KlearGear.com Incompetent Customer Service, refusal to ship products San Antonio Texas

 "Well, the latest in a long line of corporate stupidity has ended they way you hoped it might.

A court has handed down a $307,000 judgement against KlearGear:"

Yes I'm aware of that.  I was in the courtroom, seated between a wonderful lawyer from Public Citizens' Litigation Group and my husband (the one who originally ordered the items) when the Federal Judge awarded us the damages.

Thank you for the link to the ARS Technica article, though. :)

Well, the latest in a long line of corporate stupidity has ended they way you hoped it might.

A court has handed down a $307,000 judgement against KlearGear:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/06/kleargear-must-pay-306750-to-couple-that-left-negative-review/

"I'm normally all about consumers standing up for their rights and threre are lots of people angry about the fact that KlearGear has taken this couple to court."

First of all, they are not taking us to court.  What KlearGear did was far more heinous than that, and we are the ones taking them to court over their actions.

"By their own admission, the couple did eventually receive a full refund."

We were never seeking a refund.  PayPal's system automatically did that when the pre-authorization on the transaction expired when KlearGear failed to ship the items my husband ordered.  We were originally seeking to have the order completed as purchased.  In other words, KlearGear did nothing, either to process the order or initiate the refund process.  If their (in)actions had ceased there, none of the recent events would have ever transpired.

"When you take money off the table, this complaint reads like a vitriol-laced tirade over an order cancellation."

The complaint was based on the sheer frustration both my husband and I went through in attempting to resolve the matter.  Yes, 5 years later it does sound angry, but that's exactly what I was at the time. 

"To those of you running with the first ammendment argument:  have any of you actually bothered to read the first ammendment?

**snip**

In other words: the government is not allowed to suppress speach [sic].  It certainly says nothing of private coprorations defending themselves (rightfully so) against this type of toxic and hateful diatribe."

In regard to the absolute letter of the First Amendment, yes you're right.  It deals with the government's ability (or lack thereof) to issue laws regarding the free exchange of communication.  However, KlearGear's subsequent actions, three years later, are what infringed upon our rights.

As a consumer, I have the right to communicate my experiences with any vendor, good or bad, to anyone I think might benefit from that experience as long as the information I give them is 100% factual.  After posting this report, my husband and I went on with our lives.  Three years later, KlearGear came back with threats of extortion if we did not remove the review.  That's where my rights of free speech were violated.  No one should ever feel that they are being muzzled for posting a true account of their experience, and they should certainly never have their daily lives impacted in the way ours have been simply because the vendor doesn't like seeing negative reviews about their practices.

"You can say what you want on the Internet but that doesn't mean it's always a good idea."

I wholeheartedly agree, but by the same token if I had to do it all over again, I still would have posted exactly the same thing I originally wrote.  I am but one of dozens of reviews, spanning various consumer feedback sites, all indicating that they had problems with KlearGear's orders not being fulfilled.  As far as we know, we are the only ones who have had false $3,500 debts levied against our credit because of it.

I'm normally all about consumers standing up for their rights and threre are lots of people angry about the fact that KlearGear has taken this couple to court.  But let's put one major fact into context here:

By their own admission, the couple did eventually receive a full refund.  When you take money off the table, this complaint reads like a vitriol-laced tirade over an order cancellation.   You can say what you want on the Internet but that doesn't mean it's always a good idea.

To those of you running with the first ammendment argument:  have any of you actually bothered to read the first ammendment?

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

In other words: the government is not allowed to suppress speach.  It certainly says nothing of private coprorations defending themselves (rightfully so) against this type of toxic and hateful diatribe.

I'm not familair with the specifics of the law applicable to you (in my jurisdiction any unusual clauses must be very clearly pointed out and certain clasues agaisnt consumers are unenforcable).

However, even barring something like that (and free speech, etc) , if you entered a contract and the other party did not fulfil its end, then the contract is basically dead at that point and I would hazzard a guess that no clauses are enforcable agaisnt you (this story seems to be gaining traction so hopefully somebody more knowledgeable on the specific laws applicable to you will chime in to confirm or deny this).

Another consumer posted links that don't work, these do

Their Terms of Service from 2008 clearly had no BS Non-Disparagement Clause:

web.archive.org/web/20081219095714/http://www.kleargear.com/termsofuse.html

The clause wasn't added till June 2012 according to web archives and doesn't apply to a 2008 sale web.archive.org/web/20120627211945/http://www.kleargear.com/termsofuse.html

By the way, the terms URL

kleargear.com/termsofuse.html

is currently not working and redirects to another part of their site, their current terms URL

kleargear.com/help.html 

also doesn't have a Non-Disparagement Clause.

Their TOS from 2009 clearly had no BS Non-Disparagement Clause:

archive.org/web/20091225195823/ kleargear.com/termsofuse.html

It wasn't added till late 2012 and doesn't apply to a 2009 sale:

web.archive.org/web/20120827130926/ kleargear.com/termsofuse.html

I will never do business with this disreputable company.

Non-Disparagement Clause

KlearGear.com has requested that this report be removed, claiming that it is a violation of their Terms of Service (even though no such language existed at the time of our order).  Since RipoffReport.com does not allow reports to be removed, I am writing this update in order to show a good faith attempt at removing the information. 

Any further requests to have this report removed will have to be directed to RipoffReport.com and their legal team directly.  We have no control over their policies.