[ExposeTheScum]

April 24, 2009...BUYER BEWARE - I purchased a Garmin GPS on Wednesday afternoon on the 86th Street Photo & Video website. The GPS unit was showing "in stock". Wednesday evening I received a call from 86th Street Photo customer service. The person said they needed to "verify" the order. "Verify" apparently means high pressure sells tactics to upsell accessories that are grossly overpriced (500% in this case). I was told I would receive an email with tracking information by Thursday morning. The email never came. I called Thursday evening and the extremely rude 86th Street employee informed me that I would need to call back Friday morning. I logged back on their website Friday morning and the status on the order was showing "back ordered". I cancelled the order online.

I called the credit card company to flag this company in case they try to charge. The person from the credit card company was familiar with the unethical business practices of 86th Street Photo. Additionally, the credit card company requested I keep a hard copy of the transactions so they could aggressively pursue 86th Street Photo, if necessary.

Several interesting observations regarding 86th Street's website;
1) They have a "Five Star Certified Merchant" declaration posted on their home page. This means tuck-tail, grab your wallet and run. Any merchant that displays this in the future is automatically avoided.
2) They have "5 Reasons to Buy From Us" posted on their home page. All five reasons do not apply to this merchant. They should change this to "5 Reasons to Buy From Anyone But Us" and the list could be much longer.
3) They have "Customer Testimonials" on their home page. The single testimonial must be the owner or a family member of the owner.

Buyer beware,

Expose the Merchant Scum