"Product never shipped. Was told several different stories, asked for credit refund & promised on 1/23/06 would get it. Today is 3/20/06 and still no credit refund. Customer service is a joke. "

"I provided my order number because I didn't get an invoice. Customer service does not exist at Instawares. I ordered and paid for expedited shipping. Supposed to arrive Jan 2nd...never arrived so I reported a problem on Jan 6th on their website. I never got a response. Called customer service...we'll check the warehouse and call you back. I never got a response. Called Jan 25th....the product just came in and I will overnight it today. Never got the product. Jan 31st I called customer service and the warehouse fax was broke but the item is in stock and will ship overnight today. Finally talked to a "customer service" manager and canceled the order. Now wait to see if I get my money back.
I will never order from them again and recommend to anyone else to shop elsewhere. They are a joke."

"I placed an order for a set of casters for my True merchandiser cooler on December 28, and was charged immediately. I received an email a few days later from an account rep saying there was a problem with the transaction and to please call him. I left him a voice mail with the information he said he needed and heard nothing back.

A week later, I called to try to obtain tracking information, and of course there was none, and no information available as to the status of the order. I have called NUMEROUS times, only to be told either it's in the warehouse, or supposedly being drop-shipped by the vendor, etc. etc.

Instawares is a criminal enterprise, plain and simple. They take your money, hold it at their convenience for as long as they want, and don't ship the product. DO NOT BUY FROM THESE CROOKS."

"I order a large pot and lid 11/11/05. My credit card was charged immediately. I never received the item. I was never contacted by this company, outside of an automated confirmation of order email. I called several times and was told twice that the order would be shipped "Monday". This was obviously a lie, as I never received the item. I finally cancelled on 12/20/05. "

"On 10/10/05 I placed an order with Instawares for a vacuum cleaner ($220), spare belt ($1.20) and bags ($9). On 10/20/5, I received the following email: "Hi Gary, The vacuum you ordered is currently out of stock, I do not see a restocking date for this item. Please contact customer service to take further action.

After calling customer service, I requested a refund. I notified them that I had received, in one separate shipment, the $1.20 belt. They issued me a return authorization for the belt and asked me to leave it on my doorstep as they would contact UPS for a pickup. Three days later, a UPS driver delivering another package, refused to accept the return as they received no notice from Instawares.

Their customer service representative stated that it would take thirty days to process the credit to my credit card account, even though they posted the debit to my credit card account before any of the items was even shipped. Now, I've been a banker for almost thirty years, and I know it doesn't take thirty minutes to process a credit much less thirty days.

In the meantime, I got no less than seven "Reported Issue Notification" from four different reps, all saying: "As per our conversation I will issue a refund due to product being out of stock." Just when I think that all I have to do is wait for my refund, I get an auto generated email that the bags and vacuum cleaner have shipped. Two days later, I receive a UPS package containing the vacuum bags. Now I have a spare belt and vacuum bags to go with my non-existent vacuum cleaner!

Thinking that my vacuum cleaner has been shipped, I click on the hyperlink for the tracking number for the vacuum cleaner and see the following from UPS: "Unable to track shipment.” It was a bogus tracking number!

More emails over the net two weeks result in the following, in order of receipt:

“We apologize for any inconvenience that may have been caused. If I have accessed your account, but according to your message we are unable to determine your request. If you would please contact us so we could assist you further.”

“Again we apologize for the inconvenience that may have been caused. In the morning we contact our warehouse to see if you vacuum cleaner has shipped out and if it has not I will make sure that you are account is refunded. If you have additional questions please contact us.”

“The vacuum cleaner is out of stock. We have submitted the credit request to have it issued back to your credit card. I do apologize for the delay. If you have any questions feel free to contact us.”

“Your refund is being process beit can take up to 1 to two billing cycles thank you Wilma”

When I asked, how long in days is "1 to 2 billing cycles? Their response was, “It will take 60 days which is two billing cycles for your credit to show up on your account.”

Finally, I contacted my credit card company to initiate a “merchant charge back.” They advised me that MasterCard regulations require a credit after no more than fifteen days. Good luck if you deal with Instawares!
"

"I purchased item ***-***-**** using Buy it Now and am now finding that the seller will not sell the item listed.

The original listing had conflicting information. The top-level listings says it is a flat-file cabinet WITH base. The listing inside the page says it is the base only. To clarify, I reviewed the questions to seller and sure enough, another ebay member asked to double-check if it was the base only or both. THE SELLER RESPONDED THAT THE LISTING IS FOR BOTH THE CABINET AND THE BASE! On that basis, I made the purchase. It also says the item has free shipping.

After getting an email from the seller on how to pay, I went to check out and pay them only to discover that the shipping was not, in fact, free. Because of this, I called the seller's customer service line. Their rep not only didn't help with the shipping issue, he told me that the listing was for the BASE ONLY, in direct contradiction to their response in the listing. The customer service rep offered no help and refused to honor the listing. When I asked to speak with a supervisor, I was put into voicemail. So far, I have received no response and am cancelling the order.
"

"I won't use Instawares.com again. The product I purchased was not only out of stock, but it was discontinued. I doubt Instawares would ever have informed me of this fact if I had not been very diligent and patient in my efforts to check the status of my order. Although I received an order confirmation email and I received a registration email when I decided I would have to register in order to find anything out about my order status, I never received another email from them. I did not receive the tracking number I was promised both by the website and the lady I talked on the phone. It wasn’t until the third phone call that I found out I wasn’t going to be able to get any product at all. I just made a fourth phone call to find out why I haven’t seen a credit posted to my credit card and they told that would take 30 days. I don’t know if that’s normal, but it seems like an awfully long time to me. Their website is not very user friendly for finding information and in my case completely useless. Their phone system is even worse. I had to listen to very frequently repeated statements telling me I could leave a message if I didn’t want to wait and waited an average of 15 to 20 minutes on hold before I could talk to someone. I have used other online sites and this has been the worst. "

"I stumbled across this company while doing a google search for some soap dispensers, and took a chance on them. Great website, selection, prices and service. I also used their online live-chat support in selecting products and it functioned perfectly. I will definitely buy from them in the future.

Update: 07-01-2010. Since I originally wrote this review, I have ordered 3 more times from Instawares and been very satisfied. "