My Johnny Grant/The Art Farm story… (the short version)

DECEMBER 2007
I ordered a bath from The Art Farm via an Ebay ‘Buy it Now’ posting on 26th December 2007, and paid £351.00 via Paypal immediately, with a further £49 due on arrival for the delivery cost.

The Art Farm promised delivery from France "around 15th February" 2008, saying that they would be in touch in good time to organise it. (Note that 15th February is – coincidentally? – just over 45 days after my purchase date, and hence outside the Paypal complaints procedure timefame.)


FEBRUARY 2008
But by 15th February I had not heard anything further from them about delivery.

After I contacted them, the Art Farm said they had van problems, hence the delivery delay. I said I was happy to wait a week or two; they then on 21st February gave me a date they were 'hoping to deliver' nearly five weeks later, on 20th March – and offered me a refund if that did not suit.

The date was too late for my builders, and at substantial extra cost to me I had to order a new bath. I accepted their offer of a refund.

MARCH 2008
However, no refund was forthcoming… over the subsequent ten weeks they repeatedly promised said refund and did not give it to me – claiming they didn’t have the money (although they sold another bath on Ebay during this time).

I offered to take the bath instead, despite that fact that I no longer needed it. They never replied to this offer.

APRIL 2008
I told them that I would reluctantly have to give them bad feedback if they did not refund me the money, as there was a cut off date for feedback and after that I would no longer be able to leave it. I offered to withdraw the feedback within the month (Ebay's deadline for feedback withdrawl) if they gave me either a refund or the bath I had paid for in that timeframe. Again, they did not refund me the money, and sent me a pretty nasty email complaining about my negative feedback after I had left it. They told me they would refund the money “when better times are with us at the Art Farm. It is a non profit association that gives more than it recieves (sic)”. Two years later in December 2009 – I’m still waiting. And because he’s in France, there’s limited recourse to the law.

DECEMBER 2009
Since my experiences, more stories have emerged of money taken and goods undelivered… if you want the blow-by-blow account of my story, I’ll be posting the chronological emails shortly. In the meantime: just don’t follow in my footsteps and have anything to do with Johnny Grant – or The Art Farm.

Rachel