Simon C.

I have placed an order with Vitacost and some of the products received had an expiry date of July 2023.
Reached out to Vitacost and they agreed to submit a refund request for the products, however they refuse to credit the shipping charges and the taxes paid, stating that they have not charged any. Well, they have charged me for the GST and PST (Canadian taxes) in the obscure section called "International shipping surcharges".
When I confront them about that, their response is that they never refund these charges and they never refund the shipping charges. I said, ok then, reship the 3 bottles that were expired... They don`t do that.
So they want me to accept to be ripped off...
I have opened a dispute with Paypal and my advice, avoid this dishonest company at all cost unless you want to receive expired products and you want to be ripped off.
After few days, escalations, they told me that they have processed the requested credit but no trace of any credit anywhere and after 1 week, still no credit showing...I asked them for the credit transaction number and without any surprise, they didn`t respond

Purchased a Bench and thank god I paid by Paypal. Article was showing in stock and sold /shipped by Walmart Canada. Then on the delivery due date, I received a note telling me that they don't have the item in stock. Checked my Paypal account and credit card statement and saw that the transaction was actually cashed in by Walmart. Started a chat session and was told that they have just taken an authorization and that they never charge anything prior to shipping the goods.
This was obviously wrong, so I gave the agent the transaction number, status from Paypal,Paypal invoice number etc... but the agent stupidly was telling me that Walmart didn't charge me for anything. I decided to call Walmart and talked to an agent that was telling me the same lies. Then I offered him to send him proofs of what I was telling him... While we were running into circles for quite some time, I asked him if the item was in stock or not? He confirmed to me that no it was not in stock. I requested a cancellation and after some interaction... he put me on hold and then told me that indeed cancelling the order should address all issues... Then when he cancelled the order, the refund from Paypal was automatically generated a couple of minutes later. When I told him that the refund is on its way, he saw nothing on his side, like if the Walmart system didn't have any trace of them cashing in and refunding me... Imagine that!
But without the use of Paypal, the money would have been gone and it was not a cheap item.
Then, I was worried because I had another order being processed, a very heavy item... Same situation: Delays, transaction cashed in... however this time, I received a damaged item with metal parts to assemble with missing holes, broken glass on one corner that is super super heavy etc...
Contacted Walmart, they told me that the escalation team will reach out to me. Of course they never did... Then I submitted a return request and was notified that a carrier will reach out to me to pick up the item... It never happened... Contacted Walmart, was told that the escalation (Translation: phantom/ inexistent/ doesn't care/ never call/ never email team) will reach out to me and of course they never did... Chats and calls are useless, as their customer care is trained to lie and don't resolve anything. They are just buying time, so now I will open a dispute with Paypal to obtain a full refund as I have an item that I can't use

2 times in a row, I have ordered products on sales that were clearly in stock. I paid via Paypal and was waiting for my products and the shipment notification which never came. No sound, no image. I inquire, and I was told that the products were not in stock, however if I place a new order for the same item at full price, it's in stock! And I can clearly see that I can order the same item. I told them that I immediately need my money back. Their response is that is has to be approved which can take up to 2 weeks.
Thank god, I paid via Paypal; I submited a dispute and Paypal refunded me that same day.
I have paid also using some gift cards; but when they refund you, they will never refund you the gift cards amounts and their supervisor Geo told me that this is the way they do business when I tried to have the gift cards refunded.
So if you want to be ripped off, and to deal with the worst crooks that you can find, then purchase from them. I was a customer for many years but this was an eye opener. Buyer beware!

Their customer service is so bad. I can't find a proper word to describe it. To summarize their behaviour, they are polite but it's "their way or no way" which means they will never help you or address your concerns. They are telling you that they will investigate but they never respond or give you a clear answer. They will send you generic responses that they copy and paste... We can say that their customer service is Fraud because they do nothing to help customers. I was charged for taxes that are not applicable to my country; I gave them the information related to at least 10 previous orders for which they only charged me a tax of 5% but suddenly the tax rate has jumped without any regulations changes or anything in my country. Because they refused to truly address the problem, I told them, I will log a dispute with Paypal. Their response can be summarized to "we don't care and do it". On another instance, there was a great deal for a certain product, I put them in the cart but I realized that I couldn't get free shipping even though the total was greater than 200$. They basically forced my order to pay a very large shipping amount in the range of 40 $. When I asked them, why? Their response was that the usual carrier can't ship this supplement So I choose another brand and the free carrier could be selected, so it wasn't because the supplement had some restrictions or anything like that... So they are lying, bull$#*!ting people to cash in and put all kind of barriers to prevent you from getting their deals at the price they advertise. They are truly AWFUL and Stay away unless you want to be ripped off

Swanson's discounts are fraudulent and fake. They triple their price and put aside 70% off... When you check the price for the same product elsewhere it's similar to the regular price elsewhere. They don't care if they lost your parcels and will ask you to wait forever ( I've sometimes been told to wait 3-4 weeks! Past the normal delivery date)before declaring a parcel lost and reshipping the goods if their agents decide to do so. Swanson never process the returns unless you send multiple emails and threaten them... and even when they process them they will always forget to refund some articles... however they cash in very fast. Sometimes, they will ship products that will expire in less than 3 months and when you inquire why, they will tell you that they have the right to do so! And that you are the problem. Their customer care agents are sometimes polite but not helpful... 90% of the time they send you generic responses where you can clearly see that they don't care at all about customers... their mandate is to cash in!, not to help you out with any issues. Or if you order the large size but they charge you for the regular and even if you send pics to prove your point, they will not address the problem, because they are perfect and never make mistakes. You are always considered as a potential fraudster... this is how the agents are trained... Their advertisement is also questionnable and if you register for receiving their specials notifications, every day is the best sale of the year with their best savings and you should be giving all your cash to them EVERY DAY!...
Oh and when you respond that you disagree, they translate that by you are offensive and aggressive and then their customer care Manager (A.) with the intelligence of a cockroach on medication will send you a generic email of 5 pages explaining to you how wonderful Swanson is and how bad you are because you don't agree to be fooled and ripped off! And you don't say thank you to everything... Well, obviously, I will never buy again from them and it's been the worst purchasing experience of my life.

I'm placing a lot of orders through Amazon, but I have realized over time that once you have issues they can't care less and they will respond to you via their usual garbage generic emails. If you call and talk to supervisors, 99% of the time it's worse! They have issues where your purchase items not knowing that you can't return them as actually it even clearly states on the product page "satisfaction guaranty or returns made easy" but when you want to return the products, bingo. You can't. When you call them, write them and show them their website, their response is quite surprising... You can't return the products even though it states everywhere you can... They never help or never try to help, they simply pretend to help by responding quickly with generic emails that are not helping at all... If you insist, they block you and no longer let you request help for that order in question!. Or they will charge you taxes on some food items that should be exempted ( the same food in different sizes have different tax rules!) and when you notify them that this is illegal, their response is that you are wrong and that they are right! Lovely,
Or if you take the 1 day shipping guaranty. The 1 guaranty in downtown Montreal is just useless as intelcom rarely delivers on time; as per my experience it fails most of time... and when a week after you inquire, they ask you to wait more. Adding insult to the injury!
This is the most frustrating experience I had with a merchant. I can't believe how bad they became lately because they were much better in the past!