absolute fit like a child in front of her entire team to try and garner sympathy, and threaten to fire staff if they did not come in for overtime during Christmas weekend. She is not fit to run a business.
TLDR: Several of us are in contact with the labor commission over fear of not receiving pay, and we're all struggling to find new jobs or file for unemployment (painstakingly). Hundreds, maybe thousands of customers will never receive items they paid for nor will they see refunds from O&O. Be sure to share so that both employees and customers alike can save their time from an untrustworthy company.
Here are some links:
OLD ETSY SHOP (can only be viewed on a computer or laptop)
https://www.etsy.com/shop/OliverandOliviaKids
JANE SHOP (CLOSED) REBRANDED FROM OLIVER AND OLIVIA APPAREL TO PRINTED TEES SHIRT COMPANY
https://jane.com/sellers/printed-tees-shirt-company
AMAZON SHOP
https://www.amazon.com/stores/Oliver+and+Olivia+Apparel/page/E97BDC0B-143D-41D6-A88C-56AAD9B0F4B8?ref_=ast_bln
NEWS REPORT
https://kfor.com/news/in-your-corner/i-want-my-money-employees-fight-for-final-paychecks-after-boutique-shutters-shop/
REDDIT POST
https://www.reddit.com/r/oklahoma/comments/m4ef9y/local_edmond_business_oliver_and_olivia_children/
NEW ETSY SHOP
https://www.etsy.com/shop/BuffaloShirtCompany?ref=simple-shop-header-name&listing_id=*******