Terrible customer service, false advertising & consumer protection act violation

Do yourself a big favour and DO NOT shop on these sites if you want fair treatment & customer service, accurate advertising & consumer protection act compliance. Paez.co.za & brandcollectiveonline.co.za I was very disappointed recently with their customer service or lack thereof. I purchased a pair of original gum combi black Paez on the Paez.co.za site. The shoes looked like a faded matte black material exactly like the previous pair of original gum combi black Paez that I had purchased in Cape Town 3 years ago which had sadly worn through from wear and tear. I was so happy to find the same original pair online that I could replace them with. Unfortunately, what I received was a pair of shiny black paez, same design but very different material to what was portrayed online & also very different to the pair of original gum combi black Paez that I had bought in Cape Town 3 years ago. The online pair I purchased were definitely not the “original” they claimed them to be, and nowhere in the description online, nor in the advertised photograph would you get an idea that these shoes were a shiny black material.

But no harm done, I rep**** to the order confirmation mail that I received, to ask them to please arrange a return collection for a full refund as the shoes did not look as advertised. They responded first apologising that the shoes did not look as advertised, then a different agent responded saying that the shoes are exactly the same as advertised and that I should arrange to return the shoes at my own cost. When I asked if they would not be arranging and paying for the return collection themselves as they obviously had just used an incorrect photo on their site, I was met with an unprofessional, unpleasant tone and told that these are the originals that they have AWAYS sold and they are by far their BEST sellers, and was subsequently told to refer to the Ts & Cs on their page. The page referred to is brandcollectiveonline.co.za. When I investigated this, I realised that even though I had placed my order on Paez.co.za (which has no Returns or Refund Ts & Cs), when you move to checkout, it redirects you (without you really noticing) to brandcollectiveonline.co.za. So of course, there is no way that you would have seen that you are agreeing to Brand Collective’s Ts & Cs re: a return needing to be organised and paid for by the customer, and that if a refund is due, that the original delivery cost of R80 is non-refundable. So depending on which courier you use to return the shoes (mine was R99), you’re looking at about R179 out of your own pocket + the admin of organising your own courier even if the shoes are falsely portrayed on their website.

I find this disgusting that firstly you are not made aware of these Ts & Cs on the original Paez site, and secondly that even when they are violating the consumer protection act, that they are not willing to just apologise, waive this rule, honour the consumer protection act & refund all costs incurred including all shipping costs, no hard feelings. Instead they continued to try and convince me via multiple emails that the shoes are identical, even after sending them photos and video proof of the shoes I had purchased clearly illustrating how shiny the shoes were compared to the advertised matte black shoes. I sent them extracts from the consumer protection act from 3 different sites explaining that if items bought online have not yet been seen in person by the consumer and when received, subsequently appear different in reality to the advertised image online that all costs incurred must be refunded to the customer. My mails were ignored. I then organised a courier to return the shoes at my own cost of course, and once Brand Collective confirmed receipt, I asked them to again please consider refunding all costs incurred to me, and to end these comms amicably, but as suspected, only the cost of the shoes were refunded, and not the original delivery costs, and neither my courier return cost. I used to love Paez shoes but on principle I will never buy another pair, and will also never shop on brandcollectiveonline.co.za ever again if this is the terrible standard of customer service that they choose to condone.