URGENT: Any Bridal Gallery Group brides (north west)?

Bethalphadog

Hi,

I contacted the CAB last week with regards to rights etc and I have received some of the following information about Credit Cards Payments. This may be interesting to some brides who like me not only paid their 50% deposit but also paid the FULL AMOUNT and are still not going to get their orders from The Bridal Gallery despite their assurances that orders would be filled.

"You would be able to hold the credit card company liable for any losses you have suffered due to a breach of contract. This would be for the full price of the contract, not just what was paid on the card in question.


In addition, pursuing a claim against a credit company would also allow a consumer to escalate a claim with the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS), if the credit company refuse to accept liability. The FOS provides consumers with a free, independent service for resolving disputes with financial firms. They can consider complaints about a wide range of financial matters, including banking, insurance, mortgages, pensions and breaches of the Consumer Credit Act.

You can contact the FOS on 08000 234 567 or via their website – see for further information."



I only used my credit card for part of the deposit the rest of the balance I paid from my Debit Account. I am in the process of seeing if I can use the Chargeback regulations but if that fails I am definately going to look more closely at the the advice about that a Credit Card Company is responsible for the full payment and not just what I paid at the time on the Card.

Hope this is of help to some of you.

joala

Anyone else ordered a dress from Ellis? I've been in contact with them for the past couple of days and they've been very helpful and are responding very quickly to my numerous emails. Fortunately my dress order was placed with them so they are going to send it to another shop for me when it's complete (december-ish). So relieved!

Hope everyone's doing ok getting their dresses sorted.

merseybride

Hi Everyone,
This is my second attempt at posting a message on this thread-im not sure if the other one went through but i can't seem to find it anywhere!
I too paid a deposit of £200 in Jan 2012 to the BGG Liverpool store in Woolton. The store then rang me in June 2012 to say that they wanted me to pay them 50% of the cost of the dress so that they could order it in before it got discontinued. So i paid a further £1,000 in june. They asked me to come into the shop to be measured so that they could order my dress. I came in to get measured that month and they said that they would order the dress then. I thought it a little early to be ordering the dress in june as i am not getting married until august 2013, but they said that it takes 8 months to make, plus if it gets discontinued, it would be the only way to ensure that i got that dress.
Obviously, i just went along with what they had told me to do as i didn't have any prior experience a round these things and didn't want to miss out on getting the dress that i wanted and their explanations seemed to make sense at the time as i knew no different.
I couldn't get any answers from the bridal shop which had been emptied, nor from an email which i wrote to them, unless you include the generic email sent to everyone which had no relevance to my situation and confirmed nothing whatsoever. i also emailed Pronovias with no reply also.
I managed to speak with a Pronovias rep who told me that my dress only takes 12 weeks to make, NOT 8 MONTHS, and that MY DRESS HAS NEVER BEEN ORDERED!! I spoke with Begbies and Traynor, the liquidators, who told me that they had spoken with one of the directors of the BGG who said that my dress is in production! The lies are bare faced and just carry on getting deeper by the moment! I told the liquidators that Pronovias have confirmed that my dress had never been ordered so why do the directors continue to lie?? Do they not think that when my dress does not turn up that i may not start to ask questions? The liquidators didn't really comment on this, obviously they do not want to get involved in the specifics!
I asked Begbies and Traynor about the letter they sent us all regarding the creditors meeting; it tells us when it is but fails to say that us as the brides are actually creditors also and have the right to come to the meeting just the same as the suppliers and other creditors.
The creditors meeting will be held tomorrow (31st october) at;
The Racquet Club
Hargreaves Buildings
5 Chapel street
Liverpool
L3 9AG
0151 236 6676 (the Racquet club is around the corner from St Nicholas church, which faces the albert dock)
The room has been hired for the meeting 9.30am-1.30pm. I will be getting there around 9.30, although i think that it doesn't actually start until 10am, but I'm getting there early, just in case.
I was speaking to a friend who works in the tax industry and he has said that if the debt was transferred to the directors themselves, this would mean that the debt would not be liquidated along with the company (BGG LTD). This can only happen if the liquidators are asked by ourselves to do this, and they will do it at their own discretion. If we put our valid points across then they will have to take notice and take action. I have spoken with my bank, Halifax, who have said that this would be a favourable outcome in getting our money back (i paid my deposits to the BGG using my visa debit card). I hope that some of you may be able to make the meeting tomorrow- i know i will be there to get some answers as to where my money has gone, as it didn't make it to Pronovias to pay for my dress! I know that i am not the only bride who is wondering the same thing.
For the past week i have been devastated and worrying about what will happen and how i am going to find another £1,200 to order another dress.
At first when i read the letter from the BGG, i felt abit sorry for them; how their family business has been ruined by the banks and the economy and then i have realised very quickly that it was just a sob story to pull on our heart strings and a ploy to feel sorry for them and somehow minimise their involvement in our disastrous situation.
I hope we all manage to find a solution and get our money/dresses in the end an we can then move on with planning the rest of our special day! xxx

