Bitcoin Forum

Swim made a BFL order sometime in Apr/May 2013 for a single. Will (s)he be able to get a refund from BFL now? If yes, whats the process.

No, not if you paid with Bitcoin. Your only recourse is to complain loudly to the FTC and attorney general. Or sue them. Or maybe if you make a big enough stink in this forum, you'll get a forced refund.

Nope, u cant

The correct complaint destination is Attorney General Consumer Protection of Wyoming, right? Or can I send it to Kansas as well?

AG of Kansas (where BFL is located), the AG of the state you live in, and file a complaint with the FTC.
Magistrate Judge Amos L. Mazzant of the U.S. Federal District Court just ruled that Bitcoin is indeed money, so you won't have any problems along those lines.

I actually thought Wyoming because BFL is registered there: https://www.kansas.gov/bess/flow/main?execution=e1s5

Also, I'm a foreigner.

Which kind of lawyer can help me draft these letters? For e.g. divorce lawyers would be a bad option ;)   

I believe you don't need a lawyer to file a complaint. Just fill the online form: https://ag.ks.gov/about-the-office/contact-us/file-a-complaint/consumer-investigation-request

Not a chance, the product was priced in $USD not bitcoin. If you paid via bitcoin then you used a 3rd party like Bitpay that converted your BTC to $USD at a spot price to pay BFL.

That said, you should be able to get a refund from BFL in USD.

Huh??

At this point, the problem is getting any refund at all. Those Scammerfly Labs claim that "all sales are final".

BFL are in Kansas, which has strong consumer laws regarding refunds, "the all sales are final" clause can be safely ignored providing you lodge your complaint in Kansas.

BFL has publicly stated they are not providing refunds anymore.  The only refunds that appear to be going through anymore are forced ones through PP or CC.  So its FTC/government or a lawyer at this point if you paid BTC.

Thank you.
I've requested a refund today and told them I am going to file a complaint to Attorney General if they start their "sales final" bullshit. Waiting for their reply.

Make sure you explain that you haven't received the goods, as the status of refunds changes to a returns scenario once you receive the goods, which pretty much only covers defects.

BF Labs Inc. is registered in Missouri: https://www.sos.mo.gov/BusinessEntity/soskb/Corp.asp?3402461

And in Kansas: https://www.kansas.gov/bess/flow/main?execution=e1s5

http://www.sos.ks.gov/CM_ServiceWM/displaydocuments.aspx?DocID=03331329

From your nick, I'm presuming you are a Ukrainian citizen.  The concept of "federation" you are familiar with -the present Russian Federation- for example, are at the same time much looser and much more rigid than the United States' federation.

Why the paradox? 

First, the states of the United States cannot leave the Federation.  The reason Abraham Lincoln is on Mount Rushmore, and on the US 1-cent coin is that he defined the doctrine that a state may not secede from the Union, and any attempt will be suppressed with the full force of the Union.  There are people who pertend and posture otherwise - as happened after Obama was re-elected, but that is the true fact.

Second, there is no distinction between the states in terms of application of federal law.  There is absolutely no restriction on movement of goods, services, or individuals, between states; no papers are required; borders are marked only with large billboards which say "Welcome to ___" (and spend money while you are here).   The only exceptions are, in some places, inspection of live animals, fruits or vegetables to reduce the chances of the spread of diseases.

What there is, however, is differences in business climate, state taxes on corporation and individuals between the states.  This means that both people and corporations will often choose "nominal" home states, and do business in other states.  That's what the Wyoming incorporation is about.

it's perfectly possible to get a BTC refund :)

Just contact their support asking to cancel your order, you'll get the refund within 3-4 days (or it was so for me atleast)

What were your payment and refund dates? Did they refund you with BTC or PayPal?

No reply for 3 days now.

www.ag.ks.gov/about-the-office/contact-us/success



And from BBB:

Your refund was in May. It is August now. The linear passage of time changes things.

Got a reply from BFL asking my BTC address for refund.

He mean they will convert the USD value of the product you bought to BTC based on current exchange rate if you want to request BTC refund

Unless the exchange rate has fallen since then.  ;)
Then I bet they only return how many Bitcoin he paid.

