How I Lent My Camera Kit and Had It ‘Legally Stolen’
Basically this entire article comes down to the fact that agents of KitSplit lied to his face in an online chat, and he wasn't savvy enough to keep a transcript of that chat.I honestly don't feel any sympathy for the guy. Any time you're concerned about something and an agent of a company assures you of a particular outcome, e.g. "the insurance will cover it", you'd be completely foolish to a) use that assurance to make your decision while also b) not keeping a record of that assurance. I try to do all my support by chat or email just for the papertrail.It's worth noting that, at least in my state (IL), the criminal statute for consumer fraud explicitly does not require mens rea (criminal intent) - merely a deceptive statement that leads the company toward financial gain. What's more, the statement doesn't actually have to be false (just deceptive), and the employee making it doesn't have to be aware if it's false.That criterion would obviously be met here, and I would not hesitate to write the attorney general's consumer fraud department in this situation -- with the transcript I would have kept, of course. I've done so before for a health insurance dispute that basically mirrored the events in this story (being correctly wary, being assured by a corporate drone that things would be covered, then finding they are not covered).Obviously criminal prosecutions under that statue are quite rare, but even so it's amazing how a company's "last offer" quickly becomes "here, let us give you literally everything you initially asked for" when it's a (free!) moderator from the AG's office writing on your behalf.