How to get your money back from a Kickstarter Project
Step 1: Find the credit card you used for backing your Kickstarter Project... In this
example we'll use the
BrewNanny Project, since it's geared for homebrewers.
Step 2: Call the phone # on the back of the card. Create a dispute regarding the charge. Tell them that you never received the product and that the company will not respond to your emails, support tickets, KS comments, or Facebook replies.
Step 3: Print/Scan or create an Adobe Acrobat document of the following items to send/email to your credit card company (
I also used this to create a complaint with my state attorney general regarding Fraud) :
Step 4 Include a letter with all of the documentation that includes:
-
KICKSTARTER Email showing the "purchase" or backing of the project
-
KICKSTARTER - BREWNANNY Project URL https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lyonslabs/brewnanny-home-brew-monitor
-
BREWNANNY's own website http://www.brewnanny.com showing that they are/were also selling this product elsewhere
Timeline of events (
most of the info is abbreviated from the KS page) like what I created below:
Apr. 3, 2014 Credit Card Charged by Amazon Payments / Kickstarter for 1 BrewNanny Pro
(email from Kickstarter)
Jun 2014 - Original Deadline
Jun 29,2014 - Kickstarter Update -
So I am planning on shipping the first units on July 17th. The projected schedule for all units is as follows:
• Early bird Pro July 17 – 21 • Early bird Base July 21 – 26 • Remaining Pro Orders July 26 – Aug 7 • Remaining Base Orders Aug 4 – Aug 15
...NO BREWNANNY
Aug.18th,2014 Kickstarter Update - Mailing List Update
Sept. 2,2014 Your BrewNanny Shipment Info and More
Our new site will not launch until September 6th. Rather than make you wait until then we are sending your shipment info here.
Your BrewNanny is scheduled to be manufactured and tested on Sept 25th. Shipping can be the same day or 1-2 days later. We have had to juggle our original schedule to try and expedite manufacturing. So we will not necessarily be shipping in the order we received the pledges as originally planned. This scheme gets the entire production out in the fastest possible way and keeps the quality levels consistent with our standards. It has been a long summer here and I am sure you guys are anxious to get going with your brewing too....
...NO BREWNANNY
They began advertising full page ads in BYO and included in Zymurgy's holiday issue (jpg's attached), and selling directly on brewnanny.com... When I saw these ads I held off contacting my CC company, because it looked like this thing was a real product since they were advertising full page ads...
Oct 1,2014 - Email to Kickstarters: Kickstarter Founders Update
Well we are at the turning point. The product is done, the design is frozen, we are putting them together and they are wonderful. We have a snag though. We have been duking it out with the insurance company over our product liability policy. We will continue to manufacture and build up stock and as soon as this issue is resolved out the door they go. I need to show you, even though I have been advised not to, the finished product. We have been preparing for the next stage, after we ship and fulfill the Kickstarter Founders, which is to put these on the market. We have some super photographs and I am going to show you one of them and explain what we have done. The design now sports more metal for structural integrity and UV biocide lamps to keep the valve train clean. I have posted one of our ad photos at here for you to look at.
...NO BREWNANNY
Nov. 7,2014 - Email to Kickstarters Brewnanny is Shipping
We are out of issues, we are finishing up the products for the orders and making a minor modification to the power connector to keep the insurance guys off our backs We will being
shipping the week of November 17th and will have all Kickstarter orders shipped before the end of the month. I will be giving you a full update over the weekend along with your access codes to the online ordering system. But I just wanted to let you know where we stood as soon as I knew.
...NO BREWNANNY
Nov.14,2014 - Email to Kickstarters BrewNanny Order Information and Update
Nov. 14,2014 Kickstarter Update - Final Project Update
Well we are finally here. We will be shipping in about a week and will have all orders fulfilled by the end of the month. Thank-you for your patience. The bottom of this email contains your user name and password for the brewnany.com store where you can track your orders. Please double check your order items closely, we have had to scan a lot of emails to update the information and there may be a few errors here and there. But we have time to make corrections so please take the time to make sure we have it right. Your shipping address should be listed exactly as it needs to be for your order to reach you without issue.....
...password in the email was wrong... given in lowercase...despite emailing them and never getting back to me, I ended up figuring out that the password was all uppercase... small detail, but a telling sign of things to come.
...NO BREWNANNY
Dec.4,2014 - Kickstarter Update - Delivery Status
...NO BREWNANNY
Dec.23,2014 - Kickstarter Update - Shipping Daily!
...NO BREWNANNY
Jan.23,2015 Kickstarter Update - Rant about backers pestering where their rewards are.
They might as well said We don't need backers, just their money!
Feb 12, 2015 - Kickstarter Update - New Support Ticket process / new person assigned to Customer Service
Feb.16, 2015 Your BrewNanny support ticket reply was received. "ETA of shipment"
(email from brewnanny.com)
A reply was posted to one of your support tickets. The content of the ticket is: "We have experienced some production problems and are behind in our shipments. We hope to have all outstanding shipments sent within 4 to 4 weeks. We will notify you as soon as we have a firm shipment date for your order.The Support Team
--- This is when I created a dispute with my CC company...
Apr 22,2015 Longwinded update on the Kickstarter page showing photos of
BrewNannies being assembled and tested
...60 days later...CC company refunded my money & any interest on the purchase - since no one @ Brewnanny/Kickstarter replied to the dispute... IF anything you can use THEIR lack of communication skills to get your money back... KICKSTARTER DOES NOT HAVE "DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY" TO CREDIT CARD CHARGES and rules (when you charge a credit card you have a limited amount of time to fulfill the order)
...NO BREWNANNY
MAY 15,2015 New Update on Brewnanny.com - moving updates away from Kickstarter website...
...NO BREWNANNY
Jul 12,2015 Looking for parties to take equity stakes in Lyons Labs LLC
...NO BREWNANNY
Sept 8,2015 Comprehensive update coming this weekend.
Sept 13,2015 Long winded update...Starts out that he's brewing a Belgian Ale, watching Football on TV...
He's decided to scrap his original design because it takes about
20 hrs to produce each BrewNanny (
If you do the math they should have been finished a while ago), but the new version will be created
under 2 hours. He won't reply to anyone commenting about where all of the original BN's that were assembled &
shipped (
lol) are or at least producing one that works and showing off the new design...
I think he saw our posts on HBT where we discussed putting an actual glass hydrometer in a carboy with a string attached to it for retrieval...with Sea Monkeys swimming in the wort/beer...that would probably take Gary 2 hours to assemble
October 5,2015
...NO BREWNANNY
...Taking a look back in the timeline from a year ago - OCT 1,2014...
"Well we are at the turning point. The product is done, the design is frozen, we are putting them together and they are wonderful"...
I guess the people still hanging on to this project with their money must still believe in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and Global Warming... The stars have aligned for true morons
![Craft A Brew - Safale BE-256 Yeast - Fermentis - Belgian Ale Dry Yeast - For Belgian & Strong Ales - Ingredients for Home Brewing - Beer Making Supplies - [3 Pack]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51bcKEwQmWL._SL500_.jpg)