Don't worry, they have the miners in stock and could switch the one they built with your money on for a few hours and send you your refund ;)

Received the coins. It took 8 days since my first email to them. Expected this to be much harder.

P.S. Just to make it clear. They refunded the same amount in USD which I had paid. The amount of BTC I received is essentially different from what I paid.

Was there any correspondence from BFL you could share with us?  It is weird that they seemingly so easily gave you a BTC refund after they have been publicly stating for a few months now no refunds will be honoured.  I am curious why you are the only non PP customer I have seen recently get a refund.

It might have to do with his AG and BBB filed complaints.

Many more people should become Bitcoin Foundation members.  Their hidden forums seem to have many professional people willing to aid in legal assistance, tax assistance, or point you in the right direction.

 https://bitcoinfoundation.org/support

 Good idea. Will look into membership this evening.

Nothing special in the correspondence. They just asked for BTC address, then told that they have requested BitPay to process my refund, and then I received the coins. Maybe that was so easy because I only had 1 Jalapeno. Anyway, their statement of "sales final" doesn't apply in case of several months of not delivering and they know it.

Agree 100%

What I am wondering is:

-Did BFL get enough pressure (or finally wake the fuck up) and are starting to honour refunds and they are trying to keep it as quite as possible to stem the flow so to speak (ya unlikely I know but I have to consider it as possible)
-Did your pressure aid in getting you only a refund (did you file a complaint with any government agencies?)
-Was this a mistake or something like that on BFL's part

I told them in my first email that I was going to file complaints and I actually did it to BBB and Attorney General (see my above posts) but I don't think it worked so fast (I filed them on Sunday I think).
At the BBB site http://www.bbb.org/kansas-city/Business-Reviews/electronic-equipment-and-supplies-wholesale-and-manufacturers/bf-labs-inc-in-overland-park-ks-1000002011/complaints, there were already 7 complaints before me.
I don't think refund was their mistake because when running a multi-million dollar company, you would definitely refund those $187 instead of dealing with another BBB complaint.

Clueless.  BFL takes BTC payments through Bitpay which means whatever coins are immediately converted to USD and sent to them.  BFL does not have a storage wallet they keep BTC in, they only have the USD.  If you had bought in May when BTC was $100-120 and refunded in Aug when BTC hit $70 you'd have done well.

This has already been debunked thoroughly. Bitpay will only convert the bitcoins if the merchant instructs them to. BFL could have kept all of their payments in Bitcoin without converting any of them, which they should have in case they needed to refund them.

The original thread:

From the bitpay faq: https://bitpay.com/faq
How do I get paid?
Merchants choosing to keep the bitcoins can be anywhere in the world. Merchants in some countries can choose to receive a direct deposit into their bank account.

When do I get paid?
We prefer to send one payment to every merchant each day, which clears out their balance with BitPay. This prevents balances from accumulating and discourages hackers. Payments to bank accounts are made per business day. Payments in bitcoins are sent to the bitcoin address of your choice, at least once per calendar day.

prolly that coupled with their fresh cash from new monarch 'customers'.

Good to see BFL with the BBB rating they deserve.

https://i.imgur.com/73soyI4.png

There needs to be a G.

Ah yes, here's the old hindsight is 20/20 routine.  Obviously they kept all the BTC they were ever paid without ever converting it into USD cause they KNEW the price was going to spike.  ::)  ::)  ::)

I supposed they also kept all the rubles and francs and pounds and marks and yen they were paid without converting them either, IN CASE THEY HAD TO REFUND THEM AS WELL.

