TOPIC: Deposit Refunds

We received this today so fingers crossed! Will update on future developments

With regard to your son’s deposit refund, I can confirm that in-line with our cancellation policy as outlined in the Terms and Conditions document which was provided to your son at his consultation, we would ordinarily retain £150, owing to the cancellation having been made more than three (3) days after booking the surgery, but up to seven (7) days before the pre-surgery discussion. Our terms and conditions are also clearly displayed on our website.

I can see from your son’s records that you were incorrectly informed by a member of Optical Express staff that he would receive a full refund of the £500 deposit which was paid.* We will honour this, and thereafter investigate and address the issue with the member of staff in question.

Almost all members of our finance department, including all of our refunds team, are currently on furlough. In light of the Covid-19 pandemic and the ongoing lockdown situation in Scotland where our Headquarters and Finance team are located, the refund will be processed no later than 12th June 2020.

Thank you again for contacting us.

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admin: Signed by Colin Berry, following an email sent to David Moulsdale on Friday, advising that an MCOL would be issued if confirmation of their son's refund was not received by today. However, there is no reason why they have to wait until 12 June - or had to wait at all!

* OE are not entitled to retain £150, no matter when the surgery was cancelled - their T&Cs are not legal

No excuse for Optical Express to refuse to refund people's deposits immediately


www.opticalexpress.co.uk/magazine/article/covid-19-update



And if you have previously asked OE for your refund but not received it, I advise that you make your complaint here asap:
www.gov.uk/government/publications/cma-t...ellation-and-refunds

* Don't do it - your eyes are precious and irreplaceable!

For the record people, there is NO 'government directive’ OR ‘Coronavirus restrictions’ to prevent OE processing refunds as Allan McEwan, Stephen Hannan et al claim - to the contrary

And to repeat what I posted on 23 April, I strongly advise anyone who has made an advance payment to Optical Express not to ignore this warning - be it a deposit or full cost of 'postponed' surgery, ask for your money to be refunded as a matter of urgency!*


www.gov.uk/government/publications/cma-t...ellation-and-refunds



'Use this service to report a business you believe is behaving unfairly during the Coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.’
www.coronavirus-business-complaint.service.gov.uk/

*David Moulsdale was a director of Bridgewater Hospital (Manchester) Limited which went into administration in 2015, leaving thousands of patients without legal recourse or medical aftercare, and unsecured creditors owed £3,403,065.99.
beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/SC312752/filing-history

Under a legal scam, Bridgewater Hospital reopened as Bridgewater Wellness Clinic, listed with Companies House as Bridgewater Clinic Limited.
beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/SC506037/filing-history

I am awaiting a refund from Optical Express for £7490 which is a lot of money. This refund is what I paid for Lens exchange surgery that was scheduled for 11th March 2020 which they cancelled on the day of the of the scheduled surgery as I have health issues that they knew about when they took my money!
I was already at Optical Express Bridgewater Wellness Clinic in Manchester when they cancelled this surgery. I did not even see the surgeon on the day of the expected surgery, who was Dr Pedro Muel-Gonzalez.
I was told that I had to pay a deposit which was for £500 which I paid on 31st January. I was also told I had to pay for the surgery in full before the scheduled date and I paid £6.990 on 28th February.
I have repeatedly telephoned and e-mailed Optical Express to no avail requesting a refund. I am aware they have given refunds to other customers but they still refuse to acknowledge when they will give me my refund.
I have advised them I am a vulnerable pensioner and I am experiencing hardship during the present Covid restrictions but they are still declining to pay back the refund due to me.

We canceled my autistic son's surgery by phone the very next day after a consultation at Optical Express in Bristol on 5 March when we were pressured to leave a £500 deposit even before talking to a surgeon. Several days later they phoned back to confirm a follow up appointment with the surgeon (Luca Antico) to which we replied we have cancelled and they then said 'oh yes'!

This is all by the way before any Covid-19 lockdown. Multiple emails have followed requesting the money back but to no avail so far, with them just stating they are closed and cannot refund.

We have noted they are actually refunding some people and have stated in an email to them on 12 April that we see no reason that a bacs transfer cannot be made - or even a cheque as long as it doesn't bounce!

No response since that last email.
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IMPORTANT INFO
If you have asked Optical Express for your overdue refund and been told that they can't give it to you because of 'government restrictions' at this time - they are lying!

The company has refunded a number of deposits this month, they are simply using the current situation as an excuse to hold on to people's money longer than they usually do until challenged.

Since early April, I have listened to phone conversations between people wanting their money back and OE employees - some of which were recorded - proving OE to be lying when they claim they can't process payments!

I have one recording of Allan McEwan taking card details from a cancelling customer whose refund was processed back to their account within a few days.



I strongly advise anyone who has made an advance payment to Optical Express - be it a deposit or full cost of 'postponed' surgery - to chase them for your money back as a matter of urgency, because I suspect that the company may go into administration soon, and I will publishing my reasoning for this in due course.

If I'm wrong, no problem, because you can simply reschedule when life has returned to some sort of normalcy - by which time I hope you'll have done more research and given up on the idea

But if I'm right - there will be no money refunded to customers, your deposits will have been swept into an offshore account!

They've done it before - www.opticalexpressruinedmylife.co.uk/ind...ress-david-moulsdale

i was checking out about Optical Express reviews and found out I'm not the only victim of their scams.
Same methods - they have been doing it for years i'm shocked how the goverment have done nothing about it ?
My deposit was held up since 06/03/2020. They took £1000 but after I couldn't go through with the operation they said they will keep my deposit for 28 days ???
I found it bizarre and since then with Covid 19 lockdown they send me one email saying they can't get in touch with me within 4 weeks more! This is not right!
Pls advise how I deal with this company Optical Express as really they need to stop doing there scams!

