I Wish It Did Grow (I would Beat These People With It)

This company claims it has over a billion sold.  It claims to have satisfied the needs of millions of people and made the world a better place.  Its commercials can be seen all hours of the day on television and radio.  No, I am not talking about McDonalds; I am talking about Extenze, the “magic pill” that supposedly increases the length of a man’s Johnson. 

This company has a nice scheme going on.  They claim to give you a “Free 7-day trial period!”.  All you have to pay is $.95 shipping and handling.  If you don’t like it, you just let them know within 7 days and they won’t charge you anything else.  I specifically asked the rep on the phone if it was 7 days from the day you order or 7 days from when you get the product.  I was assured numerous times by the phone representative that it was seven days from when you get the product.  I agreed and gave my credit card information.  This turned out to be a huge mistake on my part; an even bigger blatant lie on theirs.  Here is what really happens. 

I place the order and get on with my life, living paycheck to paycheck at a crappy job.  I keep meticulous bank records and always know what charges I have appearing on my account.  Sometimes, I literally only have a few dollars left in my account before I get paid.  You can imagine my surprise when I check my bank account four days later and find three charges from Extenze, amounting to almost $45 on my account, after only four days?  Calendar days no less!  What happened to the seven day money back guarantee?  I had charges hitting my account that day, and this charge caused my account to be overdrawn, which caused numerous overdraft charges, because of that beloved snowball effect. 

I was, understandably, LIVID!  I called their customer service to find out what happened.  I was unable to get through at first.  The pre-recorded voice told me that all representatives were busy, and to call back later!  Excuse me, since when is customer service busy?  There is this amazing thing called a “queue; where upset customers can patiently wait on the line listening to very bad music until a representative IS available to take their call.  What does their customer service department consist of, three high school dropouts answering rotary phones in the basement of an abortion clinic?  A company that portrays itself as being a cutting-edge leader in medical technology, with “over a billion sold” should have the funds to have a whole structure filled with people that do nothing but answer phones, especially when their misleading advertising and corrupt policies will no doubt cause thousands of calls every day.

After five tries, I did get through to a customer service representative.  I explained what happened to the customer service representative, how I had unauthorized charges on my account from the company.  I explained how I had just ordered the product and my seven-day trial wasn’t up yet. The representative proved to be an arrogant douche bag.  She dropped the bombshell on me that the charges would appear on my account seven days from the order date.  Trying to keep my cool, I explained that that is not how it was explained to me.  She made it seem like it was my fault for misunderstanding the company policy.  I told her I was assured I would not get charged and she flat out called me a “liar”.  Those were her actual words.  She then tried to make me feel stupid by saying that the company could not charge me seven days from when I got the product, because they have no way of knowing when it was received.  We started arguing.  Every time I tried to say something she would talk over me.  These aren’t exactly good customer service procedures.  I told her that there is this thing called DELIVERY CONFIRMATION!, in which you can indeed track the progress of all shipped packages.  She responded to that question like I had asked her what the meaning of life was.  She truly did not know how to respond.  Realizing it was futile to push that point, I then said that it hasn’t even been 7 days since I ordered the product.  She responded with incomprehensible batter that made no sense.  She was not sympathetic AT ALL.  In fact, she was the opposite.  She acted like I should be thankful that I was allowed to be a customer.    I realized I was getting nowhere so I hung up.   I had wasted my entire lunch break on the phone with her and was too frustrated to ask for a supervisor.

This isn't such a magical pill after all

Five days later my “free trial” arrived.  It had only cost me a grand total of $52 for 7 pills.  For that price I might as well have been buying ecstasy.  I definitely would have gotten more out of the ecstasy, and I know the sex would have been amazing!  On a positive note, the “free trial” did come with two porn movies, which made it a little better.  They were crappy, generic pornos probably shot in someone’s basement after an all-night bender, but hey, they were free. 