Businesses cannot afford to hold onto a commodity (Yep, I said commodity and not currency) like Bitcoin due to it's volatile nature.  No business wanting to keep it's doors open would be that stupid.  Sure, you have the luxury now of saying "BUT!  See how stupid they were if they didn't hold any?!?!?" cause you KNOW what happened.  BTC spiked back in 2011 at over $30 and then 6 months later it was $3.  The price had only recovered to $5-$6 by the time BFL started taking preorders.  Maybe you would be willing to take a chance at losing 1/2 your money, but that would be suicide for a business.  In addition, your logic doesn't hold water.  Let's get rediculous and say only 1/5 of all orders were paid for by BTC and BFL hedged and kept 10% of all the BTC and converted the rest to USD for their operating budget.  Now we have to step into speculation, which I dislike doing, but it's the only option I have with no hard data.  Using http://bfl.ptz.ro/ as a guideline, we can see 4951 orders totalling $10mil, which is unrealistic to begin with since it's based on the original pricing of the miners which almost doubled around April.  These ~5000 orders represent only 7% of potential orders.  49 of these 'known'(I use ' ' because trust is vague since people could post complete BS on here) orders were Day 1.  10 Mini-rig, 90 Singles, 8 Little Singles and 36 Jalapenos 'KNOWN' to be ordered day 1 and this could be 1/1 to 1/6 of actual day one orders..  $298,990 + $224,910 + $9,968 + $5,364.  $539,232 * 1/5 * 1/10 = $10,784 or ~1600-1800BTC.  2% is an extremely small amount to keep and we're seeing a minimal stash being worth $160k-180k from only a percentage of Day 1 orders, of which there could be 2-5 times as many of.  By December over 14000 potential orders had been placed.  88 'known' minirigs have been ordered.  This is from 1200 of a possible 14000 orders.  BTC price end of Dec is around $13.5, so lets use that even though it shorts us on BTC.  88 * $29.899 = $2,631, 112 * 2% = 52,622.24 / 13.5 = 3897 BTC.  In todays market almost half a million dollars if they had only kept 2% of total sales as BTC from 'known' minirigs orders from Jun - Dec.  You have to at least doublt that to account for the other 'known' products.  And this is from only 10% of the potential orders made!  That's potentiallly 100,000BTC from only keeping 2% of sales from Jun through Dec as BTC.

April 5th BFL raises prices while BTC value is climbing.  April 10th BTC tops $250 before plummeting to $80, climbs back above $150, drops below 100, climbs again to 130.  Yea, let's ride the freaking roller coaster with 10's of millions of dollars FROM ONLY 2% OF SALES!

See, this is where it makes absolutely no sense to me... After receiving a potential 12,000 orders in March while BTC prices climbed from $20 to $60 and beyond, tripling the value BFLs BTC holdings in a single month, they double the price on all units.

We just became multimillionaires from holding onto a small percentage of all sales as BTC and we're so freaking greedy we stick it to the customers.

Dude, believe in your fantasies.  I just don't see it.

Paypal, Amazon, Ebay, and many other companies give you back exactly what you put in when you ask for a refund. That is what is common business practice.

Businesses should not hold on to Bitcoin yes. But scams would. Why else would BFL ask for a 100% deposit yet claim they would not spend the pre-order money?
If they were not going to spend it, but instead hold it, then yes they should assume the asset risk. Instead, they pushed that off on their customers because most of them don't have the faintest clue what proper business behavior looks like

If BFL didn't need the money like they claimed, they could have taken a 10% deposit and lessen their commodity risk. It isn't the customers fault that BFL was faced with 12 months of currency risk. They shouldn't have to pay that toll as well.

I am not saying BFL did keep all the BTC, I am saying that BFL should have and could have (since they claimed they were escrowing pre-order funds)
If they set the precedent that someone could get all their BTC back, every single person who pre-ordered with BTC in 2012 would ask for a refund. BFL would go out of business if they actually offered to make their customers whole. However, that is the risk they took by taking 100% deposits and being late by 10 months.

Or BFL could have just been upfront and said "all refunds to be paid in USD because we are converting BTC to USD and spending it on development". Strangely, BFL has begun refunding people who paid in BTC with BTC. I guess that federal judge declaring that BTC was money put the fear of legal reprisal into them. Up till now, they just told you to fuck off if you paid with BTC.

1) If I  were german and paid for an ebay order through paypal with Duetche marks it would be converted to USD (or some other fiat) and credited to the seller.  When asking for a refund, that USD (or other fiat) would be removed from the sellers account and the Marks would be credited back to mine yes, we get back what we paid, and yes, exchange rates may have shifted, but that's like 1%.  But we are talking about a highly volatile COMMODITY called Bitcoin here and as far as I can tell, none of the places you list accepts Bitcoin AS IT IS TOO VOLATILE IN PRICE.  Continue your stupidity on this, I know you will, farcical notions will remain farcical no matter how you preface them.  So what if they accepted BTC for an item, the price was USD.  As you so eloquently state, "if the value of BTC had dropped they would have gladly given back the BTC paid".  Show me 1 person who would not have bitched about that.  You expect BFL to get raped cause value shifted, but refuse to get raped if it went against you.  The truth you are refusing to see is that if you sold 10,000 shares of stock to get the USD to buy a minirig and then the price of that stock rose, BFL would not be responsible for your loss of profit by selling when you did.  The same holds true for BTC whether you agree or not.  Plain and simple fact, you SOLD BTC for USD and purchased an item.  IN asking for a refund BFL has to BUY BTC with the USD they received and REFUND it to you.  If they refunded you the USD you spent on the minirig and you could only buy 1,000 share of the stock you previously sold, BFL is not responsible.

2) According to what I read, the PREORDER money you are referring to was not spent ON RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, WHICH IS UNDERSTANDABLE, but to assume as you are that none would be used to purchase the products needed to create the parts in question is laughable.  How on earth could any startup company take 100's of millions of dollars of orders and not spend a cent of it on the materials to make the parts?  Did Avalon only take 10% on it's preorders?  Are all the other ASIC companies taking only 10% on their preorders?  What world do you live in?  Try placing a special order sometime... most places require payment up front and have a 15% restocking fee if you cancel the order after it comes in.  Whether you think so or not, that is basically what these pre-orders are, special orders.  The materials to build them has been ordered and paid for and now people want their money back.

3) Wow, just wow... Let's stop and think... WHY did BFL refuse refunds in BTC?  Maybe because people were being unreasonable.  "I paid 500 BTC and I want 500 BTC back (mainly because that $3000 is not worth $50000!!!!!)"  THIS is the main reason behind 99% of the BTC refund requests you cite... GREED... and when refused what happened?  "SCAM!!!!!!!".  Yes BFL is now refunding BTC, by converting the USD for the items paid into BTC and sending it.  

You can't have it both ways, but that's how you keep presenting it.  If as you say BFL should have held all those BTC and refunded as BTC now that prices have skyrocketed then as well, if prices had plummeted BFL should only be responsible to refund the BTC paid.

Before you refute everything above answer this:

If you paid 10,000 BTC (worth $60,000USD in June 2012) and BFL kept it as BTC and the price today was $3 per BTC, WOULD YOU ACCEPT YOUR 10,000BTC BACK or would you call them a scam and demand 20,000 BTC cause you spend $60,000?

You can't have it both ways.

Nope. You get exactly the number of Marks, Dollars, Pesos, etc that you put in. They use the exchange rate at the time of the purchase, not the time of the refund.

From Paypal's website (https://www.paypal.com/helpcenter/main.jsp;jsessionid=rV0JKsnTq3Z197277Pg2sQ4mJ1HJWQ5xpxnJnzGxvW9J1FhW03yL!-1588418?t=solutionTab&ft=homeTab&ps&solutionId=163394&locale=en_GB&_dyncharset=UTF-8&countrycode=GB&cmd=_help&serverInstance=9012)
Refunds are performed using the exchange rate which was current at the time of the original payment.

They are called factor loans. Also, they could get investors. The usual route is to get a factor loan to buy the parts and then manufacture and ship the product. If they can't get one, that is a big red flag.

No. These are not specialized one off devices produced for a single individual. This is mass produced hardware.

That is not unreasonable. That is business. If you hold someone's funds in escrow, you give them back what they put in. 500 BTC is worth 500 BTC, I don't care how many Euros or Dollars or Renmimbi it is worth.

I spent 10,000 BTC. It was worth 500,000,000 Zimbabwean dollars and when I asked for a refund it was worth 500,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 Zimbabwean dollars so why wouldn't I be happy? Z$500,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 is way more than Z$500,000,000, so I came out ahead right?

If they hold that 10,000 BTC in escrow and I asked for a refund and then they refunded my 10,000 BTC, I would have to be happy they gave it back. BTC is money. If you hold someone's money for them, you don't play exchange rate games with them. If BFL wasn't prepared to assume the risk of holding BTC, then they shouldn't have offered to take it and hold it for 12 months.

<sigh> you repeated back exactly what I said, even though you misunderstood what I said.  YES PAYPAL REFUNDS WHAT WAS SPEND EXACTLY.  Matters not that exchange rates could have shifted. THIS IS BECAUSE WE ARE DEALING WITH FIAT VS FIAT  X was removed and Y was credited... then Y was removed and X was credited.  BTC is still not FIAT, while considered a currency by some it still holds status as a commodity.  Far as I remember, the pricing on BFL's website read USD and they would accept BTC in the amount of that USD.  This implies conversion.

You did not answer my question, WHAT ASIC COMPANIES ARE TAKING DEPOSITS FOR PREORDERS?  In your words then every ASIC preorder from EVERY company is a RED FLAG.

Special orders are not "1-off devices produced for a single individual'.  Go to Home Depot and try to order a Sauna.  Since it is not IN STOCK they classify it as SPECIAL ORDER, yet it is part of their catalog and has to be paid in advance IN FULL.  Considering they have a warehouse filled with them they ship from, it is not specialty built, but still a special order.  They have hundreds even thousands of them, but it's not sent to the store until ordered.  Kind of similar to the devices BFL is producing but they have ordered the parts and made a pre-built kit compared to BFLs ordering parts and building to order.

Yet again, you are talking about BTC as a viable currency.  When Paypal accepts BTC as a viable currency I will accept your argument.  When EBAY accepts BTC as a viable currency I will accept your argument.   Up until that time, you are selling a commodity for the USD funds needed to make a purchase.  BFL is simply being kind enough to reconvert the USD funds back into BTC to refund it to you.  YOU GOT THE SAME VALUE BACK. PERIOD.

The ONLY and I repeat ONLY way your argument is valid is if BFL did not take varying amounts of BTC for their miners over time.  If they said at the beginning "29BTC for a Jalapeno" and stuck with that regardless of USD value, then yes, your point is valid and they should refund you your 29 BTC.  Since the BTC 'price' VARIED while the USD price remained the same. YOUR POINT IS INVALID.  USD was the operating currency and by purchasing with whatever method you used, you accepted USD as that currency.  The only escrow needed to be held is USD as that is what they asked for.

I notice you deleted the sale of stock example and did not comment on it, probably because you realize it was correct and admitting that would damaged your case.  BTC is not a viable currency and is not recognized by Paypal or Ebay as such.

BFL not giving refunds which is against FTC regulations.

Everything else is a diversion.

BFL needs to go bankrupt. Help them by boycotting their products.

Ill write on article how you can get a refund from BFL tomorrow.

I know for a FACT that BFL fucked up, and as required by state law. They ether  send you the item or issue you a refund. Therefore making them liable and  you could sue them for profit lost.

Ill write it tomorrow...

Eagerly waiting for it.

Just to make it clear. They refunded the same amount in USD which I had paid. The amount of BTC I received is essentially different from what I paid.

Clear. Can you explain how you managed to get the refund? I also requested one (just now), and I'm sure they will answer the usual "all sales are final", etc. which is a joke because I paid for my product +6 month ago and they did not ship anything. That's completely against consumer laws in both US and EU.

I have nothing to add, just read my posts in this thread. I'll describe the whole process in one post as soon as I reach my PC.

UPD. So the whole process with timeline.

Monday. Requested the refund by email. Told them I was aware of their "sales final" policy and still insisted the refund. Told them I would file complaints to BBB and AG. Asked for refund via the same method the order was paid, i.e. bitcoins.
Wednesday. Sent a copy through BFL online contact form.
Sunday. Filed online complaints to BBB and AG Kansas. Enclosed my invoice from BFL.
Tuesday. Received a reply asking for my BTC address. Gave one. Received email stating they had asked BitPay to refund. Received BTC.

Once again, both payment and refund are payed at fixed USD price. Invoice is in USD. Amount of BTC in both cases is determined by BitPay's instant rate.

This is excellent news that BFL is once again honoring all refunds: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=279173.0