Consumer complaint received 2018-11-29
Company: SYNCHRONY FINANCIAL
State: NY
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: Store credit card
Issue: Problem with a purchase shown on your statement
Sub-issue: Credit card company isn't resolving a dispute about a purchase on your statement

Complaint:
XXXX XXXX  XXXX & XXXX took a {$4200.00} down payment on XX/XX/18 and then had us apply for credit through Synchrony for zero percent interest for 36 months which turned out to be a XXXX XXXX credit card account. Synchrony allows the merchant to be paid in advance for services and merchandise. We did not realize that Synchrony was going to give the merchant all the money upfront. By the time we received the credit cards in the mail Synchrony had already given the merchant {$25000.00} ( {$12000.00} for an sccount for me and {$12000.00} for an account for my husband XXXX XXXX ). The merchant started work on XX/XX/18. They removed all our old cabinets the first day. After three weeks they still had not installed the new cabinets and the merchant, specifically the owner, XXXX XXXX , XXXX, called on XX/XX/18 and said he was not sending his installers out " until we resolve this '' ( my bad XXXX review ). Because he was yelling I hung up and he then sent me a text again saying he was not sending his installers out, threatening to sue me for " declamation of reputation, '' threatening to put a lien on my home even though he had {$29000.00} and we had no kitchen and threatening to call the agency our International students  were with because they should not be in THAT home. He made no effort to send installers back out and we moved forward to have another contractor finish the job. We had to have another contractor install the new cabinets. We purchased a sink, faucet, countertop, recessed lighting, undercabinet lighting, and missing cabinets and trim, and backsplash as well as paid to have them installed in addition to also paying for plumbing and to have our built in microwave and dishwasher and two doors adjusted and reinstalled. The ceiling has to be repaired and the kitchen has to be repainted as well. The merchant puts on all contracts that special orders are not refundable and apparently on the back on the contract says that all items not in stock are special order. Directly from the XXXX website on the merchant : " Pattern of Complaint XXXX reached out to the company regarding a pattern of complaints concerning lack of or unprofessional communications with concerns regarding consumer orders, extremely late or non-delivery of consumer orders, and consumers who are promised orders in a specific time frame which are not honored, nor are consumers made aware of any issue with the delivery deadlines until they reach out to your company for inquiry as to order status. XXXX also identified a pattern in responses to consumer complaints stating that the consumers will receive follow up communication or that orders which have not been received by promised dates are special order items and therefore nonreturnable. Consumers have reported that despite responses their complaint issue have not been addressed or resolved ; when return calls are promised to consumer, none are received. In the limited cases when a refund has been promised it is not followed through on. '' To which the merchant replied in part : I will also take your recommendation and spell out Special Order on each contract that is not a stock item. Synchrony received lots of documents and photos supporting our case. Their most recent letter closing our dispute says no refunds after 30 days and magically many of the items submitted to Synchrony were listed as special order ( AND NEVER DELIVERED ) even though the merchant never told us the items were special order nor listed them as special order on the contract. We have been told by two different attorneys that this business/owner is a non-collectable account. Even if we were to win a judgment we would have to stand in line behind others with judgments. There is a IRS lien over {$220000.00} and a recent judgment from XXXX over {$13000.00} and there are other cases/judgments in the XXXX and XXXX areas as well as other states where they also do business. No reputable contractor takes all the money upfront and a reason to do so is because the company is not financially stable. According to the NYS Attorney General website prepaid funds are supposed to be held in escrow or at the very least have bond insurance to protect our money and the customer has the right to view those records. The contract MUST contain a SPECIFIC description of work and materials including brands and model numbers and other identifying information as well as the approximate start and completion dates including any contingencies which would change the completion date. We have asked for an accounting several times from the merchant and never received one. It is very difficult to request a refund within 30 days when Synchrony allows the merchant to have all the money weeks or months in advance and then for the customer to know in advance that the merchant is not going to complete work in a timely manner or do poor work ( both in our case ) and the merchant commonly uses " special order '' as a way to not refund money so often that there were multiple complaints from consumers to the XXXX. I think the merchant has no intention of taking the XXXX recommendation to spell out special order on each contract that is not a stock item. Also all items that magically became special order were items selected from samples as a result of their super summer sale advertisement in the XXXX & XXXX newspaper and this merchant is in the kitchen remodeling business and therefore can use all these items on another kitchen project but more importantly many expensive items that magically became listed as special order WERE NEVER DELIVERED and on the documents the merchant submitted to Synchrony there is a {$900.00} dumpster fee. There was never any dumpster delivered or used at our home. The photo shows how

Company public response: Company has responded to the consumer and the CFPB and chooses not to provide a public response
Company response to consumer: Closed with monetary relief