Ciao Café > Buyer Beware!

Advantages: Beware of Franchises, use people who have been recommended
Disadvantages: Too expensive for an ok product, it's hard to find out what it will cost you

We had the same sort of experience last Christmas. We were given a £125.00 voucher by some friends who had bought it at a local shopping centre.The photos were fun and lots of them were 'high key' ie photoshopped. The high pressure sales technique really put me off and my husband and I ended up spending £600.00!!!! On a recommendation from a friend recently we went to see a local photographer at his weekend stall in Northcote Road London SW11. The ... Read review

Advantages: ?
Disadvantages: Bad news if you're on special diets

Supposing you were allergic to something, for example nuts - and you buy a product which, on the ingredients, does not state that it does, or MAY contain nuts. You eat it, and then - well, we all know how bad things can be. Now, I don't claim that people who don't eat pork have the same problems as people who can't eat nuts - not eating pork is a lifestyle choice, and not a life threatening issue. My beef [excuse the pun]however, is with products ...
...flavoured whole chicken, was really looking forward dinner that evening. My husband, just out of curiosity was reading the label as I popped the bird in the oven. He said - "Indigo, did you know that this has got pork flavourings in it?" - "No -" I says. And I looked, and to my horror, the said was true. I pulled the chicken [if I may be so bold as to call it that] out, put it back in its wrapper, and proceeded to take it back from whence it came. ... Read review

Advantages: Website is very straight forward and simple to use. Service is good value.
Disadvantages: Goods very delayed. Might never have got there if I hadn't noticed a problem!

I recently bought some items with MandM Direct which unfortunately had to be returned (Superdry Clothing was not designed to fit "normal" people!) and noticed on their website that they were advertising a company that offered cheaper rates than Royal Mail for returning goods. I had a quick look at the details and thought I would give it a whirl. So I went on and followed some very simple instructions on the Collect + website. I have to say that at ...
...easy to use and explained things very well. You type in your postcode and it tells you the nearest place to take you parcel, which would be a local corner shop or similar. Then you have to book it in on the website and pay. Then you print a label out, stick it on the parcel and then take it to the place you chose. All very simple! I really did like the whole experience up until now. I took my parcel in to the shop on 27th October and got my receipt ... Read review

Advantages: Site does pay out
Disadvantages: Treats you like dirt

Ask me thoughts about the american site Reviewstream and up to a few days ago it would have all been quite on the positive scale..so what went wrong? Well last year my penpal (Leeanne160480) introduced me to world of Dooyoo, and ciao and a few months later told me about another paid review site she had found called Reviewstream. I immediately took to Dooyoo and found it easy to use so assumed the same of Reviewstream. My first impressions of the ...
...of a 'mish mash' - all over the place and not quite as easy and user friendly looking as it's counterparts as ciao and Dooyoo. First a quick rundown of the site: Find a user name Write a review Submit and wait to see if it's been accepted Get paid Once your account totals $50 you can request payment through paypal..how simple..or is it? You don't actually enter any personal details or even log in like you do on some other sites. What happens is you ... Read review

Advantages: None
Disadvantages: Plenty

Equiniti The company that is the share registraer for BT, they are also a Stockbroker. Avoid dealing with this company like the plague. I wanted to sell BT shares but to cut a long story short the Share certificates I held had been replaced by a new issue, easy since I sold shares with Equniti I can get replacement certificate which should have been issued to me in the first place. Wrong, incomptence is not a strong enough word to use with this company. ...
...to them lost. 2. Incorrect documentation returned to me. 3. Lost Documentation sent by registered post once Equniti signed it was lost in their system twice. 4. Documentation sent to me but not sent until 7 days after they said sent stamp franking proves my point. 5. Phoned 20 times to chase shares documents etc each time dealing with different office, different department. 6. End result shares supposedly sold not sold so it cost me a great ... Read review