Emm L.

Chalk up another angry customer to Tulip World.

They say they guarantee bloom but they are not so clear on what happens if you are sent the wrong item, which is what happened to me. I ordered a specific color of tulips for 12.37, paid for shipping and tax, which brought it up to about 23.50. They bloomed and are totally the wrong color. So I took photos as they request and sent them in so a customer service person could handle the case. First, I heard nothing back for a week. I wrote again. Two more days went by before I got an email saying very briefly, sorry for any inconvenience, here is a gift certificate. For 12.37. It didn't cover the shipping or tax even though they sent me the wrong thing. I tried to use it and it didn't work. So I emailed to say it didn't work and got nothing back. Wrote AGAIN and said wow, some customer service. This time they answered, saying they had got my email, but not explaining why they didn't bother to answer. They did include detailed fussy instructions on how to make the GC work so I went back and reordered my specific color of tulips, which were now 2.00 more base price and I had to pay the shipping and tax on this order all over again. So in the end, I paid half again as much for the item I wanted, even though they were at fault.

Don't shop here. The guarantee is flawed. The communication is mediocre and they will charge you more money even if they screw up the order.
Very disappointed. I will probably try to cancel the second order and demand a refund as the new bulbs won't even ship until this Fall, and then I'll have to wait again for next spring to see if they're right. Super frustrating.
I should probably be glad the damn things even bloomed, after reading all the other reviews but wow.
(P.S. Right after I wrote this, they reached out and pointed out in the terrible email they sent that they did provide a separate coupon code for free shipping. Will see if it works or not. Still not jazzed: the communication is so poorly handled.)

Mags.com got ahold of my PayPal from when I made the mistake of buying subscriptions from them through my frequent flyer miles program: Since then, they charged me small sums three times last year and now suddenly four larger sums (around 20-25 a crack), all without permission, all set up as "automatic payments". Be cautious. I never agreed to ongoing subscriptions with them and yet every 'free magazine' I've got from frequent flyer has been that without my knowing. They're thieves. Am undergoing PayPal dispute and have cancelled them all by hand but this is a warning. I did NOT buy any ongoing service with them. Each was supposed to be a one-time shot for a set number of magazines. I had to go to their own site, create and account to see my 'subscriptions' and cancel each by hand. They try to con you into sticking with it and coming back later to cancel in order to get all you paid for, or you can just throw money away on the new amount they just charged you and cancel now. Just not right.

Years ago I bought from Light in the Box and when the item didn't work out, they allowed me to return it to a U.S. address and stood behind the return. They don't do that anymore, and the size charts are no longer even slightly trustworthy. There is just zero way of knowing how an item will fit. It's even more of a risk than eBay sellers from China. The items vaguely resemble the thing you see in the picture on the sales page, but only slightly. They are made as cheaply as possible. Sizing up only means they make things bigger around, but never actually longer; the numbers won't match the size chart in any case. Returns are now required to go to China even though they are shipped from a U.S. address. You pay for the return shipping or are only offered a coupon for 40% off the next order, to be used on their site, and the new order to exceed the coupon in price so they are assured to get more money out of you. Or they will refund you a pitiful amount in hopes you'll just keep the useless items. We got four items, only one of which vaguely resembled the sales page. The shirt was close enough to keep. Two pairs of pants and a dress were ridiculously far of from all measured sizes and the dress in particular was so bizarrely proportioned and hideously sized that it bears almost no resemblance to the sale page. All three items were way too small despite the charts; we bought everything to fit several inches bigger than they needed to be and they're all too small.

Seriously. If anything meets your expectations, it will be a minor miracle. Do not assume you can return anything, and assume that you have a 2% chance of being able to use what you have just bought. If those odd are okay with you, go ahead and buy from Light in the Box. If not, be aware that any purchase is pretty much a good way to throw money away.

UPDATE: the way to get good customer service is to post a negative review, apparently. Once this review went up, we had instant communication from another service rep (we'd already had at least 2 different people via email). They honored the refund this time, including the shirt we meant to keep, for a full sale price refund, of course minus shipping and taxes. We were not asked to return the items but were asked to give a four or five star review. As I consider that in the way of mild blackmail, I can't quite go that high. With the right pressure, they will stand behind the products but you still can't expect not to return things, still can't expect them to be quality, and it's still a total crap shoot whether or not you can use the purchase. But they will eventually work with you on the refund and they were polite about it all.

Well, I loved these guys for the first three items. Everything is super well made (with pockets!) and they guarantee it will fit you. You send your measurements in and if the thing doesn't fit, they will remake it twice. After the third purchase however, there is no way of knowing if they'll do that again or what. I purchased 2 items and both were pretty close with only minor adjustments on the one so I was happy enough and felt they were worth the average 50-70.00 for dresses (you pay that at the mall for off the rack). However, they had a contest and I won a third dress for free. They applied my third fit guarantee to that dress so when I went to actually PAY for a third, there was no guarantee. The theory is that by the third item, they have you sized and it all will work in future but that was not the case. The fourth dress was a disaster. It didn't fit in any way and was made weirdly. With no choice but to return it, I sadly did (because I really wanted it). Then the choices in returns are meh: if you want money back, you only get refunded on the cost of the garment, not the tax or shipping. To get all your money back, you must roll it into a gift card on the site. I did that and went shopping for something they couldn't get wrong. Even though the final dress was 5.00 less than the one I'd returned, with tax and now increased shipping, I ended up paying an ADDITIONAL 16.36 for the final dress. So while I love my first three dresses and they fit perfectly, I warn everyone that once you've hit three, it's no longer worth the price. Oh and I emailed at least six times, both on their site and to their email and never got a single answer of any kind in regard to my questions. So I guess there is no fit guarantee after three items. Sorry then. I'm not paying 70.00 or more for something that probably won't fit and will lose me money if I have to return it.

I ordered 7 items from these folks and of that, four were severely undersized based on the dimensions given on the website. I did a chat and the chat agent was supremely unhelpful, listing me what they say are acceptable dimensions for any given item, repeating over and over that they wont' all be the same size (duh. I'm not stupid), and insisting that the only way to measure is with calipers. I set these beads on a flat ruler and can't see how a caliper will make a bead measuring clearly less than 8mm stretch to meet a minimum of 8-10. The worst was a 12 X 8 bead string where not one measured above 7 X 8. Minimum quoted was 9 X 7 for that size. So the other three I bought were great and all within ballpark but the four here were disappointing and the customer chat was insulting and useless. Be warned: they are very generous about what they think is okay range of sizes. If you go in like that, you won't be left angry like me.