FRNCH OFFICIAL - HORRIBLE SERVICE - Please be careful

Hi Everyone

This is my TERRIBLE experience with Frnch Official as my sister & I feel like we were scammed by a well known South African brand called Frnch Official, Frnch Casuals & Frnch UAE with a legitimate website https://frnch.co.za - they have reputable & very well known ambassadors who represent the brand from our community (celebs & influencers).

My sister & I shared our experience on our social media platforms tagging the brands just to be ignored & blocked in the hopes we keep quite & not gain any traction tarnishing the name of the brand - Bear in mind that we tried resolving this with them privately for over 3 months prior to us doing any of this. Our order totaled around R3000.

We have had multiple issues with the brand from the get to namely:

1. Under the FAQs they say all amounts depicted include VAT but upon check out they charge you a further 14% VAT (should be 15%) & when we enquirer they said that Shopify started charging VAT so they had to account for this however we aren’t sure of how the e-commerce side works but it appears as if they are charging VAT twice;

2. When we received our package upon inspection the clothes were poor quality, looked nothing like the images on the website & labels were torn off and certain garments were damaged, different material or looked like ‘reject’ items. We again sent an email which was ignored for some time and upon following up they responded that the clothes were samples / dead stock that never made the cut to their clothing line. At no point on the website or under each item was there a mention that the items were samples (but for one item we made a conscious decision to purchase) the other 4 items appeared to be a part of the collections they sold. We advised them that there are garments damaged etc. and they stated they have a no refund policy and they would check with the supplier what they could do and we have heard nothing back. We also mentioned that had we known these were dead stock/sample items we would have never purchased them especially if we were aware that they were damaged. They have since ignored every email since. We have screenshots, images and/or communication with them as proof. We told them that this amounted to false advertising & we could report them under the CPA.

3. They have now changed the wording under their website to cover their tracks so that they don’t end up in hot water (I have screenshots of the website previously and how it currently looks) since we brought how serious this is to their attention.

4. Since going live on social media (Instagram & Facebook) they have blocked our accounts but we have received numerous other messages from other customers who experienced the same thing & they just ignore you hoping you give up. Further to this we have received the similar experiences from more than 3 other ladies & the amount everything totals to is outrageous for defective, dead / sample stock.

The total account thus far of all orders received by other customers (4 or 5 of us that we know about) with beyond horrible quality & not representative of the images is over R10 000 - imagine how many of us are out there that they have done this to.

They refuse to acknowledge or take accountability for what they are doing because no one holds them accountable. What they are doing almost amounts to fraud & contravenes the CPA. We just wanted to raise this with our community in the event one of you are deciding to / planning on buying from them in future.

We know that we can take this up legally but we also want to raise awareness so you don’t get duped. There is no trace of the owners - other than an email address that changes from time to time.

I am happy to answer all questions you may have but we wanted to share our experience.