Aliciamc91

Merseybride!!! Go you! I wish I'd known sooner that we could have gone I would have got time off work but couldn't arrange that now! I agree with u and had initially felt sorry for BGG but its a sham and they are tryin to fob us off! Shame on them! Let us know how u get on x

dazswife

I would like to confirm this.
We are a small bridal boutique and have had a telephone call from a TBGG bride asking if we will take delivery of her wedding dress for her wedding on NYE this year. We have agreed to do this and arrange for our seamstress to do the alterations to the dress for her. She has paid her balance direct to the dress supplier so will not pay any money to ourselves except for the alterations as we do have to pay our seamstresses wages.
We have battled for the last 5 years against TBGG when brides have been in to our shop, we have spend hours with them and they have then ordered their dress from TBGG! Why? Nothing to do with our shop or our service, but TBGG offered them 20% discount!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We have refused to do this. We sell our gowns at the designers RRP and continue to win our brides on our exceptional level of service not by offering ridiculous discounts and that's probably why we are still offering this after 21 years in business! Maybe if TBGG had done this, this situation wouldn't have arisen in the first place. So next time you hear a bride saying that she's ringing round to get the best price, refer them to this thread! What appears to be to good to be true usually is!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
In the meantime, we will continue to help any TBGG bride we can to have their dress in time for their wedding. Not to make a profit, but we will not be making a loss either. We want to still be serving our brides in another 21 years!

lillie2107

Racee_Berry wrote: »

Thanks Lillie - Essense are proving rather hard work, probably because of the fact they're in Kansas! Just makes it that little bit harder to get an update from them. I've made the decision not to cancel and re-order the dress and have definitely run out of time to do this now, so I'm praying that nothing more goes wrong - they promised it would be delivered one way or the other, just needed to work the logistics out with other suppliers and the status of the account held with BGG once liquidated etc. It's nice to know that there are other Essense brides out there though

Ive got everything crossed for you. BUT if its any consellation, they do seem to be helping the brides who's weddings are sooner than the rest of us, so im quite confident that you will get your dress especially as you have paid for it , Essence have your order etc. You should get some correspondence soon. xxxx

lillie2107

merseybride wrote: »

Hi Everyone,
This is my second attempt at posting a message on this thread-im not sure if the other one went through but i can't seem to find it anywhere!
I too paid a deposit of £200 in Jan 2012 to the BGG Liverpool store in Woolton. The store then rang me in June 2012 to say that they wanted me to pay them 50% of the cost of the dress so that they could order it in before it got discontinued. So i paid a further £1,000 in june. They asked me to come into the shop to be measured so that they could order my dress. I came in to get measured that month and they said that they would order the dress then. I thought it a little early to be ordering the dress in june as i am not getting married until august 2013, but they said that it takes 8 months to make, plus if it gets discontinued, it would be the only way to ensure that i got that dress.
Obviously, i just went along with what they had told me to do as i didn't have any prior experience a round these things and didn't want to miss out on getting the dress that i wanted and their explanations seemed to make sense at the time as i knew no different.
I couldn't get any answers from the bridal shop which had been emptied, nor from an email which i wrote to them, unless you include the generic email sent to everyone which had no relevance to my situation and confirmed nothing whatsoever. i also emailed Pronovias with no reply also.
I managed to speak with a Pronovias rep who told me that my dress only takes 12 weeks to make, NOT 8 MONTHS, and that MY DRESS HAS NEVER BEEN ORDERED!! I spoke with Begbies and Traynor, the liquidators, who told me that they had spoken with one of the directors of the BGG who said that my dress is in production! The lies are bare faced and just carry on getting deeper by the moment! I told the liquidators that Pronovias have confirmed that my dress had never been ordered so why do the directors continue to lie?? Do they not think that when my dress does not turn up that i may not start to ask questions? The liquidators didn't really comment on this, obviously they do not want to get involved in the specifics!
I asked Begbies and Traynor about the letter they sent us all regarding the creditors meeting; it tells us when it is but fails to say that us as the brides are actually creditors also and have the right to come to the meeting just the same as the suppliers and other creditors.
The creditors meeting will be held tomorrow (31st october) at;
The Racquet Club
Hargreaves Buildings
5 Chapel street
Liverpool
L3 9AG
0151 236 6676 (the Racquet club is around the corner from St Nicholas church, which faces the albert dock)
The room has been hired for the meeting 9.30am-1.30pm. I will be getting there around 9.30, although i think that it doesn't actually start until 10am, but I'm getting there early, just in case.
I was speaking to a friend who works in the tax industry and he has said that if the debt was transferred to the directors themselves, this would mean that the debt would not be liquidated along with the company (BGG LTD). This can only happen if the liquidators are asked by ourselves to do this, and they will do it at their own discretion. If we put our valid points across then they will have to take notice and take action. I have spoken with my bank, Halifax, who have said that this would be a favourable outcome in getting our money back (i paid my deposits to the BGG using my visa debit card). I hope that some of you may be able to make the meeting tomorrow- i know i will be there to get some answers as to where my money has gone, as it didn't make it to Pronovias to pay for my dress! I know that i am not the only bride who is wondering the same thing.
For the past week i have been devastated and worrying about what will happen and how i am going to find another £1,200 to order another dress.
At first when i read the letter from the BGG, i felt abit sorry for them; how their family business has been ruined by the banks and the economy and then i have realised very quickly that it was just a sob story to pull on our heart strings and a ploy to feel sorry for them and somehow minimise their involvement in our disastrous situation.
I hope we all manage to find a solution and get our money/dresses in the end an we can then move on with planning the rest of our special day! xxx

