Joanne H

Exploitative and useless.

I signed up with Better Help due to the convincing marketing and I was abroad, it seemed like a good option. The claim of being matched with a therapist for my specific issue was something I really believed and expected. I filled out a very lengthy questionnaire that outlined that I was looking for trauma based counselling.

Instead of acting ethically and telling me they didn’t have any matching therapists, I was matched with a list of ‘Marriage and Family’ specialists. None were qualified to deal with my issue, but due to having already paid, I was left with no options but to accept one.

She was awful. Got my name wrong repeatedly despite being corrected multiple times, then got an attitude with me. She just sent poorly written generic responses that didn’t address my issues at all. I got frustrated with the very lengthy response time, and lack of engagement, and asked specifically for functional tools to deal with what I was struggling with. She refused and tried to drag things past the current subscription date. It was blatant and I got absolutely nothing helpful from her. It was just mindless texting back.

“Oh, that must be difficult. Stay positive.” And things like that. No questions, nothing to work on.

I could get more helpful engagement from ChatGPT than her. I tried another therapist and it was still from the list that didn’t correspond to what I had signed up for. While the option to go to another therapist is good, you have to start at the beginning, which wastes the time you paid for going over the same thing and potentially having to pay more only to not have anything helpful.

Customer services were terrible and didn’t care at all. Despite the woman getting my name wrong repeatedly and me sending them the chats. I cancelled and they confirmed, but still tried to take money from my account for months afterwards. They’d apologise and say nothing else would be taken, but it happened again. I had to contact my bank to dispute charges and they advised me to cancel my card.

They aggressively market and prey upon vulnerable people. The therapists, who as far as I can tell, are not paid very much considering their supposed qualifications, use this as a side hustle to make a little extra money while they’re at home/going about their daily business. The treatment they offered me, which is very common, as is evidenced by REAL reviews available all over the internet, was so low quality that it’s actually dangerous should someone really be struggling. I don’t know how they’re legally allowed to operate because this is wildly unethical.

I suspect many of these positive reviews are fake. Lots of people with glowing things to say and only one review left, all very close together.

Considering the floods of awful and very specifically similar bad reviews on independent platforms, it really makes you think.

Do NOT take the risk with these charlatans.

They claimed to be recruiting, so I thought I might as well give it a go. I was a bit suspicious of them hard selling courses at $75 minimum for an entry level position. Still, I went through the very brief form as a ‘seasoned pro’ because I have 2+ of experience with AI and my application was for AI Editor.

I outlined this experience on the form only to be send an email from ‘HR’ immediately afterwards thanking me for taking the time, but telling me that they only hire people with experience (yep, I have that)…then trying to sell me a course on the very thing I have experience in so that I can “kick start my career” - a career I already have had for 2+ years for a much more widely known platform.

Essentially, it’s a scam to sell their nonsense courses. The lingo is very specific even on site - almost promising to hire “course graduates.”

It’s low paid entry level work, and apparently you have to pay them at least $75 dollars for consideration.

Save yourself the bother.

The AI interviewer is ridiculous and somewhat condescending. It asks asinine questions and is generally incredibly poor. I have zero expectations for the platform if the interview process is that idiotic. Only a singular review here is good, and that one is fairly questionable in its veracity, so I'd avoid wasting time with Opentrain.ai.

DO NOT GIVE THESE FRAUDS YOUR DATA OR ANY PERSONAL INFORMATION!!

Due to heavy marketing on social media and the promise of available work, I signed up for Crowdgen. I have approximately 2-3 years experience on other AI freelancing platforms, but this is by far the least professional and sketchy one I've ever had the misfortune of being on. Their onboarding and support is laughable. They take all of your personal and sensitive data, but you get nothing in return. My ID verification has been stuck for 2+ months, so while it worked for the initial project I signed up for, I cannot apply for any further projects. I have tried over the course of 2+ months to contact support, but honestly, the bot makes more sense than they do. They seem woefully unknowledgeable to the point that I've had to spoon feed them operational practices and they still don't seem to understand.

As far as I can ascertain, they are collecting data and offer no meaningful service or work opportunities. They mismanage all aspects and if they can't handle basic onboarding, I'd hate to see the dumpster fire of getting actually paid (if you even manage to get onto a project).

There's a rise in these charlatans, specifically for this industry, that promise work, but do nothing other than data mine for profit. Stay away.

