Thonk is Withholding My Refund Because They Feel Upset About a Word I Used

Steve Grimley-Taylor (user Monobass on Muffwiggler) is flouting UK trade laws by refusing to refund my payment outside of the PayPal dispute i have had to open against his company Thonk Ltd (www.thonk.co.uk). This is all because he misread a comment i made in an e-mail and is now expecting an apology for a slight which wasn't even given. I am going to place this message in every forum i have access to, so that people can see that the company is operated by a person who doesn't have any concern for customer service, and believes it is ok to drag things out to cause distress and inconvenience to a repeat customer.

Do not buy from Thonk Ltd if you dislike these petty grievance practices and the way they disregard customer care.

I should note that this is all a tad vague. You give no actual, verbatim examples in a disagreement where the verbatim record might clear the situation up. Instead, your response is to troll Thonk, which of course will simply make your situation worse.

If you're going to lob crap at a longstanding and respected vendor, you'd better be willing to post ALL the details, not merely a sanitized one-sided screed. If there IS a problem, and you know about it, then I would think that you would want the modular community to know exactly what that is. But this looks far more self-serving and makes me think that the problem probably doesn't lie with Thonk.

So, if this is for real, explain.

I was sent an e-mail, as all customers with outstanding orders were, on March 24th, giving me the option of three choices to go forward with my order:

1. immediate refund.
2. wait for delivery, but accept a very long delay
3. receive credit note for full amount plus 15%

I told him i would have to take the refund, as the items i required were urgent, and i would have to go elsewhere to buy them.

He did not respond with a refund, even after the date of 29th March set out in the e-mail. So i followed it up several times, with no reply.

The first response i got was two weeks after the initial request for a refund, once i had opened a PayPal case against them, for items not received.

I did not initiate a request for a refund, but was forced to make the choice, and note it stated 'immediate' refund, so two weeks later i'm still waiting for that refund. Now i will get it from PayPal, but it needn't have been so difficult. He did not keep his word, and has made me run about trying to get what was promised.

That is bad faith practice for any business, and in the current climate it is to be expected your customers might have limited resources to work with. I am out for the cost of my items twice, having bought from two sellers now, one of which is withholding my money out of petty personal reasons. That to me spells 'unprofessional' in glaring neon letters. Make of it what you will.

Thank you.

First post speaks about a "misread comment" and implies the refund is blocked by an "expected apology", all that is gone in the second post... Apparently Thonk answered when you initiated the Paypal claim, but that is left out. The "misread comment" is also left out. According to my calculations, 2 weeks after the 24th of March was yesterday, a bit more than a week after the set deadline, which isn't completely out of the understandable realm given that Thonk proposed a refund because of delays I'm assuming. So far, it looks like you're PayPal claiming someone because they are late. I'm also not getting the "urgent purchase" during the confinement times, I certainly wouldn't count on accurate delivery times lately, wouldn't even be surprised if PayPal takes it into account. I'd like to sympathize with you but I need a coherent story.

Not to beat a dead horse, but the facts are laid out about as plainly as i can make them. I am not going to post any further detail, and will not be including private correspondence to illustrate the episode as that is beyond the pale of the intent i had in making this publicly known.

It will stand as is, people who read it may be able to take heed and use caution being informed as they now are about this man and his way of treating customers. Believe it or not? It's up to you. But i know myself which company will never see another red cent of my money, and that's a word i can be sure of keeping to. Do as you will, it's your choice.

• I have an issue with Thonk caused by X and Z, here's my story with no details
• Really, can you explain this a bit more though ? This is too vague.
• I have an issue with Thonk caused by Y
• Wait, where is X and Z now ?
• I will now stop explaining.

Indeed, let's leave the public to decide.

ganymede published this text on all of the forums and has been equally casuistic and agitated about the response everywhere. Best ignored, I'd say.

My very good friend, someone with a good heart and the person who would help anyone even their worst enemy has precisely this experience with Steve from Thonk too, it is uncanny how similar the stories are. My friend even reached out and apologised a good 6 months later and said look mistakes happen, it's a small community, can't we just get along or at least just do business and there was a flat out rejection and a lot of nastiness - my friend ended up in hospital having panic attacks because of it :(((

There's yet another story on Trust Pilot that also sounds very similar, maybe it's the same one, I don't know!

I have no axe to grind here other than I was upset that my friend was upset, seems there's something going on though - where there is smoke there is fire!!