Purasilk and Abacus Products, 2357 Thompson Way, Santa Maria CA 9345
Complaint 92496 Details

During late February and March 2012 I have had the following problems with Purasilk of California and Maine.

What they are running is a scam. I ordered a cream health-aid sample charged against my credit card at Bank of America for less than $4.00. BofA paid that charge to Purasilk and put it against by credit card account.

No further commitments or requirements were made by Purasilk that I knew about. When I received the cream product it did not look right, so I did not use it, and assumed that the matter was through.

But then I was not paying attention and received two more shipments of the product that I never ordered, nor had any contact with them about the matter. They were also charged to my credit card for about $100 each. Even when I had become aware of the matter after not realizing what was happening, and started complaining to Purasilk about this matter in 2 telephone calls and 3 e-mails to them, it did no good, nor did I receive any instructions of how I could send the products back and get a refund, or how to stop their sending more product.

During this time my telephone calls and e-mails to them did no good. The e-mails were not answered. The telephone calls were to avail. They kept sending me product I never ordered and charging it to my Bank of America credit card. Due to Parasilk having used my Bank of America credit card for the shipments of product, I complained to BofA about this matter in three meetings on different days with consumer representatives at the local Bank of America in Hayward, CA. The first two times the representative Nate Navarro (while I was there with him) telephoned Purasilk to stop shipping me product and charging it against my credit card. In the second telephone call to a Purasilk representative from the Bank of America I corroborated to the Purasilk representative what the BofA representative asked of them. But Purasilk ignored it, and kept sending product. The last time that I myself telephoned Purasilk last week their representative was aware of my complaint but claimed that because they had three different addresses for their business, the matter may have been overlooked and that they would stop sending product. Later another box of Purasilk product arrived at my home address, same as before, and no doubt I will find that my credit card was charged again as it had been before for each box sent.

My last effort, as of yesterday, was to send all the boxes of product back to them through the U.S. post office, with a letter enclosed, asking for a refund. I can only guess as to what will happen on this. Again, I wish to make clear that I never touched the products sent and they are totally unused.

An ominous part of this is that the Bank of America people
--the main one handling the matter was Nate Navarro ([email protected], Personal Banker, Loan Officer, Bank of America 24700 Hesperian Blvd, Hayward, CA 94545, tel 510 265-6009, Cust. Serv. 800 622-8731
--said that they could not stop Purasilk from charging my accountand doing what they were doing. And I am not exaggerating in this. The Bank of America would not put a stop to my being charged for goods that I never ordered. Which meant that they represented Purasilk, not their credit card customers such as me. I was just a nobody using my Bank of America credit card. What they cared about was their business relationships with Purasilk.

However, there is another side to this. Through the decades as president and owner of several companies I had been doing millions of dollars yearly in business with Bank of America, mainly at this branch in Hayward, in their handling the checking and savings accounts of these companies. So you can see how little that means, when they are dealing with charges against Bank of America credit cards.

What I asked Nate Navarro of Bank of America to stop the Bank of America from putting charges by Parasilk on my credit card that I had never authorized, and in fact had repeatedly telephoned Durasilk to stop sending me shipments that I had never ordered, my requests were completely ignored by Nate Navarro. Nate Navarro said that the BofA refused to stop putting charges from Purasilk on my credit card, even though I had never authorized those charges and were against my wishes, because they were doing what Purasilk was asking them to do in charging my credit card.

What it means is that the user of BofA credit cards assumes all responsibility. And any company can just put charges in to the BofA when they get hold of a consumer's credit card name and number. This is a warning to all that a BofA credit card should not be used unless one is sure that it will not be abused by the company supplying the merchandise charged against the card.

The BofA was of help in putting telephone calls through to Purasilk and talking to their representatives. But whether that has brought the unordered and unauthorized shipments to be finally discontinued or not, and reimbursed, I do not know.

But others, such as you are in contact with, should be warned of what they are up against when dealing with Purasilk. /.R3
Robert Rofen