EDIT 4/10/25:

I have contacted support twice to ask them to delete my data, and they have not responded. This is against data protection laws in my own country and their country of operation.

Aggressive recruiting on social media platforms, but I recommend avoiding it unless you like wasting your time. So far, two weeks after submitting my ID for verification, it’s still under review. The projects a few but I can’t apply for any of them because they can’t manage their processes. If you submit a ticket, you get a nonsense AI email and have to ask to speak to support, who similarly have no basic reading or procedural comprehension skills.

If they can’t manage basic automated onboarding, then they absolutely should not be trusted to pay you on time or manage their workers.

Open AI are basically making users pay to Beta test their product. ChatGPT routinely fabricates information or fails to follow instructions, which turns one task into sometimes dozens of prompts and inadequate responses. I have never had an interaction with ChatGPT that didn't involve me feeding it the correct information, while paying for the pleasure of doing so. People literally get paid to do what this company are making us pay for. It's honestly disgusting practice.

9/10 what you order is going to be trash. Low quality knock-offs and bad sellers who mark items as packed so you can’t cancel, despite them taking 1 week + to dispatch. Lazada do not have a proper cancellation policy and customer care are purposely vague and lie to you. Sellers are left to scam and abuse the system. You’d be better off taking the money you would spend on Lazada and setting fire to it.

I've used this service before, and usually without too much issue, although this is heavily reliant on the integrity of their 'Gifting Partner'.

However, on this occasion, it's now 5 pm on the day of estimated delivery. I have not received an OTP, and my order is not yet marked for delivery. When I contacted Customer Service, they refused to answer my questions directly and made vague assurances. The agent repeatedly evaded my question as to whether or not they had spoken to the Gifting Partner and what confirmation they had received to make assurances.

I had to ask this question 4-5 times to get a direct response. They had not spoken to the Gifting Partner at all and had absolutely no information to make any confirmation or assurance. They offered no actual information as to how they planned to get my package delivered.

This meant that the agent had lied to me several times. They explicitly said multiple times that my order would be delivered 'TODAY ONLY, WITHIN THE TIME SLOT' - but this is clearly not going to be the case. No plan was set, just lies and poetic responses about spreading smiles.

Obviously, they have been trained to mislead and placate customers instead of providing accurate information and solutions for issues.

I will likely have to contact again as they have no intention of following-up with the Gifting Partner.

Since Shiprocket generate tracking numbers prior to item pick-up, they are being used by scam sellers on Etsy and other platforms. Bad sellers will use this and delay tactics to take advantage of customers. I've had this happen multiple times now. Unfortunately, so many scams from independent Indian sellers using Shiprocket's policies and lack of diligence as an opportunity.

I hope this shows up on Google search so other customers know what to look for.

1. Your order will get marked as dispatched on the platform way too quickly (even if it's a custom order).
2. You will get a Shiprocket email about tracking also very quickly, with a scheduled pick up date.
3. That pick up will be cancelled or you'll get a 'pick-up failed' type of message, repeatedly. Likely because there is no item to pick up or because the pick up location given is false.
4. The seller will keep asking for more time or tell you they definitely sent the package and the problem is on Shiprocket end.
5. They will lie: they will tell you that the item is stuck at customs (even if it is a domestic order) or that they contacted the courier and that there has been some type of delay with illogical excuses.
6. When you confront them with screenshots they may send you another tracking number.
7. They will repeat the cycle of lies, excuses, fake tracking info and even begging you on behalf of their family not to start a case against them with the platform or PayPal.

DO NOT LISTEN TO THEM.

Shiprocket's tracking policy makes this possible. They can mark things as dispatched without handing anything over. They can generate as many tracking numbers as they want.

Be very cautious with online sellers using this method. Keep an eye on the tracking and make sure that your item is moving. Make sure the information on the tracking matches up to your address. If pick up is failing, you have likely been scammed.

Take screenshots of every communication and submit a claim without delay. Going back and forth with the sellers will eat your brains and be nothing else than time pass listening to silly lies that make no sense.

Shiprocket needs to add policies and safeguards to stop this service being used to scam people, but it seems they do not care.

I have contacted them every time this has happened and they just talk rubbish.

Honestly, in their previous iteration, they were hopeless. However, my local Evri driver is an absolute pleasure to deal with. I work nights, so I sleep during the day, though if I'm waiting for a delivery, I'll stay up. When my delivery guy found that out (I apologized for being in PJs/a bit of a mess), he asked where he should leave packages so I didn't have to worry about it & get my sleep. I told him a place and he has steadfastly left packages there with no issue since.

