i have decided to try and get my money back after the complete shambles that i signed up to yesterday...i got a refund after the vip disaster at the london concerts in 2007 so i wont accept piss poor service....i am not paying 50 pounds for albums i cant download without a degree in computer studies...videos that dont work and you can get for nothing anyway on other websites and a t shirt i need to pay the postage for ???....wtf !.....nah....sorry prince...not good enough....anyone else joining me....will keep you posted on how i get on...

wow. probably wasn't a good time for a 'high-tech revolution'.

A few hits from the membership terms of service

1.2 - REFUND POLICY

All sales are final.

1.4 - LOTUSFLOW3ER.COM MEMBERSHIPS

Lotusflow3r memberships are valid for one calendar year from date of purchase, and are non-refundable.

1.5 - PRICING

Lotusflow3r reserves the right to change prices for Membership and Products at any time, and does not provide price protection or refunds in the event of promotions or price decreases.

Customer use of Lotusflow3r includes the ability to enter into agreements and/or to make transactions electronically. Customers hereby acknowledge that electronic submissions constitute an agreement and intent to be bound by all agreements and to pay for all transactions, including notices of cancellation, policies and contracts. In order to access and retain electronic records, customers may be required to have certain hardware and software, which are your sole responsibility.

3.11 - Lotusflow3r reserves the right to modify, suspend, or discontinue Products or Memberships at any time with or without notice to you. Lotusflow3r will not be liable to you or to any third party should it exercise such rights.

3.13 - Lotusflow3r does not guarantee that use of Lotusflow3r, Memberships and/or Products will be error-free or uninterrupted. Lotusflow3r may remove all or part of the website or Products without notice to customers.

3.14 - Customers agree to indemnify and hold Lotusflow3r, its directors and employees harmless with respect to claims arising out of breach of this agreement. Customers may not sue or recover damages from Lotusflow3r, its directors and employees as a result of any decision any of the above should make to remove or refuse access to Customers, or to take any other action during the investigation of a suspected violation.

3.15 - Lotusflow3r reserves the right, at any time, to update, revise, supplement, and otherwise modify this Agreement, and to impose new or additional rules, policies, terms, or conditions, which will be effective immediately. All Additional Terms are hereby incorporated into this Agreement by this reference. These changes may be without notice, so, Customers should review these Terms and Conditions periodically.

blackbob said:

I don't think there's a snowballs chance in hell you'll get your money back.
perhaps just give it a few days for some glitches to get worked out and the traffic to die down a bit...

yes i know all that but they cant just expect people to put up with that ...i was told there was no refunds for the vip tickets as well but i got my money back eventually...if the site had been free to enter and you paid for the albums then fine...i would accept a few problems but not when i have paid 52 uk pounds to be given a sore head and nothing else...the site should have been tested.....its not good enough , i WILL get my money back...

blackbob said:

Yeah, good luck with that.

Here's a question though: It looks like you didn't sign up straight away on the 24th. Didn't the countless posts here tip you off that the site isn't working flawlessly?

i paid and can't log in, already sent a mail to get my money back.
i paid for nothing.

TwiliteKid said:

.
woke up at 4 in the morning (one hour after it opened ..uk time)and in a moment of madness decided to to see if prince had finally got it right and signed up ( after playing feckin guessing games to log on of course)...i wanted to hear the albums and i wanted to get it the right way instead of getting it off some other website ....so i didnt have any prior warning....

blackbob said:

oh come on bob! have you tried the site again? I logged on this morning and was able to watch the creep video....OH MY! I could ALMOST say that's worth the price of admission right there...almost! I'm gonna try the sacrifice of victor video later....I dunno dude...I think you should consider the money spent and get as much as you can outta the site.

blackbob said:

You won't be getting your money back. Do you not read the terms of services or any legal information they present you???

makavelli187 said:

The terms basically say you agree to pay them and they have zero obligation to provide anything.

Who's really breaking the agreement? You agreed to the terms and they are complying with them.

Mars23 said:

Precisely why I did not join.

Mars23 said:

Except they kinda do, sort of,... well... maybe. It's a murky area.

In Europe, under the European Commission Protection of Consumers in respect of contracts made by means of distance communication Regulations 2001 (that's a mouthful) we have a 7 day cooling-off period in respect of all goods and services purchased.

Which essentially means we can change our minds up to 7 days after a purchase and have the legal right to a full refund.

However, although it is a legal requirement for any company (regardless of where they are based) to adhere to these regulations when selling goods or services to EU member states, it also says that "If you buy from a website or a catalogue based outside the EU any problems that arise may be more difficult to solve - so check the terms and conditions. Any international complaints can be directed to Econsumer.gov."

There are a few exclusions to the cooling-off period, one of which is :

- The provision of services have already begun with the consumer's agreement.

And I would hazard a guess that the purchase of a lotusflow$r membership falls into that category.

Having said that, I'd still think there would be a good case for getting a refund - if it weren't for the fact that they are in the process of resolving the downloading and video streaming issues and will probably have them resolved within 7 days.

Anyway, blackbob, I'd be interested to know how you get on, so keep us posted. Good luck.

makavelli187 said:

Just because something is written into a terms of services document doesn't mean it's enforceable.

Further, if the customer here is complaining because there are technical issues where they are not getting what they were promised (as opposed to complaining that they don't like the art itself), they can definitely get a refund if they dispute the charge with their credit card company.

