Their modus operandi is to charge the full amount of the order right away to your credit card, then vaguely claim that some unspecified items are backordered. Until it's too late to reverse the CC charges. Then they don't answer phones, don't return emails, etc. They are under investigation by the TX attorney general's office. DO NOT ORDER FROM sciencelab.com Sources: http://www.resellerratings.com/store/ScienceLab http://www.siteadvisor.com/sites/sciencelab.com http://www.bbb.org/houston/business...oducts/science-lab-com-in-humble-tx-13007572/ http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=8270 http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/sciencelabcom-c254656.html http://blogs.chron.com/consumerwatch/2008/04/ http://www.ripoffreport.com/drug-ma...-com/sciencelab-com-kept-my-money-f-db4mc.htm http://74.125.93.132/search?q=cache...am&cd=10&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca&client=firefox-a
Adding detail This is what they do: (1) They receive an order. (2) They laugh and charge the credit card immediately. (3) They tell you some items are back ordered without listing specifics. (4) You don't hear from them for months and then they tell you the expensive part of your order is back ordered. (5) Ooooops it's too late for the client to reverse credit card charges. (6) You tell them to cancel the back ordered stuff (7) They send you broken, used, past-the-due date stuff (8 ) MOST IMPORTANTLY, they don't refund the difference. (9) They don't answer phone calls. (10) They don't reply to messages left on answering machine (most of which are full, I had to try several) (11) They don't respond to emails. (12) BTW they were supposedly back ordered for 4 months on DMSO... it's like the grocery store being out of eggs for 4 months.
You came close to losing your money... If you have ordered, make sure to call your CC company and be very well informed of the CHARGE BACK deadlines. Past that deadline, you can't charge back and the money is lost. If you participate in a forum where people might casually order a chemical here and there, you'd be an outstanding citizen if you passed the message, and suggest that the message be past on further. As you see from the links, there is no such thing as an isolated case or irate customer when it comes to sciencelab.com. Their method is routine and systematic.
I'll further point out that the Texas attorneys office is very interested in pursuing this issue, but they only have a dozen complaints. Compared the hundred or so at the BBB. I think few people realize that this avenue of lodging a complaint exists, and is so easy to do. If you have been scammed by sciencelab.com, please take a few minutes to fill out their online form: http://oag.state.tx.us If you're going to complain to one place, make it the Texas Attorney's Office.
When you see things like that going on, report them here: http://www.ic3.gov Also, encourage those who have encountered problems to submit reports as well.