My wife initially contacted Tandette and scheduled a phone consultation. Minutes before the call was supposed to begin, it was cancelled due to the owner of Tandette having a car problem. No big deal, life happens. We eventually hired them and paid a deposit of $1,000 for a website and SEO package. To get started, I was also asked to have a phone consultation with them. Again, it was abruptly cancelled due to car problems. Seemed odd, and I was upset, but I was invested at that point, so I let the owners talk me out of getting a refund and taking my business elsewhere. Unfortunately, the last minute cancellations became a trend. Every time we were supposed to have a phone call, the owner would have an excuse to cancel: Car problems, sick kid, death in the family, meeting went long, etc. The problem is, I own a carpet cleaning business, and I can't talk on the phone while serving customers. So I'd take entire afternoons off for these phone calls, only to have them cancelled. I lost thousands in revenue simply from taking multiple afternoons off. After weeks of this, which included missed deadline after missed deadline, cancelled phone calls and every excuse under the sun, I demanded a refund of my $1,000 deposit. As a last ditch effort to keep me on as a client, the owner claimed the website was done and everything was ready to go. However, I was so disgusted I didn't want to see it. I still have no idea if it was completed or not. All I know is, several deadlines were missed and at that point, it didn't matter to me whether or not the website was completed. I no longer wanted to work with this company. At that point, things took a bizarre turn. The owner accused me of conspiring with other Tandette clients to damage Tandette's reputation. I don't even know their other clients and have never met any of them except for the guy who originally referred me to Tandette. And by the way, he also left Tandette because he got tired of all the shenanigans. Next, after accusing me of slander, the owner threatened legal action, claiming to have powerful attorney relatives who would represent Tandette for free. It got really weird. I've never experienced anything like this from a business before. Eventually, the owner agreed to refund my deposit if I agreed not to leave a bad review anywhere. I accepted those terms. Sadly, only half of my deposit was returned. Efforts to get the remaining $500 were fruitless. Thus, this review. Yes, it's my first Yelp review, but that does not diminish the truthfulness. I feel I owe a warning to my fellow business owners: Do not get involved with Tandette. Note that their Facebook reviews are no longer visible, there is a warning on their Yelp page that they are suspected of farming fake positive reviews (see attached image), and other Yelp reviews are very similar to mine. Lots of excuses, lots of big claims, and lots of broken promises. I'm not mad, nor am I writing this out of emotion. This all happened months ago, and I've moved on. I just want people to know the truth. If Tandette responds to this review, I'm sure it will include personal attacks and some of the bizarre accusations made against me, so ask yourself if any reputable business owner would ever behave that way. I know I wouldn't. Thanks for reading.
Updates based on Tandette's response:
A: My wife did contact Tandette first. She spoke with Ben.
B: The agreement for me not to leave a bad review could not have been blackmail because it was Tandette's idea, not mine.
C: The 50% refund policy, if it truly exists, is moot because Tandette agreed to a full refund in the emails I still have saved. At any rate, I no longer care about the remaining $500 I lost. The important thing for me at this point is to make sure other business owners do not get involved with Tandette. read more