Truly above and beyond. He is also incredibly diligent with updating delivery times along his route.

The best delivery driver I've ever had for any company.

UPDATE:

I was lied to again. CS representative assured me it was getting delivered, again. It did not arrive. They then asked for time to investigate and gave another date. That date came and went without my parcel or any explanation. Contacted CS once more and they asked for more time/made more assurances.

I opened a dispute with my bank and got a refund.

I cannot stress this enough - DO NOT TRUST AMAZON CS. They are liars and at this point, Amazon itself cannot be trusted. Outsourced or not, Amazon are clearly not conducting any quality or compliance measures on their partners and allowing this to be done to customers.

If you have an issue, dispute it with your bank or credit card. Do not believe anything CS say.

I will not be using Amazon again.

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Their couriers are lazy and dishonest. This is not the first time this has happened to me - packages scanned as delivered and 'handed to resident', but no sign of the package.

Contacted customer services and was lied to/told absolute rubbish by the first web chat agent.

"I can see on the system that it will be delivered today by 10pm. The courier just scanned it by mistake."

- when questioned regarding this claim...

"Oh, I can see that this package will be delivered on 15th May, tomorrow." (it was the 13th May...so not 'tomorrow' - although, the CS team are usually India based, so tomorrow for them, I guess).

- When asked how the same system could give two dates:

*CS agent ignores me from that point onward.

----

I call CS. The first girl is nice, and sounds SE Asian. Transfers me over to an exasperated Indian guy (me too, buddy...I've spent an hour of my UNPAID time being lied to chasing an item I've paid for! At least this is your literal paid job!), who speaks to me like I'm an idiot.

Tells me that on the 15th I have to contact them AGAIN and they will refund me or send out another package. Said this is for them to investigate. Acts like I'm unreasonable for wanting to receive decent customer service and the item I paid for in the time I was guaranteed it would arrive (I pay for Amazon Prime). But assures me again that I can contact them ON 15th May and they will 'HELP ME with a refund...'

That's not help, buddy. That's literally the bare minimum.

----

15th May arrives. No package by 7 pm, no updated tracking. Still shows as being delivered on the 13th.I contacted them AGAIN as requested. CS agent on webchat acts like this is the first time I've queried this, fails to acknowledge any previous contact, and tells me I now have to wait til the 18th and contact them then for a refund. They did not start investigating on the 15th as I was told they would. They were literally doing nothing, waiting to see if the package came.

When queried because I had it in writing that the refund date was 15th May, the agent ignored my questions and ended the chat on me.

I contacted another agent to highlight the issue. The agent initially said 'I should just contact them on 18th May' and when I said I had assurances in writing of a 15th May refund date, they disappeared again.

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Their in-house delivery drivers are worse than Evri/Yodel combined. I've had electrical items left without a knock on my doorstep, which is essentially a main road, in the rain. And this is not the first time they have failed to deliver an item, but wrongly marked it as having been delivered.

HOWEVER, the main issue is their awful customer service. This is due to them outsourcing this element to companies based in India and the Philippines. I've lived and worked in India, I know that they have no oversight or ombudsman. Consumer rights are not legally a thing there. There are absolutely no legal data protection laws (one minor act covering digital data attached to a wider law passed in 2020 -but essentially meaningless).

It's not a one-off thing. EVERY time I contact Amazon CS I am persistently lied to, hung up on, ignored and treated as though spending hours chasing an item or just to have them deal with the issue properly is somehow acceptable.

I've opened a dispute with my bank. I will be deleting my account with Amazon. I asked for all data, notes, and conversations regarding this issue (for my bank dispute) as per my rights according to GDPR and the agent didn't even know what GDPR was. Either that or they lied to avoid giving me this data, which is also fundamentally illegal...but what do they care, they're outsourced.

Order from literally anywhere else via PayPal. Do not trust Amazon with your money or your data. Their CS agents don't even understand the concept of customer service or consumer rights. They don't seem to be tied to UK standards either.

Took money from my account. Then decided the fare had changed by a significant amount. I called customer service, the woman on the line was pretending she couldn't take down the phone number I'd already entered on the IVR. Every number I gave, she was coming back with numbers that didn't even sound like it. She was doing it deliberately. When I started talking in legal terms and Ombudsmans she suddenly could hear my information perfectly and reversed the payment within seconds. DO NOT DEAL WITH THIS COMPANY.