I figured I might as well use the sample- so over the next seven days I followed the instructions, popping one pill  a day.  Not surprisingly, after the seven days were over I saw no results.  $52 for nothing, I could have used that money for any number of things.  I would rather give it to the government than have it in the hands of this joke of a company.  I found myself in a predicament.  The worthless customer service beyatch said that I could return the months supply and get a full refund, but since the month’s supply hadn’t arrived yet, I found myself out the money.  I had to borrow money from my parents to cover all the overdraft charges I got hit with.  I didn’t even bring this fact up with the company, because I didn’t want to waste my breath.  If they are that ruthless over $45, I can imagine what they would be like with $125 in overdraft charges. 

Finally, three weeks later, the package arrived.  I had honestly forgotten about this experience by then.  Just like when someone brings up how your girlfriend dumped you three months ago, all the bad memories came rushing back into my head as soon as I opened the package.   So after doing the math, I realized that it took over a month to get the package they were supposed to send right out.  How did they send this package, pony express?  Was it delivered by some Mexican riding a donkey?  I immediately wrote REFUSE- RETURN TO SENDER on the box and drove it down to the post office.  It took three more weeks before the money was refunded to me.  So basically you are out the $45 for a month-and-a-half.  It’s funny, they are sure to get their money right away, but when it comes to giving it back, or, heaven forbid, delivering the product they promised, they take their sweet ass time. 

About a week after returning the product, before I got my refund, I received more charges amounting to almost $25 from the company.  I immediately called customer service four times, as that’s how many times it took me to get through.  After finally getting a rep, it was explained to me that these most recent charges were for the free videos I received.  I had two problems with this statement.  First off, the only videos I received came with the “free trial”; I did not get any with the months supply.  Secondly, if they are free why am I getting charged for them now?  The rep said that they are shipped separately.  I did not get mad when informed of this because I totally expected this company to pull something like this.  I would wait until they arrived and then return them.  I wasn’t holding my breath on getting this money back.  I figured I wouldn’t get them for another few weeks, and I was right.  All told, it took me over two months to get all my money back. 

This farce of a company charged my debit card 5 different times for a total of almost $70.  All this for what amounted to be 7 pills and 2 pornos I have never even watched.  This does not even count all the time I had to take out of my day to call customer service and all the minutes I racked up on my cell phone talking to these ignorant pricks. 

Unfortunately, as bad as this experience was, this company is definitely not alone in their business practices.  They promise a free trial membership for one low fee only to charge you an obscene amount of money afterwards without your knowledge.  When you call to complain and get your money back they give you the runaround.  You get transferred to six different people and have to explain what happened to each person; you get so frustrated and angry that you want to strangle them through the phone.  Each time they transfer you they say that they are transferring you to the person “that handles that problem”.  After a few minutes, this “expert” turns out to be some guy from India named “Steve” who barely speaks English.  He promises your money is getting refunded, which never happens, but he just wanted to get you off the phone so he can get on with his life of lying to the next customer.  You hang up, wait a few days, and then call back after nothing happens.  This time you are even madder, because you were lied to.  You explain what happened for the umpteenth time to another uncaring piece of trash customer service rep who just wants to get you off phone.  They promise you the world and assure you that you are a valued customer.  After another week or so of no refund you call back yet again.  Fed up with the crap they have been spoon-feeding you, you let loose with a tirade of expletives that will make a truck driver blush.  The poor customer service rep, who is not responsible for anything that happened to you, threatens to hang up on you unless you calm down.  They transfer you to a manager, who feeds you more crap, because they don’t care.  They don’t get paid enough to care.  After wasting another twenty minutes of your worthless life you hang up the phone, feeling frustrated and unfulfilled.  Your only recourse is to go to the bar and drink your sorrows away, or go to the gym, and let go of some of that aggression.  Eventually, you calm down, until the next time a company like this takes advantage of you, which isn’t long.  Then you repeat this whole process over again.  It’s a vicious circle and it needs to change.  The American public does not deserve this.  Companies like Extenze should be targeted by Congress and eliminated.   I hope this article spearheads that movement.