Kind regards
Tarek


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This was a very interesting read. I have myself spoken to Allan McEwan today (9 April) and was informed that no refunds will be processed due to the government regulations regarding coronavirus.

My initial consultation was on 7 March in Tallaght, Dublin, and I was advised that I'm eligible for the iDesign Lasik treatment. This had a much higher price point than I expected, which made me put second thoughts into the surgery at this point in time. However, I felt very cornered and pressured to pay the deposit of €395 on the spot, so I did. On Tuesday 10 March I contacted the Scottish office saying that I wished for my deposit to be refunded, to which they responded that someone from the Tallaght office would contact me. No one did.

On Friday 10 March I used the chat function on OE's website to ask for a status update on the refund. The adviser told me the refunds/admin team would handle my request and that there was no further action required from my side on the matter. He also mentioned that OE normally would process refunds well within those 28 days.

On Wednesday 25 March I received an email from Paul Hazelton which stated "my appointment has been postponed" due to the uncertain circumstances. At this point I had still not even received a confirmation that I wished for my appointment to be cancelled.

This is obviously the short version of my story but after reading some comments on this forum I feel disheartened about getting my deposit back. I am aware that it relates to a relatively small amount compared to the sums others have paid (or worse, physical consequences suffered), but this really is a matter of principle. No respectable company treats their customers this way.

Congratulations to Pauline and the others who have had lucky outcomes in dealing with this company. It's a shame it seems to be so few of us who did.
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5 December 2019 Daniel Weaver wrote: 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

Finally have my money back after waiting nearly 5 months for the deposit money back thanks to Sasha!!!!
I issued a MCOL in November which Optical Express asked for the deadline to be extended which took us to the end of December and then I got offered mediation which I asked Sasha to represent me. I had let the courts know who was representing me but Sasha didn't receive a phone call on the date which it should of gone ahead 27th January.
We didn't hear anything until we received a letter to fill out a Directions Questionnaire at the beginning of February. I filled it in and sent a copy to the courts and to Optical Express, which it stated to do on the letter. This meant Optical Express would have had to do the same but I didn't receive anything from them!
I then received another letter on the 13th March 2020 saying that my claim had been sent to the County Court and to await further directions.
On 17th March I received an email from the legal team at Optical Express to say they would refund my £500 deposit and £35 fee to issue the MCOL. I replied to the email straight away to agree to the refund then heard nothing back.
I tried to contact Optical Express on the 27th March to ask what was happening about my refund, they told me that the finance team were not working due to the COVID-19 situation, I said that shouldn't matter as I responded before everyone stopped working. They stated that they would look into it and get back to me.
I hadn't heard anything back so emailed Stephen Hannan to state that if I didn't receive confirmation of refund that I would be issuing a CCJ. He emailed back straight away to say it would be sent out first class on Monday 30th March and I should receive it Tuesday.



By Friday 3rd April I hadn't received a cheque so my partner contacted David Moulsdale himself who was very shocked at us contacting him and told us to go through his lawyers and put the phone down.
He then rang back and proceeded to tell my partner that Sasha was a big fraudster and I didn't know who I was dealing with and said “she fabricates the proof so that I have to pay big money out. The judges feel sorry for the claimants so they are refunded.”
He said he’d get his colleague to send some documents to prove it but he still didn't tell me when I would receive my refund.
I then received an email from his colleague Mary-Frances Kelly attaching a document that she said "will provide you with some interesting background on the individual you referred to on your call with Mr Moulsdale”. It was a newspaper article from about 25 years ago when Sasha and her university friends played a prank on the press and it was very funny, but it had nothing to do with this so not sure why David Moulsdale thought we’d be interested.
Mary-Frances Kelly said she had checked and a cheque was sent out on the 30th March (which contradicted Stephen Hannan saying they that they had stopped working on 27th March) and to get in contact if I hadn't received it by Monday 6th March
Nothing received on the 6th and Stephen Hannan asked for another 24hrs to see if it arrived and if not they would issue a bank transfer and cancel the cheque. I agreed to give them 24hrs…..
Still no cheque so I asked for a bank transfer (which they could have done in the first place) and Stephen Hannan replied to say it would be in by 9th April.
I finally received my money this morning after starting court proceedings at the end of November 2019 so please don't give up!!
I couldn't of done it without all the help of Sasha and just so glad I found this site before I ruined my life.

Further to my earlier post, I have today been told that my refund of £1590.00 has been returned to my card.

On 27th March I emailed David Moulsdale asking for my refund and also why I had been charged £200.00 more than was advertised. Didn't receive a reply so emailed him again on 5th April and told him if no-one contacted me within 48 hours, that my refund was being returned, I would start court proceedings. Also sent a copy of that email to Stephen Hannan.

On 7th April I received a phone call from Allan McEwan who told me that they would do my refund but due to only a handful of staff working, it would take a few days but he would contact me with a daily update, which I agreed to. Shortly after that I received an email from Stephen Hannan who acknowledged the call and said they would contact me again within 24 hours.



When no-one had contacted me, I rang Allan McEwan and he manually processed the refund back to my card there and then.

None of this would have happened without the help and advice of Sasha, who has been amazing through all of this.

Sasha you are doing such a good job, I know my situation was only money but there are so many other people who have life changing difficulties that you are helping, so thank you very much.

Good Luck with your ongoing campaign

Keep well, keep safe

With grateful thanks
Pauline