Deposit Refunds

Christina wrote: Update from Dublin office. Ashling, Manager, rang me on Thursday and assured me that I would get a call on Monday 6th of February to return my deposit. Guess what?? No phone call and no money in my account. More empty promises. Terrible company, no word. Whole experience terrible. My biggest shock was when I discovered that the lady carrying out the initial tests was an administrator not an optometrist.

Money finally in bank. Took 2 months from my last appointment. Unreal people to deal with.

Heres an update to my story and hopefully my illegally held deposit is winging its way back to my account as of today.
As earlier stated it was over 28 days from my original cancellation date when I contacted Optical Express and was told there was a 7-10 day delay. Well yesterday was the 10th day and as they hadn't called me I had to call them. They were robotically apologetic and told me there was unfortunately another 7-10 days delay as there was a backlog of refunds to be done, to which I pointed out, if Optical Express had a backlog they should be employing more staff to deal with the refunds and not illegally extending their own deadline. It was like talking in circles, I was given the same excuses as 10 days before. Got off the phone furious again. Managed to get hold of phone number for Hugh Kerr, told him I wanted my refund or I would be escalating it to the small claims court, he seemed totally unfazed until I pointed out that Optical Express are in breach of their terms and conditions by not refunding within the 28 days and are therefore operating illegally, at which point he laughed and told me he would get someone called Lindsay Shaw to call me today and issue the refund. Lindsay Shaw didn't but someone else did. They took my card details to process the return of my money. Whilst I waited yesterday I went on every review site I could find and posted my story, I also posted my story on a comment on their Facebook page. Possibly these things also helped.

This morning I got a call from the cancellations dept at OE. I told them that I wanted to cancel and that I wanted a refund of my £500 deposit. They immediately went into hard sell mode trying to get me to carry on with the surgery despite me being adamant that I will not be going ahead. I was also told that as my 7 day cancellation period was up that I would only be entitled to a credit voucher against future services from their stores. This is not good to me, so what do I do now?
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admin: Send your phone number info@opticalexpressruinedmylife.co.uk

I have sent my number can you let me know what happens next please.
P.S they told me they needed an extension of 7-10 days after the 28 days, that time has now passed and they are allowing themselves another 7-10 day so so far 38 days now going on 48 days. for a refund.
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admin: I don't know who you are!
Pls email me info@opticalexpressruinedmylife.co.uk

An update on our situation is that OE called my husband several times after he had made the initial cancellation and then called asking him to attend a phone consultation with Luca Antico. I found out that this practice was banned by the GMC in June last year and warned my husband on this. I shall report this back to the GMC. He subsequently cancelled the consultation in fear that it would somehow negate his cancellation and give OE an excuse not to pay the deposit back. it is due back (28 working days, goodness knows why it has to take that long - oh actually it doesn't) on 1st March so I shall be checking the credit card each day.....

Thank you. I will get in touch with the GMC and have sent you my phone number

I have now been trying to cancel my surgery for the past 3 days after reading numerous stories on how surgery has ruined their eyesight.
On every occasion I have been told that the cancellations dept is too busy but they will call me back. Surely if there are that many people trying to cancel there must be a serious problem?
My initial appointment at Bluewater was on the 18th Jan where I paid a £500 deposit and was booked in for surgery at Westfield White City on the 27th and 28th of this month.
Something that I am also concerned about is that I was also booked in for a 'telephone consultation' with the surgeon Amir Mani on the 20th Feb, is this legal? I would have thought that for any medical procedure, not least something as important and possibly life changing that any consultation with the surgeon should be face to face? I shall be contacting the GMC to check on this.
I do know what to do next to try and cancel this and to get my deposit back, as I am sure that they are just trying to delay until 28 days have passed. Can anyone help?
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admin: Definitely report to the GMC, because their own guideline, introduced on 1 June 2016, states that the surgeon should MEET with the patient prior to the day of surgery! The GMC are useless but this issue needs to be logged with them for future reference!
Pls send your phone number info@opticalexpressruinedmylife.co.uk :kiss:

Update from Dublin office. Ashling, Manager, rang me on Thursday and assured me that I would get a call on Monday 6th of February to return my deposit. Guess what?? No phone call and no money in my account. More empty promises. Terrible company, no word. Whole experience terrible. My biggest shock was when I discovered that the lady carrying out the initial tests was an administrator not an optometrist.

After Sasha's advice, I contacted Hugh Kerr. Just got a call back from him to say someone from his customer care team will contact me shortly and my deposit will be placed back on my card today. He also said if I had any further problems I can call him back on the mobile number he was calling from and he would look into it.
Good luck to everyone who is waiting for their deposit and a BIG THANK YOU AGAIN TO SASHA!
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admin: Hugh Kerr is OE Group Operations Director - he's all heart
www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/optical-ex...er-hugh-kerr-3088318

I am in the exact same position. I attended my consultation on 12th December. I couldn't advise anyone enough to STAY AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY!!! They are so quick to push you into paying a deposit, with a free 7 day no obligation money back guarantee. I have had nothing but a nightmare dealing with people who are unable to give me my money back! The customer care line is constantly busy. This is not surprising dealing with the disgraceful customer care they provide!!
I am contacting the small claims court for legal advice.