ComplaintsforMuscarella's Cafe Italia

• Initial Complaint

  02/07/2024

  Complaint Type:

  Service or Repair Issues

  Status:

  Answered

  More info

  On 11/27/2023, my wife went to Muscarellas Italian Restaurant in Sharpsville, PA to purchase gift cards for our Christmas party. She used my debit card for the purchase. The restaurant charged us $311.55 for the gift cards. They never gave her the actual gift cards but only paper receipts. We never made it to the Christmas party because we had Covid. We called to make reservations for 02/10/2024. I mentioned to to the girl taking the reservation that it was strange that we were only given paper receipts and not actual gift cards. She told me they don't accept paper receipts only gift cards. I replied no gift cards were given to my wife when purchased. I said that I'd be right over to talk about this. When I got there I spoke to the girl then I had to wait for the owner to show up. He explained the policy and blamed my wife for being irresponsible and she obviously misplaced the cards. I said what if the girl that made the transaction forgot to give my wife the gift cards or possibly kept them and sold them to someone else leaving us (senior citizens living on social security) $311.55 with absolutely nothing. I immediately went to my bank and filed a dispute. I asked my banker if I should notify BBB or even a police report. I'm reluctant to do that yet. What recourse do I have?

  Business response

  04/02/2024

  When Mr* ******** called the restaurant he let the person making his reservation know he would be redeeming paper slips instead of gift cards as he didn't have any gift cards. Our employee Alaina let him know that we could not accept activation slips as payment and he said he would be right over. Upon arrival he did wait a few minutes to speak with our owner Tom Patton. The policy was again explained, we could not accept activation slips as gift card payment as we are unable to tell whether his gift cards had been given to someone else and redeemed or redeemed previously by the customer himself. With him he had the holders for the gift cards and the activation slips but not the physical cards, he insinuated that the person who sold him the cards possibly didn't give them to him or kept them for herself. It was explained to him that no gift cards were left behind nor did our employee keep his gift cards for her own use. Since he came here with all the components he would have received such as a sales receipt, activation slips and actual gift card holders given to him with the cards it was suggested they possibly had gotten misplaced in the hustle and bustle of the holidays. He did then go and file and a complaint with his bank, we successfully fought that chargeback as we had evidence his card was present that day and was used for payment for the gift cards. Muscarella's is a small business, I know I personally have lost gift cards to merchants I have been given over the years, I have never thought I could walk into the business and say I lost my gift card but here is my receipt, please now allow me to redeem this receipt for $400 worth of merchandise which is esentially what he is asking us to do. Gift cards are non-refundable and we are not responsible for lost or damaged cards, that has always been our policy. If you have any further questions please feel free to reach out to me via email at ************************* or via phone at ************. Thank you, Jamie R*****, Office Manager

*Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business. ↩