Your Own Store Complaint

superman1979

Hello,

In May of 2011 I bought a website from bright light media. The website was bought for over £3200 and promised with work an income of £26+ a year.
I believed this and invested over £7k into SEO to make it work.

I made £50 over the year. I am not happy with this purchase and the advertisement of the websites is very misleading and untrue.
I know this for a fact as I have started a facebook group for disgruntled website owners we have about 70 people who have been missold and are now seeking refunds or legal action.

I have gone to the bank for a refund, will contact citizens advice, have emailed trading standards.

Can anyone else suggest other types of action to help us get refunds and close this corrupt company down please?


Regards

bris

In this regard you are not a consumer but a business, so B2B contract law applies. Without seeing any T&C's it's difficult to know whether you have a case or not.
A quick look would suggest however that all you bought was a website, without trading figures or any presence what so ever on the net. This was a loser from the start, a website needs constant advertising to have a chance. If you thought you could just sit back and wait on the work or sales coming in you were very mistaken.

If you were made promises that have not been upheld then they will be in your contract, have you had a solicitor look at it, this should be your first port of call.

NeverEnough

None of the buyers expected to "sit back and do nothing" . YourOwnStore, as part of their sales blurb, stated that you would need to do 10-15 hours a week on optimising the SEO in order to get the traffic to make the income / sales.
They also produced projected incomes for each of the sites they were selling. These were not "just websites" either, they were CMS affiliate sites with supported "backend" input, where owners could post articles and make changes To improve SEO. The company claimed that if their system was followed, you could not fail to make the projected incomes.


Unfortunately the claims have been proven to be false and not a single identified site owner of approx 80 known sites has made anything beyond a few hundred pounds at best ( mostly far less, even nothing)

The company owner has been extremely avoidant and arrogant and keen not to talk to store owners or try to resolve anything.

A lot of the buyers of the stores were people who wanted to build up an additional income, some had been made redundant and were trying to work at the websites full time. However, it has become apparent that the technical support is patchy and the prjected incomes have simply not happened. The sales pitches have been inaccurate and downright deceitful and people are looking to try to get a refund.


Apart the obvious "speak to a solicitor" , I think the post is looking to see if anyone has any other suggestions about what could be done to expose this set up , get refunds etc.

ThumbRemote

It's a scam. You almost certainly won't get a refund, whoever is behind it will just wind the company up, keep the money and start again, fleecing more customers.

System

As a matter of interest which one did you buy?

I like the premise of the business but I imagine you have to choose a good brand to be marketing. Also you have to do the work.

Honestly though if it was me I would just design my own website to do the same thing and save the £4k, it doesn't look very difficult to do.

System

I like the reviews of people who have set up "successful" websites. This is my favourite

"With more than a sense of hesitation and concern at spending over £5k on my store, DevonCottageRental.co.uk, I decided to plunge in feet first.

What I received was a store that had already been set up and all I had to do was to add the meat to the bones. Yes its daunting but to anyone with some pc training its totally doable.
Let’s face it with investments today online you never know who you are dealing with as there are so many crooked schemes about. But what I found with YourOwnStore, is a dedicated team of staff who are there to help and guide you through all the steps.
The training modules are excellent and given time if you go through them all methodically your efforts will start to pay off. I realise my particular store is seasonal being a holiday niche at home which is dictated by the British weather, but having taken a month to get where I am now I have just had my first commission albeit £60.30, Im highly confident that by the 2013 season I will be making not only my investment back but to start to make a profit and an income.

paddyrg

FULL MONEY BACK GUARANTEE: If you use the provided software and training to generate 250 or more visitors a day to the Website and you don't make an income you're happy with, you can return the Website for a full refund within 1 year of the purchase.

I take it this is !!!!!!!!, then?

Mistral001

FULL MONEY BACK GUARANTEE: If you use the provided software and training to
generate 250 or more visitors a day to the Website and you don't make an income
you're happy with, you can return the Website for a full refund within 1 year
of the purchase

.

paddyrg wrote: »

I take it this is !!!!!!!!, then?

Paddy, but did the OP have "250 or more visitors a day"?

That might be the let out clause for this what appear dubious firm and not really help the OP.

Edit: Maybe that is what you mean. The Op is up the proverbal creek?

System

I was reading on another forum that they do honour the refund. It seems like there are alot of good reviews for the company and the customer service is meant to be excellent.

Whether its overpriced or not is irelevant as the OP was happy to pay the price at the time. It seems like if you are prepared to put the work in you can make reasonably decent profits out of these sites. Not the £27k but someone on another forum said he was clearing £1k a month which isn't bad.

NeverEnough

Which forum is that, goater? My searches haven't found glowingly good reviews except for obviously "canned" ones....nor people who can prove consistent incomes from these sites, anywhere near the amount claimed by the company. Company also will not point anyone to successful websites to take a look - bit odd, you're not asking them to identify the owner or anything and the sites would be available for millions to view.

The "customer service" is actually pretty inconsistent and is only "excellent" to their chosen favourites, whom they ply with freebies etc, while other clients are treated like complete rubbish.

There are a LOT of dissatisfied people who tried all their "methods" and could get nowhere near the 250 visitors a day they demand for you to get a refund - they also duplicate the niches of these sites so effectively sell competing sites in quick succession making it even harder to succeed as there are numerous others in the exact same niche from them, using their software, their methods etc - not exactly a recipe for success.

System

There is a guy on here that seems pretty positive and he doesn't look like a fake reviewer.

http://www.thewholesaleforums.co.uk/threads/any-experience-with-yourownstore-co-uk.142065/