Deposit Refunds

Hello everyone,
Like most people in their 40s my eyesight started to deteriorate but I never really thought about having laser eye treatment until I was pressured by Optical Express, constantly seeing their pop up ads for laser eye surgery. I am currently unemployed so I was unable to afford it but my boyfriend said if it’s £395 to go ahead and he would help pay. OE called to book my appointment on the 18th April. After filling in the form they took me to a room, where they did some eye tests on machines. At the end of the consultation, I was given contact lenses and told that after the surgery I would be able to see the way I could see with the contact lenses. After that they rushed me to the finance room and told me it was £3,990! I was shocked at the price and told the woman I wouldn't be able to afford this. She told me I had a voucher for a discount up to £2,000 and if I wanted the big discount I should act now and pay the deposit of £400 immediately and I could pay the rest on a finance agreement.
I told her to give me time to go home and speak to my boyfriend, but she told me no, if I wanted it I should call him now, and she showed me a phone on the table and left the room.
I rang my boyfriend to discuss this and he said he only had £100 so I rang my daughter and she loaned me £300.
I told the woman that I'm not working so how would the finance work. She said my boyfriend would be my guarantor and she gave me papers to sign and booked me in for the operation on the 27th April and gave me the leaflet for the Westfields branch in White City and asked me to go there before the operation day to set up the face with my boyfriend.
She did not tell me any information about the surgery or the whole procedure. She just told me to come with sunglasses on the day of the operation. Before the date of my surgery I went to Westfield but they said there was no-one able to set up finances for me that day and apologised and said someone will call me to set it up over the phone.
Nobody rang me so I decided to ring them, which I had to do numerous times. Nobody got back to me and it felt weird that a big company such as Optical Express would work like this.
I didn't go to my operation as nobody had set up my finances despite all the effort I put trying to contact them. During this time also I lost my trust in the company as I felt it was dodgy and didn't want to go through with the operation.
I did some research into the company and found many people had experienced the same problems. Now it has been two weeks and they still havent rung me. I feel like I have been robbed. English is my second language. This sort of things happen in 3rd world countries but I never expected it from a company in the UK.
They have no right to keep my deposit for two weeks.
I eventually got through to them once with email and once over the phone, but they told me my deposit is not refundable but I intend to fight to get it back!

Thank you.

Great News: I wanted to let you know that last night I received the complete refund from Optical Express

I have nothing more than words of gratitude to Sasha and her campaign My Beautiful Eyes. I'm completely sure that without her help, support and advice I would not have get the complete refund from Optical Express.

I hope you continue doing this great job Sasha!

Update: As of this morning the full amount paid for my cancelled surgery is back in my account!

Thank you so much Sasha, I have no doubt that posting here was the reason OE contacted me. I only wish I had found this site sooner.

Keep up your amazing work and thanks again!

Jemma

Dan from OE left me a phone message saying that the refund of the full amount of my £5500 payment had been authorised. I told her I wanted my refund immediately as it was their fault I did not have the surgery on Saturday as scheduled, not mine.

Today, Lynn from OE called me and took the card details of the debit cards used to pay the deposit and the additional balance and said the refund was going to be processed today. She sent me a confirmation email this afternoon saying that the refund was processed and the money would leave their account immediately and be in mine between 3-5 working days.

I am very happy about this and cant be more grateful to you Sasha for all your help, advice and support. You gave me confidence and empowered me, and I really think that there should be more people like you helping people like me fighting against dishonest companies like OE.

I hope to see the money in my account soon.

Thanks
Natalia

Just to let you know that my card details were processed at 6 pm by OE. Apparently Lynsay Shaw called me at 4:30pm - in spite of my being told in an earlier phone call that she was off work until Tuesday! I called back at 6 and they immediately offered to take my card details. The money should be back in my account in a few days. If it's not another post on here might do the trick...

In the meantime, thanks very much, Sasha. Keep up the good work against such obvious shysters!

Keep pestering. and threaten small claims court. That's what my mum did & she received it this morning. Just don't give up!!!

Like the rest of you I have been promised a refund from Optical Express which has yet to arrive. It is now over two months since they cancelled my operation. At the time I was assured that I would be refunded both the deposit (£400) and the remaining cost of the treatment - £3,890, which I had paid up front.

After having initially been told that my refund wold take up to 28 days to arrive I got in touch with them again. Yesterday they told me they very sorry for the delay but there had been a fault with the processing equipment in the banking department, but nevertheless I would receive my money within the next ten days.

When I called up today I was told that the authorisation had yet to been granted for the release of my money(!) but that they would call me within "5-7 working days". No mention was made of the supposed fault in their processing equipment.

From reading this discussion board and others like it I can see that my experience is hardly unique. I find it shocking that a supposedly reputable company can treat its customers like this.