Think of the following analogy: when you buy a CD at a store, there are no refunds or exchanges allowed if you unseal it. And if you listen to it and determine the album is a big pile of poo, you won't have any basis to be able to exchange it.

OTOH, if the album has a technical flaw in the CD that makes it not unplayable when opened, you ABSOLUTELY can get a refund, regardless of the store or label policy.

All the refund requests I'm reading about are due to technical problems with the website, not because people don't like the content (though many appear disappointed with the selection of videos available too). If those problems are not resolved, getting a refund from LF.com may be hard (given their lack of staffing), but getting one by disputing the charge with your credit card company should not be difficult.
[Edited 3/27/09 13:15pm]

It's strange...I haven't had any problems downloading. Must be something not compatible with some computers

I run an e-commerce with music downloads, so I have some experience in this area.
If you file a complaint with your credit card company saying to you have been unable to access the website or its content, there is a 99.99 % chance you get your money back.

The procedure is as follows :
- You file your complaint with the cc issuer.
- This company sends a request to lotusflow3r.com and asks them to proof that you DID have access to the downloads. I'm pretty sure they are unable to provide that proof.
- Upon the lack of this proof the issuer will redraw the money from lotusflow3r's account and return it to your card. This is called a "chargeback".

BUT allow me to issue a warning :
- A chargeback is accompanied with an administrative fine. The merchant has to pay a fine for each chargeback.
- If the merchant receives too many chargebacks the credit card company may decide to terminate his account and he will no langer be able to process cards.

I advise you to try to get a refund from the website itself first (mentioning of the word "chargeback" might help !).

Otherwise they might have to pay a massive fine if too many people try to get a refund from the cc issuer directly and might end up having to close the website altogether.

I am not a member of the website yet. I have already foreseen these technical problems once I saw their Flash interface. I also have serious doubts regarding the security of credit card details and other vulnerable data. I'd like to see these issues resolved before I sign up. I've seen enough on the Net to know how easily credit card details can be stolen if the traffic is not secured and the storage is not encrypted...

FunkyStrange said:

Amen! Same Here.

graphicpop said:

Snap!

LittleSister said:

Little Sister is right. I worked for American Express for 10 years. The process is to file a dispute claiming you never received the product or service. Since this is a website dealing with e-goods or digital downloads, your credit card company may just credit your card back immediately. But Lotusflow may send your credit card company their (terms and agreement) and they may side with Prince. But try yo get a credit back from the website first before doing the dispute. After that contact your credit card company with the date, time, who you spoke to, and the resolution of your initial contact with Lotusflow.

If you really push the issue to a supervisor at your credit card company, they may go ahead and just credit your account to resolve the issue. Because it cost them money to dispute the charge.

Good luck.

LittleSister said:

Those issues have been resolved - quite quickly too. I won't give personal details (let alone credit card info) on an unsecured page, so I was waiting for that to be resolved. I joined 2 days ago, and I can confirm that the registration and credit card pages are now secure; in fact the entire site seems to be secured now.

The interface is still big and glitchy - and will probably remain that way, unless they get rid of that quite nice but totally unnecessary intro thing. It often takes me a few attempts to get in, it freezes for no apparent reason, videos don't always load, and the album downloads were the slowest I've ever encountered - I can walk faster.

Still, everything does work, and every day so far (all 3 of them for me) I've seen improvements in speed and less glitches.

Getting used to the navigation doesn't take long, daft as it is (whose bright idea was it that to get to the MPLSouND album you have to click on a headless goose and...well, I won't ruin it for you).

It's shaping up nicely. With more content (which will hopefully be provided) it'll be a nice little site.

Because I was charge twice durring the sign up process AND STILL HAVE NO ANSWER from lotus I HAVE FILED A CLAIM with my credit card company! I suggest ANY1 with issues due the same!

blackbob said:

interesting scheme. go to a concert, complain, get your money back. join a website, complain, get your money back. will you buy the cds at target, tell them you don't like them, then demand you're money back too?

Mars23 said:

Good Lord. ´Customers may not sue´. This ´agreement´ is full of illegal shit just screaming: IMMA RIPP YOU OFF AGAIN MOTHERFUCKER!

I haven´t joined his sites since year 1 of the ´club´. Now I remember again why.

LittleSister said:

.
[Edited 12/29/09 9:53am]

Frederick96 said:

Yea! Funny as I have a 4 mo. old Dell with anti-virus & anti-spyware -but got a virus after downloading the site that no-one can get rid of since last Tues.(can Mr. Man pay me by the Hr. for time with Dell/Mcafee & Norton) & I had to spend $249-US currency-as well & dell said it's my expense as I downloaded a music site last Tues. so my cost was abit more than $77 I'd say! I'm a Mad White Woman who's trying to forgive right about now-but need more time!

PS. I'll have to work another 8hrs after work to see what I can do-the dudes are very nice & trying from India-so I see where my cost on the phone 8hrs comes from!

Ok! I've vented!
Peace!
Randee

RtPunkyGirl14 said:

Are you sure the virus is from the Prince site? The only downloads were WAVs and MP3s. I find that very hard to believe, and I think we would've heard more people speaking out about it.

Either way, I am sorry that you got infected. There is a nasty virus going around right now, and it's from clicking on questionable content in an email.

Frederick96 said:

That, and user error.

Tremolina said:

NoBody gives a good damn if u didnt join his clubs or not...Everything is outlined for the customer before they sign up..policy..sys req. etc.
If anybody is "Ripping" its you ripping off Prince's good name .

Se7en said: