Were you victimized by Avon? Tell us about your experience.
You might have heard Avon but now you aren’t sure whether they are worth it? Have you struggled getting a response from their customer service and now you wonder if they are a pyramid scheme? You aren’t alone.
Avon is a company that offers top rated beauty products through independent sales representatives, including cosmetics, skincare, fragrances, and Jewelry. They are the second biggest direct selling enterprise after Amway. More importantly they are one of the oldest. Avon has been around since 1886 offering women an opportunity to make money long before they could even vote. Today they are the fifth largest beauty company with over 6.4 million representatives selling their products.
Avon, a beauty products maker is facing a lawsuit from two former employees who say that this company, allegedly for women, discriminated against them once they were pregnant. In this lawsuit one of the former employees claimed that she was fired one month after she was hired because she disclosed that she had a high risk pregnancy so she would have to work from home temporarily. In the lawsuit her supervisor is said to have commented, “your health isn’t my concern, but your performance is”.
Another former employee was discriminated against after she became pregnant and had to start pumping breast milk at work and claims that she was repeatedly harassed and demeaned because she wouldn’t work with hazardous chemicals that pose a risk to pregnant women.
A class action lawsuit out of California has just recently hit Avon, in response to the legal changes for the classification of workers in California. According to the WARN Act and the fair labor standards act, Avon products designated their workers as independent contractors in some cases and employees and other cases with independent contractors not receiving the same protections that employees did. Boost class action lawsuit claims that workers who were designated independent contractors should have been considered employees and given workplace protections. The misclassification of independent contractors is that the only issue brought about in this claim. The defendants also claimed that the company took wrongful deductions from their wages, coerced them into purchasing items, and failed to give them rest breaks and off-duty meal breaks.
There are a handful of complaints involving products and services as well as billing. Some individuals joined Avon and then decided to discontinue but we’re told that they have remaining balances even though they never sold any products and those remaining balances went so far as to turn into collections notices. Other complaints crafts to do with unnecessary charges and agreed-upon refunds that never came to pass. Some representatives were told that they would be eligible for credit but they could use it and then when they tried to use it, they were charged that amount directly with no credit applicable to the account. Every complaint lodged officially with the Better Business Bureau has been responded to by Avon even in situations where the person complaining says they’ve tried to contact the company repeatedly but to no avail. Submitting a written complaint to the Better Business Bureau seems to warrant a much faster response when other methods fail.
Even though Avon has a lot of issues with billing and collections, overcharging people in using somewhat misleading practices, they are not considered a pyramid scheme because they don’t put an emphasis on recruiting over actual sales. A big part of the profits someone can make lies directly with their ability to sell the beauty products.
If you have tried to get a resolution for an account or billing issue, and also had no luck, a written complaint to the company, using consumer arbitration might just be the solution. We can guide you through the process.
The Ultimate Guide to Consumer Complaints
Learn More