Do you know of anyone I could contact directly at Optical Express about this matter? Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Gareth
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admin: Contactinfo@opticalexpressruinedmylife.co.uk :kiss:

Perhaps Dan had surgery at OE herself, because I can’t find anything in the T&Cs saying that lenses could take up to 12 weeks to arrive!

Unless of course OE interpret "postponement of treatment" due to non arrival of lenses as "due to equipment failure”?

We’ll find out in court, when I will of course publish details.

Meanwhile, I know I have poor vision, but even with the help of reading glasses and a magnifying glass I found it difficult to read this document. Presumably why a blue background was chosen, so the text is already blurred even without OE adminstering dilating eye drops before asking customers to sign it!

Dan from OE just called and offered me another £500 discount off the treatment.

I told her that I don't want treatment and I want my money refunding because I am not willing to risk my eyes with Optical Express. She said they would only refund £4,500 pounds because I signed a disclaimer document that says I can’t get back my £1,000 deposit even if the lenses don't arrive, and that the document also says that the lenses can take up to 12 weeks to arrive after the consent appointment. So she is basically saying that I have to pay for lenses that are not in my eyes!

When I went to the first appointment at Optical Express Westfield clinic in February they put drops in my eyes before I signed the disclaimer document and did not give me a copy. (Dan said she would post a hard copy to me but why did they not give me a copy on the day?)

They also told me that if I did not pay the deposit immediately and schedule the surgery for March, they could not give me the discount. So they made me book my surgery for 20 and 27 March even though they knew the lenses could take up to 12 weeks to arrive just to take my money from me.

I told her that at my consent appointment I was informed that if the supplier advised that they were unable to deliver in time Optical Express would call me to reschedule the surgery, but instead of doing this they sent me a confirmation letter (which now Dan claims was just computer generated) and then the customer service team called me two weeks before the surgery to confirm, and of course they also called to take payment the date before.

Her only explanation for all of this was that there was a problem of miscommunication between the staff in OE.

I am now going to take legal action and report this company to the Financial Ombudsman and Trading Standards because this must be an illegal scam!

Thank goodness the lenses did not arrive in time!

Hi

My name is Natalia Burbano and I am 30 years old. Early in February '15 I went to the Westfield branch of Optical Express in White City. Because I have high Myopia and Astigmatism they said my only option was to have Natural Lens Enhancement surgery (NLE), implanting Intraocular lens on top of my own and it would cost £6,200, but if I paid £1,000 deposit I could have a discount, but only if I paid immediately. I did so and they scheduled my consent appointment for 17 February. Some weeks later, they rescheduled my appt for 3 March.

At the consent appointment at Harley Street surgeon Dimitris Kazakos told me I was suitable for the procedure and scheduled my first surgery on 18 April for my right eye (my lazy eye) and 25 April for the left eye. They told me that because they had to order the lens from an overseas supplier the surgery might have to be rescheduled but they would contact me if necessary. In fact, a few weeks later they sent a letter confirming both surgery dates.

Two weeks before the first surgery, OE called and told me that they needed to change the time from 8:45 to 8:30am and the surgeon would be Alex George, not Dimitri Kazakos.

On 17 April they called and asked me to pay the outstanding £4,500 balance which I did.

On Saturday 18 April I arrived at the Westfield clinic in time for surgery at 8:30am, but after waiting one hour they told me the surgery would have to be rescheduled (they did not know when) because the lens had not arrived, yet they had taken full payment from me the day before knowing this! I felt I had been misled and that I couldn’t trust them with my eyes so I told them I wanted to cancel.

The person dealing with me ( I don't remember his name) told me I have the right to cancel - and also to receive compensation as I had to put some medicine in my eyes over three days before the surgery and needed to wear my glasses for more than two months - I don't see as well with glasses! - because their optometrist, Stephanie, told me I needed to stop using contact lenses before the surgery to hydrate my eyes.

As I don't trust OE after everything they have done to me, I called the cancellation team that same day and they told me they were not working. I called again three times on Monday 20 April and each time customer services told me that someone in the cancellation team would contact me shortly. Yesterday, 21 April, I called again and finally spoke with Lawrence McLaughlin who told me (in a very rude way) that they may not refund the money because it was the suppliers fault the surgery was not done, not theirs, and they will contact me within 48 hours with an answer.

I told him I don't want to reschedule the surgery because I cant trust my eyes to a company that doesn't care about the patients, able to call me the day before surgery to take the payment but telling me the lenses hadn’t arrived and surgery had to be postponed. This makes me feel they only care about money.

I think I have been very lucky because if the lenses had arrived I would not have found this website and read of so many problems people have had. This could have been me!

I don't want to reschedule surgery with Optical Express and I want my payment refunded. Could you please advise me what I should?

Thanks
Natalia
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admin: Pls email info@opticalexpressruinedmy life and I wiil be happy to advise