TOPIC: Deposit Refunds

The partial refund £350 deposit has finally gone back onto the credit card. The remaining money they owe me (£150), I'm certain will be joining it in due course!

On 5 December 2019 i had an assessment at OE Norwich store for lens replacement surgery. I was told by the optician Suckbir Sangha that i could try some surgical contact lenses to see if i would benefit from the surgery (i am complaining about Suckbir to GOC given that i have a lazy left eye). I had to pay £500 deposit before they could order the lenses, which i did. I returned to the store on 12 December to try the lenses but it was quite obvious as soon as i tried them that it was not going to work. The optician said she would process my cancellation and that i would get my deposit back within 3 weeks. I have telephoned the Norwich store several times in the last few weeks but still have not got my deposit back.

A couple of weeks ago i spoke to Bob at the Norwich store who looked into this, he left a message on my phone saying i should get my deposit back 22/23 January, i am still waiting. On 23 January i spoke to the Norwich store manager who said he had spoken to HO and they said my deposit was being processed. This situation is totally unacceptable.

So quick update.

Thank you Sasha you’ve helped a ton - two day’s after contacting Sasha I had ALL my money refunded!

Thanks again Sasha

Update: After tweeting Optical Express Care @OEcare on December 13th, I received a very quick DM and was promised that an email confirmation of the cancellation would be sent out. My tweet is still on their page. I heard nothing back and so today sent another DM and they promised they would get this sorted right away.
Into my inbox just now finally arrived the confirmation email. Very business like and to the point, helpfully attaching a copy of their terms and conditions, and reminding me again that, "When paying a deposit, you agree to the terms outlined within the terms and conditions" and advising me that they are retaining £150 of my £500 deposit and my partial refund will be made around the 9th of January.
As I posted on December 2nd I have no intention of leaving my £150 with this company and will fight for it to be refunded.
I have also made a complaint to the General Optical Council.

So the story is I went through the pre-consultation back in October and was told I was qualified so they scheduled me for Dec 11th to have Lasek idesign on both of my eyes for £5549 (I fully paid) I get to the appointment with Dr. Muhammad Kazmi and he was brilliant, explained everything to me the different portions of my eye, he also advised me my eyes were just to thin to proceed and extremely dangerous to get the procedure ultimately he advised against me going forward, so I heeded his advice and decided to not proceed.

I was told I’d receive a phone call the next day but still haven’t. It’s only been two days but after reading so many horror stories thought I’d ask Sasha what she thinks or what anyone else thinks. Have they gotten better at timely refunds or do they still try and keep them?
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admin: They will do their utmost to hang on to the money for as long as possible, hence why you haven’t had a phone call. And if you don’t chase them they certainly won’t chase you!
I will respond to your email ASAP 😎

Managed to get a refund in two weeks. I decided against the symphony IOL multifocal after seeing what can go so wrong. I dodged a a whole heap of problems. Thanks Sasha for your assistance and help.

Update: No email confirmation of the cancellation in my inbox from OE as promised. I emailed Stephen Hannan, asking him to facilitate the confirmation email, but the email bounced back with the following message:



I don't know what this message means, but all in all is seems to be a very unprofessional way of conducting business.

I was told I had to wait 28 working days to get my refund of 2500 from optical express,since getting in touch with sasha she as helped me through everything brilliantly, and I received 2000 within a couple of days, but I am still 500 short, sasha advised me to make an online claim which i am just waiting to hear back from

Just managed to get through to Cancellations on the phone and spoke to "Jamie" who tried his hardest to persuade me to continue with the surgery. He tried to scare me by saying the cataracts will only get worse and eventually I'll lose my sight so I should get the surgery done sooner than later and that Dr Teenan was one of the most highly respected experts in the entire field!
And why wouldn't I want to be free of glasses?!! (The sales person told me that if I had this surgery my cataracts would be gone, my distance, intermediate and near vision would be good enough never to need glasses again: indeed, "freedom from spectacles" was the reason they put down on one of their many forms - which I did think was kind of secondary to cataract removal in my case, but I didn't mention this at the time…)
He also said that even though I've got a new prescription ordered that won't be any use because it won't take the blurriness of the cataract away - ie it won't affect the cataract!
I stood my ground and kept repeating that I was not ready for surgery atm and after nearly 20 minutes he conceded by telling me that the deposit, all bar £150, would be refunded up to 28 days back onto the credit card.
When I queried this, he said. "Well you got our T & Cs with you at the time of the initial consultation and it states clearly they’re our policies”
I replied that I hadn't signed the T & C's but he said that signing wasn't necessary!! He also said he would keep the £150 on my patient file in case I wanted to spend it on anything with Optical Express in the future and that the consultation I had just cancelled was still valid for 6 months.
I asked him for a confirmation email re the cancellation and he said he would try to get one to today or tomorrow at the latest.
But I have no intention of leaving my £150 with Optical Express because I will never set foot through their doors again.
I'll let you know what happens.

[Posted by Jud99]
I have a pre surgery discussion with David Teenan in Glasgow booked for 19 December and the surgery for NLR Multifocal (both eyes) booked on 28 December. I have only paid the £500 deposit at this moment in time. I had been noticing recent difficulties seeing clearly in my right eye lately.
I am 55 and I have worn glasses since I was 13 and have severe myopia and astigmatism and a few years ago I found I needed reading glasses as well.
I went to Specsavers in early November as I thought my multifocal glasses were not right. I was seeing everything mainly in the distance part of the lens as slightly blurry and after testing and examination they told me I had early cataracts in both eyes, the right eye being worse. They also said that cataracts can make myopia worse, hence the reason why my distance vision was not so clear. They said at some point in the future I would have to have surgery, but glasses would do just fine for the present.
I came out of Specsavers and immediately began researching online to see if there was laser or another kind of treatment that could deal with all of this. The Optical Express website made it all sound so wonderfully easy, and with the inevitability of lens surgery at some point I went along to my free consultation at OE, who conducted tests and confirmed, yes, I did indeed have cataracts and they had this amazing solution which would be multifocal lenses.
My cataracts would be gone, my distance, intermediate and near vision would be good enough never to need glasses again: indeed, "freedom from spectacles" was the reason they put down on one of their many forms - which I did think was kind of secondary to cataract removal in my case, but I didn't mention this at the time as I was on a high, thinking about this miracle treatment.
This would be performed by their very own experienced surgeon Dr David Teenan who they said was wonderful. They mentioned very briefly about risks and complications such as Halos, but they said this was rare and most people got used to them.
They said multifocals were not at all like the MF glasses - with the implants you "saw" two images and had to "choose the correct one", but not to worry as my brain would soon adapt.
I was a bit concerned with this but they presented it as a piece of cake! So I paid my £500 deposit and went home with my surgery date and pre surgery consult all booked, although I still owed them the small sum of £7990!
Since then I've been doing quite a lot of research, mainly to prepare my questions for Dr Teenan, but the more I looked at Multifocals Lens replacement, the more I began to have my doubts. I just can't get my head round how you actually SEE with them and then there's all the night and low light phenomena, not to mention the list of risks and complications.
I have lost confidence in multifocals and was even considering just getting toric monos and then buying reading glasses. I felt that I could mangage just fine with reading glasses if my distance vision was clear, but I don't even trust OE to do that now and as my cataracts are still relitavely small, I can just get a set of new variofocal glasses for the moment and consider toric mono lenses when things get worse - but I don't think I'll go with Optical Express.
Maybe I'm just running scared, but the more I read (especilally on this forum) the more I think that surgery could either be a great success or a terrible failure and I'm just not willing to risk my sight. I was going to attend the pre surgery discussion on 19th Dec and then decide, but I would be interested to know what other people think?
I have couple of questions: What is the phone number for the cancellation department and should I push to get my deposit back? According to their T&C's I've now read online I'm out of time for the full amount to be refunded and I will only get £150, but it's a lot of money for me and maybe someone here can help/advice please?
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admin: To cancel surgery, call 0800 0232020 - but because Optical Express cancellation department is allegedly understaffed, and they frequently claim that the system is down, you should email Clinical Services Director Stephen Hannan - This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. - he'll make sure it goes to the correct dept.
Be prepared then for a phone call pushing you to change your mind, offering to hold on to your money in case you do so, or suggesting you accept vouchers to spend in store. Ask for email confirmation of your cancellion - which they will often try to refuse!
Email me for advice on how to get your FULL deposit refunded - because no matter whst they claim, OE are not legally entitled to keep ANY of it
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.