Worst customer service/care I've ever experienced from an airline (& Air India STILL owe me £600 from 2020). I paid for a preferred seat because it was a 6hr flight, looked pretty full and I wanted to be comfortable.

Boarding was abysmal, staff were rude and the whole thing was not only late, but a shambles.

I walk to my window seat near the front of the economy cabin and a man, traveling with his mother had spread out accross the three seats and predictably, in my seat. I told him it was my seat and he argued with me, pretended not be able to count or see (the seat numbers are on the screens). He made me show him my ticket and then made a big fuss, being rude and aggressive about moving, shouting at me to wait. So I did. He then shouting at me to get in my seat and starts using abusive language in both English and Arabic. The latter of which I may not be fluent in, but do know what "promiscuous lady of ill-repute" is. He's bad mouthing me to his party in the centre seating of the plane and as I would have been confined to a window seat next to this very large angry man, I didn't feel safe. I told him to let me out and he refused. I got cabin crew involved. They were sympathetic (so I thought) but largely useless and didn't really do much to deal with the man now verbally assaulting me.

There were three options other than finding myself as a lone woman trapped in a window seat next to an aggressive man.

1) I deboard and give Qatar Airways the financial gift of my money with no services rendered and give up my important travel plans.
2) Swap seats but sit amongst members of his party who he was using abusive language about me to, who didn't seem to mind his bullying behaviour.
3. Beg the cabin crew to find me a (lesser) seat elsewhere.

The man never received a warning, there was never any meaningful intervention from cabin crew and I was very shaken. They were nice about it, but basically couldn't really be bothered and it seemed like an annoyance to them as we were late already.

I was sat at the back of the plane. At that point I was so relieved to be away from this oaf.

No one, I repeat no one, bothered to help or ask about my moving my cabin bag. It stayed in the overhead locker above my original seat, with my aggressor. I say this because it'll be important later.

Because of the fact this guy was unhinged and that I'd paid money for a seat I wasn't able to use for my own safety, I contacted customer care. Also partly to find out what had been done about the situation on their end, as I would like to be reassured of their commitment to my safety before ever flying with them again.

It took two weeks for customer care to respond. And I genuinely wish they hadn't. I now feel even worse about Qatar Airways and the situation.

Their claims:
- I voluntarily left my seat and was offered two alternative seats before I accepted one.
- Cabin crew moved my stuff across to my new seat.

It was implied that I was the nuisance party and cabin crew went above and beyond to accommodate me being difficult.

This is all lies. I had to beg to be sat away from this man, while I was shaking and he was still insulting me.

Their admission:
- no warning issued, no talking to given and no record was made of the man's behaviour.

Apparently passenger safety, especially that of women traveling alone (shocking, how dare we...) is less important than boorish men's rights to admonish, bully and aggress us.

Apparently I should have been grateful that they moved me to the back end of the plane after I annoyed them by not wanting to be trapped in a window seat next to an angry 'man' who was calling me a wh*re to anyone who'd listen and being aggressive towards me.

The whole thing was humiliating and quite frankly, has left a mark on my confidence in traveling (despite me literally taking dozens of flights yearly for the past 5yrs).

Qatar Airways belittling response, the dishonesty and irresponsible actions of their cabin crew has utterly sickened me. I'm glad I moved seats because of this man's behaviour had escalated (& his anger was showing no signs of slowing down), I'd hate to see what their response/lack of intervention would have been, considering their attitude.

Unacceptable, insulting and, quite frankly, unsafe attitude to passenger safety.

I genuinely don't understand the negative reviews at all. Every single experience I've had with IndiGo has been exemplary and I very rarely say that. They've become my absolute go to airline, where at all possible but especially within India. I've flown with them to Vietnam and Thailand too. Sure, the planes are basic but the staff are always organised, professional and courteous. They have been extremely helpful and accommodating to me on multiple occasions, even when I was late for my flight/check-in cos my connecting flight from Air India was late (don't get me started on how useless and unpleasant Air India are!). They checked me in even though it was closed and had a member of staff literally run with me through the airport, help me through security and get me on the plane with ONE SINGLE MINUTE to spare before take off. They have also taken care of fragile items in the cockpit for me and beyond any extra care; their boarding is always efficient, stress free and humane (other airlines, even vastly more expensive ones treat passengers like cattle), their cabin crew are always polite even when faced with ignorant, rude customers - especially in the emergency exit rows. Even de-boarding is handled gracefully and the luggage is always available at baggage claim quickly. I have only ever had one flight with them be late and that was due to extreme fog at Bangalore.

