My Bad Business Experience and What I did about it

I registered online for a belly dancing workshop and paid through PayPal, it was $60 total for 3 classes at $20 each. The workshop was being held in a dance studio in Columbus, Ohio (so about a 2 hour drive for me) and I was to meet up with the other dancers and follow them to the place.

However, in a tragic twist of events, we failed to meet up and so I ended up driving myself, and when I made it to Columbus I couldn’t find the studio anywhere. I tried looking it up with Google Maps, calling the number on the website (no answer) and asking other businesses in the vicinity if they knew where it was with no luck.

Finally, I found the place (which was housed within another dance studio with a different name) and the door was locked, so I texted one of the other dancers I knew and when they had a break between classes she got my text and came to let me in. I had missed the first two classes ($40 wasted) and was able to participate in part of the last class.

One of the other dancers suggested that I ask for a refund since I missed the classes and she thought the owner would be very understanding. At first, it seemed that she was and she said she would write me a check for the $40 and bring it to me later that evening at the performance.

Well, the performance was ending and I was ready to go home and still no word from her about the refund, so I approached her and asked if she brought the check. She got very nasty with me and said she didn’t have time to deal with that and I would have to come back another time and get it settled. I explained to her that I came from out of town and that it would be easiest for me if we could do it right then.

Well, apparently, that was considered harassment and she said I would have to leave the premises or I would be kicked out. Obviously, I didn’t feel I was in the wrong, but I didn’t want to incur any legal trouble myself so I left and went home.

When I got home, I did file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau and was refunded the partial amount of $20.

Even though the refund wasn’t as much as I had hoped, the satisfaction of filing a complaint was pretty satisfactory, and it kind of worked.