Rejoice Relations
Complaint 353525 Details

My complaint is about Rejoice Relations Dating Agency. The agency’s website address is http://rejoicerelations.com.au/.

My complaint is that Rejoice has sent me women sex workers instead of matches, whilst keeping me under the impression that I was getting matches.

At first the agency sent me an SMS message and asked me to call a woman (being Vanessa) whom they claimed was a match they found. So I tried to reach Vanessa but as she did not reply I spoke to Melanie at the agency (who I believe is the boss) and she informed me that if Vanessa wants to book a room to let her, to spend only 1 to 2 hours with her max and not to discuss anything personal with her in the room. Eventually, Vanessa and I got on the phone and when communicating via mobile with her, she said that she wants to book a room in Parramatta where she claimed she was working in the banking industry. I said fine and that I thought it was a bit early for that. Later she claimed via SMS that the hotels in Parramatta go from $360.00 a night upwards and that my share would be $180.00 in cash. So I checked the internet and confirmed with the hotel (being the Park Royal) by phone what the maximum price is for a room and found that Vanessa lied to me and that the prices their never go above $200.00 per night. I responded by saying that we can get a room in Parramatta for a lot less (I don’t remember the price but it was a lot less) and that I wanted her to get back to me with a better price. Then she informed me that she already booked the room where my share would be $180.00. So I informed her that I wanted to reschedule the time and day she booked the room for being at the Park Royal and spoke to Melanie. Melanie took the side of Vanessa saying in a very angry voice: (a) I can't believe you discussed the price of the room with her; (2) if you don't go on the date I'll penalize you; and (3) you ought to apologize to her. So I apologized and went along, paying the $180.00 in cash up front and we both had sex. After that while still in the room: (1) I informed her that I wanted an activity partner to do other things with if she was interested and she told me no and that she wanted only casual sex for now; and (2) when I was on my way out and noticed that she stayed in the room next to the window, I told her “... we might as well go together to the lobby..” and she seemed a bit uneasy to respond and responded “no I got to stay here” and when I asked her whether that was to pay the bill she said “..Yes, I got to pay the bill” but that did not make sense to me as she informed me that she already paid for the room when we spoke on the phone before we met. So I figured that she probably is a sex worker, obtaining $180.00 cash per client throughout the day in the room where we stayed because why else would she and the agency have behaved that way so far. And that the dating agency operation has been run as a sex worker operation but under the disguise of a dating agency so as to not pay the brothel fee whilst: (1) Being registered as a dating agency; and 2) Deceiving men into thinking that they are getting female matches who want sex to be part of their short or long term relationship.
The next week the agency tells me to ring another number and after a few SMSs the woman the agency said was my match rings me and says she wants to book a room. So I responded to her, saying ...”and you want me to pay $180.00” as my share?” She said yes and I responded by saying “...well, I just paid $180.00 the week before last and can’t be paying that every week or every time I want to go on a date”.
I rang the agency in relation to my contract on Monday, 23/05/2015 and when I spoke to one of the staff there I was informed that they would be happy to send me a match once a week when requesting it on Monday which I have been informed is when Melanie would be in. So that even further confirmed my suspicion as it is so unrealistic and sounds too good to be true.
Finally, after being so unhappy about how the agency treated me and their scam, I wanted my auto-renewal option on my contract removed but found that this could not be done without cancelling my contract and paying some more money during my cancellation meeting with Melanie because the she ticked the auto-renewal option on the contract which I later signed. The cancellation ended my six months contract and costed me another $349.80 which totalled 40% of the total of $874.50 that I already paid. In total the whole deal cost me AUD 1,224.30.
I found that the agency has been acting very deceptively and unethically.