Update to this thread - March 25, 2009

Hi everyone,

I've recently received a complaint about this thread from Dermapril, which I forwarded on to Roger Baumann.

We've decided to reopen this thread as it's felt that consumers should have a place to discuss these matters, and this is exactly what STS is for - consumer information about products, etc..,.

The fact remains there are an awful lot of people with a very similar complaint. One only has to visit here or Google "Dermapril complaint" to read the experiences of many others, all of which sound all-too-familiar.

Please stick to the facts only when making a post in this thread and please be mindful of how you word your post.

I will continue to monitor this thread and any posts which I feel have crossed-the-line will be edited or deleted.

I'd also like to invite Dermapril to respond to the issues raised in this thread. This, is your opportunity to state your side of the story and sort out some of the problems people have been experiencing.

Josh.




Original post:

Warning! Dermapril-SP -- Rip-off? Misleading advertising? "Free trial" Scam? You decide

Hope I can spare some of you a hassle. I've spent the past couple of days helping my mom dispute a credit card charge for what was supposed to be a "risk-free" "14-day Free Trial" of Dermapril-SP Wrinkle Cream. (Thank goodness she used her AmEx Plat. card.)

Mom ordered the free trial over the phone, giving her CC # to pay the ~$6 Shipping. When the "free" pump of cream arrived, she saw in the paperwork that they had subscribed her to a monthly "auto-ship" program w/o notifying her.

Mom did not like the cream nor the co's business practices, so she promptly called and canceled the subscription. They required her to ship back the pump "even if it's empty" w/in 10 days of canceling. Even though she did that back in May, a charge of $69.95 dated 6/18 appeared on her CC .

We finally (yesterday) got the company to give us a cancellation # (after being given a major "run-around") on the phone. We had previously contested the charge with Am. Express. The company never denied having received the returned pump container.

The Dermapril-SP web-site isn't exactly forthright about the "free trial" program. I poked around myself. Their home page doesn't give any of the "fine print" details about the "free trial". You have to put in all of your information before you even get to a page with any details. It turns out that they really make you jump through hoops to avoid being charged $69.95 plus S&H for the product.

We finally (yesterday) got the company to give us a cancelation # after being given a major "run-around" on the phone and contesting the charge with Am. Express.

I did a google search on this company (Rauscher-Bakke, LLC) and Dermapril yesterday. Amazingly, only a couple of complaints showed up. Very odd thing is that I ran the same search today and I had trouble finding the complaints. The google search engine seemed to be "flooded" with sponsored links and amazing claims for this product (EG: "The Top Five Reasons Dermapril-SP is the Best Skincream " "Dermapril-SP Earns Perfect Scores in Rigorous Dermatologic Safety Testing ")

Most of the "reviews" that come up seem to be thinly-disguised, sponsored links by the company -- some are well-disguised sounding "too good to be true".

I had trouble finding much info about this company online, although I did find a listing on the SE Florida Better Business Bureau site. They (uncannily) are "A" rated with no complaints filed against them, although they have only been registered since May 07). This company is actually based out of Miami -- Dr. Leslie's home turf.

Have any of you ever done business with this company or tried their Dermapril-SP anti-wrinkle cream?
This feels to me an awful lot like the the StriVectin shady business practices that Leslie warned us about in her July 1 blog on Amatokin and Stem Cell Technology.
Something is just not right here.

Pasted-in below is the offer as listed on their home page and an (apparently objective) review:

"Free 14-day Free Trial"
We're so confident you'll love how well Dermapril-SP works, you can
try it RISK FREE...
Q. What is your return policy?
In the event that Dermapril-SP™is not for you, simply contact our customer-service group within 14 days of receiving your product. Return the unused portion (you can even return an empty Pump!) of your product for a full refund (less shipping & handling).

From Yesterday's Google search:
"Dermapril-sp Review: Decent product, bad business
One persons’ Dermapril experience:

How a company treats their customers reflects how you can trust their product. That is precisely why I do not trust Dermapril-sp. They do some shady things to their customers that are just plain bad ethics...I read through some reviews ...a woman who had used Dermapril-sp recently. She had a negative experience with the effectiveness of the Dermapril-sp and decided to return it. She had good looking skin before she started using the product but wanted to get rid of some problem spots by using the Dermapril-sp, but of course, it did not work for her.
The thing that she said though that really bother me was the following: She said that when she called in to cancel her auto-ship program, they offered to cut her price for the Dermapril-sp in half...Also the Dermapril-sp people manage to make it nearly impossible for customers to get a refund on their product...Aside from the shady business practices, Dermapril-sp seems to be a slightly less than average product"


Jane