I ordered mine from the Liverpool shop too, but from speaking with my designer they do have my order. But they have no idea how much of the £720 ive paid, they have so im waiting to find that out. How did you get on today? Feed back how it went im sure everybody will want to know. I had no idea where it was or the fact that you can turn up, ill be calling Begbies later this afternoon for an update. All i need is confirmation they have gone into liquidation so i can try and get my money back through my insurance company! Just not what any of us need at all!!!!

Dawnporter_2000

Have you tried your bank? X

dazswife

veryupset85 wrote: »

I spoke to Sophia Tolli at 9.30am this morning and they said they would deal with me direct. I am now worried if my order is going to go through another store and I have to pay again - what price are these other stores going to charge us, will it be the same price that we were paying to the bridal gallery? Also I had 15% off the price of my dress due to a promotion the shop were doing at the time. I am a bit worried about dealing with another store.

Weddings are expensive times and completely understand why people want to get what they want for the best possible price. However, ringing round to get the best price is all well and good, but someone who is willing to sell something at a discount just to get the sale, may be looked at as desperate. This company continually discounted wedding dresses and therefore reduced their profits irrepairably which is one of the reasons this situation has occurred. So if brides go to other shops now to reorder their dresses, they may pay a higher price either because their has been a price increase by the designer since the initial order or because the shop they go to is selling at the RRP and not prepared to jeopodise their business by offering a discount. Maybe if this group had done this in the first place, then we wouldn't be discussing this now.

dazswife

JLS2501 wrote: »

My daughter gets married in May next year and she ordered her dress and bridesmaids dresses in the Tarleton branch of BGG, we have spoke to Ellis Bridal who have been very helpful and confirmed that her dress has been ordered and they will send it to a shop of her choice, however we have not yet contacted Dessy (Alfred Sung) as they are in New York. Has anyone else dealt with them yet? She paid the full amount for the bridesmaids, so in my mind she is the rightful owner of the property IF THEY HAVE BEEN ORDERED?
She has had a letter off BGG but it is no more than what is says on their website, the CC company will not start any action/refunds until BGG have officially declared liquidation. So we wait, as I am sure all you brides are and it's so frustrating and annoying.


UPDATE 24th Oct 9.00: After speaking with a large number of suppliers and brides over the last two days, the best way we can help all brides is to help you work either directly with the bridal designers, or through one of their other local suppliers, to obtain your dress as intended. This will enable you to receive the level of service you expected when you first purchased your dress.
We will be finalising over the next few days what each particular designer would rather their brides do, either work directly or with another supplier, and will contact each bride directly to give you more specific details. We will also post this information on here as and when we have it.
Of course you can also decide to fully cancel your order and obtain a refund for your deposit either through your bridal insurance provider firstly, or through your credit/debit card provider. We are awaiting final details on the process for each of these methods from our Administrators and credit card processors, and we will inform anyone who wishes to do so as soon as possible.
As we have continually stated, our aim has been to make sure we can provide the dress you ordered as intended with as little upset and inconvenience as possible, and we are still pushing forward with attempting to do so.

Hope you get things sorted. As far as your bridesmaid dresses are concerned, unless BGG paid Dessy (Alfred Sung) for them at the time of order, I think you'll find that they will still belong to Dessy! Most bridal shops have accounts with their suppliers and pay for things on account so goods remain the property of the designer until the invoice (sent at time of delivery of the dresses) is paid. But you should be able to reclaim if you paid by debit of credit card. Good luck