I don't really care of their website is clunky, it's a damned lot better than Air India, Spicejet of any of the others, honestly and at least IndiGo refund you within the timeframe they state and don't make you chase of call them to get your funds.

Considering how bad other airlines are at all of the above, even if IndiGo weren't as good as they are, by comparison I still don't understand the complaints.

Literally flown with them (multiple) dozens of times and have yet to have a really negative experience.

Onboarding and the general UI for signing up is really clunky. Some of the drop down menus are really unresponsive and oddly show errors every time you try to type in something not beginning with a number or the letter A. There is very little obvious help/support for this phase and I'm just really unimpressed with it. Literally cannot complete onboarding because my area of expertise starts with the letter C and it won't recognize anything further than A in the alphabet. Waste of time. It's a shame because it seems like other people are having good experiences (according to reviews anyway), but unfortunately, it doesn't seem like I'm going to be able to work for any impact whatsoever because of the poor UI.

Also, why make someone download a PDF of their LinkedIn to upload as the only other alternative to manually entering what's already on my resume, only to have it not actually pull most of the profile information? Again another time waste for anyone onboarding.

Recruitment and onboarding are the first glimpse into a company for any employee, it should at least make a positive impact, no?

Our tax payer money hard at work, eh? I was misled recently to work in a call center that was scamming vulnerable timeshare victims out of 5-10k each for fraudulent legal services. I quit the second I figured it out (literally the instant I was out of training and on the floor). I tried to use the form but it wasn't working. I was prompted to call them. I waited almost 30mins for them to tell me that they couldn't do anything on the call and I'd need to use the form. Hundreds of victims being scammed right now, I had full names, phone numbers of almost everyone involved and information on the call center, as well as full details (names, phone numbers, email addresses and postal addresses) of potential victims because they stupidly added me into the work group chat and were posting personal details in there. These are people who were imminently at risk of losing thousands. The woman said "yeah, well not even the police will look at that cos of Data Protection" so the police, Action Fraud and the UK Govt who fund this ridiculous service care about vulnerable people, many elderly who have already lost thousands to basically the same people who use different company names to victimize them repeatedly. The script that I also had a copy of states that they are a Govt funded fraud action team investigating scam companies. Literally was told to do the form online, even though I'd wasted my time on hold because I was told that they would be. It's like they make it purposely hard to report a crime so they can sit and do nothing.

I had enough evidence to help the named victims so they could contact their banks and get their money back or not get scammed at all. I had the call center address and all the names/numbers of the main players. They could have literally just driven there and found mountains of usable evidence, made arrests and saved people thousands - you know, actually provide a public service? I had the other company names, addresses and company numbers they were using too. Would have been a very quick investigation since they literally could have rocked up there and seen for themselves. They weren't very good at hiding anything, hence why it took me only a couple of hours to figure it out...or more succinctly, the first time they put that ridiculous script in front of me. It's hardly a sophisticated outfit but apparently no one cares enough about hundreds of elderly people, some of which fall under the vulnerable persons act, being scammed repeatedly for thousands and then ending up with UK Courts sending bailiffs to their homes when they're run into ruin.

Anyone working for/running this service should feel so ashamed and embarrassed with themselves. As should the police for diverting their responsibilities to victims of crime to what's essentially an answering machine to nowhere. No wonder fraud is so lucrative, no one bothers to investigate.

I first heard about Music Magpie from buying refurbished DVDs in my local Poundland. Struggling with finding titles I wanted from their limited selection, I went online and made my first purchase. Amazon is hard to avoid and I've got some serious ethical reservations about using it, but Music Magpie has given me a great trustworthy alternative that is far more affordable. The pre-owned DVDs I bought work perfectly and it helps recycling usable items that would just end up in a landfill otherwise. I was pleasantly surprised by the range of titles and the special offers. Older and more niche films are available too. Once I applied the deals, the DVDs worked out to £1 each, but that all depends on choices. Free shipping is fast and obviously a big plus. I also ventured a look into the tech portion of the website and when I replace my old Macbook Pro in the near future, I'll be doing so on Music Magpie. It really one of the best finds.