My daughter went in for a laser hair removal consultation. She decided against doing the laser hair removal. The company ended up opening up a credit card account in her name (without her knowledge) and charged the card for $1, 000.

Stay away from this company. They are deceptive, costly, and very manipulative.

I won the $300 coupon from American Laser Center's website after entering their contest. After some high pressure sales tactics such as, "this offer is only good for today, " I went in for my free consultation, and was strongly pressured to sign up for their laser services. First, the lady I met with told me everything would cost an exaggerated amount of $15, 000 if I did everything separately. She said if I signed up for the package to do everything together, it would only cost $5, 000 (4, 600 after the coupon). This still seemed like a lot of money to me, but she kept saying things like "Oh it's worth it, you'll absolutely love it once all that hair is gone!" She proceeded to tell me about monthly payment plans for a couple hundred a month. This seemed like a good idea at the time, considering she kept saying things like "Oh we'll help you out, and make it easy for you to pay!" She ran a credit check and said I was impressed that I was approved for $5, 000 and asked me if I wanted to start the paperwork right away.

Being 21 years old, and a full-time student, working part-time at the time, I told her I wanted to go home and discuss everything with my parents before I decide anything, since they would be helping me pay for this, and again to pressure me; she basically said she will wait outside so I can call my mom. My mom was very confused and hesistant about this as I told her on the phone, but I felt convinced and urged by the saleswoman to just go ahead and start laser. She immediately brought the papers and simply told me what laser treatments I would be starting, and told me to sign. She never explained to me or told me to read over ANYTHING ELSE on that paper. I later realized that she opened a credit line for $4, 600 with Care Credit (GE Money). I showed my parents everything when I got home and they immediately knew this was something we couldn't afford to do, and they weren't going to help me pay for it.

I called the ALC office to cancel approximately one hour after my consultation and no one answered. I called three times the next day during regular business hours and no one answered so I left a voicemail telling the saleswoman I needed to cancel everything. She finally called me back and started lowering the prices of the monthly payments to try to convince me not to cancel. I told her there was no way I could do it right now because my parents and I can't afford it. She got upset and told me I would have to pay a 10% cancelation fee because I signed a contract, and I told her there is no way I am paying $460 for absolutely nothing. I told her she never explained that to me, nor told me to read over that part in the contract, which is very misleading. I called the very same day to cancel, I have not received any laser treatments, and now was being told I have to pay them. I asked her if she could do something about this, and in a very rude tone of voice she told me she will talk to her regionale manager and one of them will call me back. I waited patiently and receieved no phone call, so I went there in person to return the lotions she gave me and to see why she didn't call me back. She immediately told me calm down right when i walked in, even though i hadn't said anything yet, and I was calm. She said her regional manager was very busy and she will call me when she acn; she also told me to hold on to everything including the lotions she gave me- which I still have, unopened. Even in person, she proceeded to try to lower the prices and tell me I could afford this. I left the office very frustrated. I called GE money and closed my account the same day, and later they sent me a letter saying my account has been successfully closed. A month later I received a bill from them saying I still have a balance of $4, 600 with American Laser and my first monthly payment is due. I called the saleswoman and told her I received this bill for laser treatments that I never started, and asked her why no one had called me in over a month to settle this problem. She acted surprised that her regional didn't call me, and she told me she will have her call me to take care of this asap. It's been about 2 weeks and still no phone call. I never thought canceling a service that I never even started would be so difficult and this whole process has been very frustrating and overwhelming to myself and my family!!!

