Complaints

• Initial Complaint

  07/27/2022

  Complaint Type:

  Product Issues

  Status:

  Answered

  More info

  Paid Heather Meyer Photography $1800 to complete the job of photographing our wedding. We paid an initial deposit of $540 and then $1260 prior to our wedding. She lost the majority of our wedding photos and refuses to pay us a refund per our signed contract.

  Business response

  09/14/2022

  Business Response /* (1000, 13, 2022/08/26) */ ***Document Attached*** ******** hired me to photograph her wedding in September of 2021. I photographed her wedding, and delivered a sneak peek of her images a few days later. On October XX XXXX I had a house fire that resulted in a total loss. My computer, and back up hard drives were all melted and all data was lost. I paid for 2 years for a cloud storage through ADOBE, but after hours on the phone with them it was discovered that all my photos (tens of thousands, not just Courtneys) were lost without explanation. I informed ******** of what was going on a few days after the fire and began doing what I could to recover images. I sent the hard drives and my computer to California to a data recovery center. That took about a month before I knew the status. While it was there I physically searched for SD cards in the rubble as I never clear data from an SD card until galleries are delivered. I communicated all of this to ********. When we got the information that the data on the hard drives and computer were not recoverable, I informed ********. I told her we would continue to search for SD cards in hopes that we would find hers. (We found 5 other weddings this way!) I told her that if I couldn't find them I would either give her a pro-rated refund (she had received some images at this point) and/or I would reshoot any part of her wedding that she wanted, or any type of session she wanted. She declined my offer of a reshoot and said she'd like a refund. I told her I would figure that up once my house was bulldozed, and after the dust had settled. A few months went by as life was crazy being displaced and trying to get settled and survive as a family of five. That gap of time is an oversight on my end, and I have apologized numerous times to her for that. She had a lawyer friend email me in March stating I was to refund her or they would sue. I contacted ******** immediately and told her I never intended to not refund her, gave her my phone number for her to call me and said I'd have a refund amount figured up by morning. She refused to discuss with me. I then called and spoke with Brent Watson (who she wanted communication to be funneled through) and told him I would refund her $1,500. She denied my refund and demanded I refund her the full amount of $1,800. At this time she had a small amount of pictures that had been delivered, and I had worked an entire wedding day + prep and post wedding work. I charge hourly. My offer of $1,500 was more than fair. She told me if I didn't give her the full refund she would take me to court. I told her if she felt that was what she needed to do, she was welcome to do so. A couple months passed and I received a call from a local company here that had SD cards that we were unable to read that my husband dropped off last November. They said they were able to finally recover the majority of the images and I immediately picked them up. Some of Courtneys images were on there. I immediately worked on them and sent them to her. At this point she had about half the amount of images I would have originally sent her. I emailed her to inform her and also told her if she still felt she wanted to move forward with a pro rated refund or the suit, that I understood and she was welcome to do so. I didn't hear back from her for a month. At that time she demanded $1,200 and threatened to sue again. I again tried to communicated with her and she was less than willing to talk with me. She then began to smear my name all over the internet claiming I've ignored her and refuse to refund her. I had been trying to sit down with her (or Brent Watson) for months at this point to come to an agreement. She would not discuss with me and he would not return my calls or emails. It was at that point that I just went ahead and sent her $1,000 as a pro-rated refund. After calculating it both hourly, and per image, $1,000 is over the amount she was owed. I have been trying to settle this matter with her for months and after ******** being unreasonable and refusing to talk with me about it, I sent her a refund anyway. I have attached some documentation to show my willingness to settle, and also that she has been refunded. Thank you.

*Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business. ↩