Sometimes it is unbelievable that companies still exist. They scam thousands of people out of their money and keep getting away with it. Take this furniture store called Rooms and Furniture Accessories in Mississauga that exists since at least 2012. One search on Google and loads of complaints in capital letters pop up: DO NOT BUY. And still here they are, earning money by defrauding their hard working costumers.
We received a message at Canadian Fraud News from Alex who lost around $55,000 dollars to Rooms in November this year. He owns a printing company and made flyers for the furniture store. They said he would be paid in cheques but all three of them bounced at the bank.
Complaints from consumers online
This April Kimberley ordered new furniture at Rooms and paid a deposit to ‘reserve the price’. She writes in her complaint that the store is closed permanently when she went to pick up the order. And she never got her money back: “they are thieves”.
A similar story by Sandra was posted in February. She bought a couch set end of 2015 that would be delivered in January. But her furniture did not arrive. Rooms kept telling her that the deliveryman was sick or it was kept in China. She paid the full price and waited more than three months: “they are scammers”. It is unclear if the couch ever got delivered.
A confused consumer posts: “I would like to know why these people are still in business. They appear to be running some sort of Ponzi scheme, they take your money and pay for someone else’s furniture that paid for their furniture months before.”
What to do when you become a victim
Norman Groot, fraud recovery lawyer, handles numerous consumer fraud cases and tells us this is not uncommon: “this seems like a straight forward case. The expense is going through the litigation process if Rooms will not respond to a demand letter.” Most people do not go to court for ‘small’ cases like this. Really your only outlet is media and writing a bad review.
Lawyer Groot: “If someone wishes to bring a civil action, the process is an initial retainer where we investigate and provide our legal opinion on proving liability, quantifying damages and providing a recovery strategy.”