This is an update to what I wrote several months ago. After 19 hair removal treatments, I had no results. I started the refund claim (referred to as non respondent claim by American Laser) on December 5, 2007. Generally the non respondent claim review process is about 3 days. However, in reality that is not the case. After writing a letter to the Regnial Manager for the NYC center, Carina Rodriguez, to be submitted with my refund claim, I waited for a reply. After not getting a reply, I started calling Ms. Rodriguez and leaving voice messages for her each and every time. Then finally, I was informed a month later that, I needed to come into the center for more pictures. At this time, I realised that I was given the run around and decided to write a letter on January 4, 2008 to the CEO of American Laser (Gary Graves, 24555 Hallwood Court, Farmington Hills, MI 48335. Fax # 248-426-0129 Phone # 248-426-8250) This letter explained my entire history with American Laser and outlined what happend to me and who I spoke with (their names, telephone numbers and dates). I send this letter by certified mail with return receipt requested because if this did not work out, I was getting my paper work ready to file a small claims complaint in court. After faxing the letter, I called his office to confirm that they have received the fax and what the procedure was going to be. I also called every other day to follow up, but was trasnferred to voicemails of customer services and the legal department. i.e. Erica, Eva, and Robert Fessinger. Eva and Mr. Fessinger never returned my calls. Erica returned my call saying that she can't do anything and she doesn't know who can help. Carina Rodrigues returned my call on January 10, 2008 saying that she couldn't figure out what my name was and thus was unable to pull my file so she didn't call me earlier. My response to that was all she had to do is call me ONCE and ask me to spell my name, but appearently that was too much for her to comprehend. In this telephone conversation, I informed her that I wrote a letter to the CEO and Ms. Rodriguez became very upset and said "I should not have done that and that we are talking about people's livelyhood". To make this long conversation short, I summerized what happened and faxed her a copy of the letter to the CEO. Almost of the month past by where I kept calling to find out the status of my refund claim and was given more run around. Finally, on Feb. 19, 2008, I was told that my refund was approved and that I should get it soon. Because I paid thru Care Credit (GE Money), I would have to wait until Care Credit processed the refund claim. FYI - Care Credit takes 4-6 weeks to process a refund claim and they are even worse then American Laser about refunds. Finally I received my refund on March 25th 2008.

My advise is to keep following up with American Laser Center and make sure you keep a log of who you speak with and when you call and what happened during that conversation. They will give you a run around, but you have to keep at it. For me, December 5 thru Feb. 19th, were a living hell. It was very frustrating and extremely stressful. However, I kept calling to let them know that I was not giving up on my claim. I also wrote letters to outlining my dealings with American Laser. I finally that's what paid off.

Good Luck.

Misrepresentation started from the minute I walked in. I "won" a 300 dollar contest and decided to check it out. I'm blonde hair and pale skin. Good ol' irish. I do have some dark hairs as well. I was told specifically that I would be a good candidate because my skin is pale. I asked direct and specific questions. How long would it take before I saw results. I was told 2-4 treatments. I asked how permanent is this laser hair removal. She said very permanent. I wouldn't have to worry about hair regrowth unless I had a hormone change. I asked for an example of a hormone change and she stated something women go through such as menopause.
Other questions in that session were if the laser did not work on me. I'm very pessimistic and make sure I cover all angles, at least so I thought. She said if I went to the treatments and noticed there was no change then I would get a full refund. Of course, my next statement is because I know how it was worded. What happens if I get minor change and not the hair loss in the areas I am paying for, for it to be removed. She stated directly to me there would be a full refund. I made specific sure to ask if I didn't receive full hair loss I would receive my money back.

The treatments were of course a little painful and I made sure they wasted no time maxing the machine out as much as possible on my skin to hopefully see results. I used their "cream" the first time but my skin broke out and I told them of this. I told them I wouldn't use it again and they let it drop. They didn't tell me why my skin broke out or why I needed the cream. I never really got burned and my skin never broke out again.

The treatments never showed any improvements and my hair has grown back. I was letting it grow to prove a point to the clinic but I see that is futile as compared to other people. The last few treatments they did double overpasses and I believe the final treatment I did they went over it I believe 3 times. I was in session for the chest and back about 6+ hours.

After the next month seeing my hair grow back and coming up to my next treatment I cancelled the treatment and said enough is a enough and requested my money back. I complained directly to the office manager and found her sympathetic. She stated she would write a formal complaint and send it to me and the corporate at the same time. I never received the complain and followed up for about 2 weeks. I took the matter into my own hands and called corporate to issue a complaint and they stated directly they hadn't received a complain on my case yet and would write one up. Calling the corporate office and even issueing that complaint took about 2 solid week of calling and harassing the voicemail.

The next two weeks went by and the office manager called and stated corporate had given almost an identical complaint as hers and she specifically stated that because I had showed a 10% hair loss I was not going to be issued a refund and that I must continue my treatment before they would consider a refund.

Hopefully that spells out the story and most of the details. This is the worst company I've ever dealt with in regards to treating customers.

Van stokes is a not only a horrible manager...but a horrible person in general! This woman should be in NO position of authority. She is emotionally unstable, rude, crude, and only after client's money. She does not care about her employees or clients. She treats her employees terribly and is often unprofessional in front of clients and flat out RUDE.I don't know how she has ever had the opportunity to attain employment ANYWHERE.