News

FineYoga, a renowned yoga franchise in China, was recently revealed to be not paying salary for its employees for almost half a year, as well as closing down numerous gyms and barber shops under its name. Even worse, consumers found that they can’t refund their prepaid cards at FineYoga. The news has drawn widespread public concern. JAVY’s executive director Ge Youshan Esq. has commented on this issue when interview by media.

As Mr. Ge pointed out, according to article 53 of Consumer Rights Protection Law, consumers has the right to refund if the business owners haven’t provide promised service. However, it’s usually hard for consumers to do so, because the refund process can be lengthy, some unscrupulous business owners may have already closed their shops and fled the country, long before the consumer’s refund can be completed. In this case, the consumers have the following options:

l  Apply for mediation with the local consumer advocacy organizations;

l  File a complaint to the local market supervision and management bureau;

l  File a lawsuit against the business owner to cancel the contract and claim the refund.

Mr. Ge also suggested that consumers should conduct some basic investigations on the business owner before purchasing the prepaid cards, such as:

l  Whether their business reputation is flawed;

l  Whether there were complaints against them to the local authority;

l  Whether they are on the list of dishonest judgment debtors, etc.

It is also strongly advised that the consumers should carefully examine the details in the pre-pay contract and keep an eye for unfair terms, keep the invoices, as well as transaction records, those may serve as evidence if a litigation is to be filed.

Mr. Ge also calls for stronger supervision on the authority’s side on the prepaid business model, he said the authority may require mandatory registration for business owners which adopt the pre-paid model, and their transactions should be monitored by 3rd party financial institutions, the market supervision and management bureau should also take actions to force the business owners to pay if they have failed to provide promised services to the consumers.