New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced last week that LA Weight Loss Centers Inc. reached a settlement to pay $275,000 in refunds to thousands of New York state customers who paid for but never received services after LA Weight Loss closed its doors in January 2008.

Read more here: LA Weight Loss to Pay Refunds to New York Members

Also Read:  LA WEIGHT LOSS, PURE WEIGHT LOSS

For months now, FranchisePick.com readers have been warning that LA Weight Loss Centers will begin closing in the same manner that Pure Weight Loss centers closed before them:  with no warning and leaving members owed hundreds and thousands of dollars in prepaid services likely they’ll never and products they may never get.

Well, here come the closings:

LA WEIGHT LOSS: Multiple Centers Close in KY

LA WEIGHT LOSS: 4 Weight Loss Centers Closing in CO

LA WEIGHT LOSS: Terre Haute, IN Center Closed

LA WEIGHT LOSS: Evansville, IN Center Closes

Recent Postings:

LA Weight Loss Tosses Client Files in Dumpster

LA Weight Loss Center Closings Rumored (UPDATED)

La Weight Loss ex-employee warns of closings. Don’t prepay!

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Unhappy Franchisee: Franchising rumors, rants, controversies, issues, complaints & insider information you’re not supposed to know.

(FranchisePick.Com) Does Cuppy’s Coffee or Elite Manufacturing owe you a refund? Have things improved with the new ownership? Is the Danny Jones runaround a thing of the past? Has the AAFD been helpful?

Please share your experience with Cuppy’s Coffee, Elite Manufacturing and Fransynergy below.

It’s been more than a month since Dale Nabors and Fransynergy took over the assets and liabilities of the troubled Medina Enterprises, Cuppy’s Coffee and Elite Manufacturing and vowed to return deposits owed to Cuppy’s Coffee franchisees and prospects. The April 21, 2008 post on BlueMauMau stated:

Elite, the construction arm that builds Cuppy’s properties, has been embroiled in disagreements with Cuppy’s depositors and franchise owners. The organization took on deposits from a number of investors, but controversy erupted when franchises were not purchased and deposit money was not returned.

Nabors declares, “We are fully aware of the refund challenges faced by the organization and we are addressing those and evaluating those on a case-by-case basis and look forward to resolving those as quickly as possible.”

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(FranchisePick.com) Pure Weight Loss Adds Insult to Injury Part 1: Pure Weight Loss Members, out thousands of dollars from the company’s abrupt closure, have their refund claim forms returned as undeliverable. Add lost time, postage costs, aggravation.

Pure Weight Loss Adds Insult to Injury Part 2: Pure Weight Loss offers stranded members discounts to an program… a program not available in their area.

Announcing Pure Weight Loss Adds Insult to Injury Part 3: Bounced refund checks… and NSF bank charges.

On HOW MUCH DOES PURE WEIGHT LOSS OWE YOU? FranchisePick.Com contributor and ex-Pure Weight Loss (LA Weight Loss) member Kim Matunis writes:

I got a refund check for $84 (they owed me over $1000) and it bounced!! THe bank said the account it is written on was closed in December 2007. I am filed with the PA Attn. General’s office….hope we get somewhere.

I have no clue how much they owe exactly, bought extra weeks on sales, paid some regular weeks, they took my copy of my contract when I applied for the refund, so I do not even have that. Trying to get receipts and credit card statements organized.

GOd help us all

RECENT PURE WEIGHT LOSS POSTS:
February 25th, 2008 Did HONESTY Kill Pure Weight Loss? or LA Weight Loss: The Movie
February 22nd, 2008 Pure Weight Loss Meeting of Creditors Set for March 14
February 20th, 2008 Pure Weight Loss Employees Also to Suffering Losses
February 3rd, 2008 IS PURE WEIGHT LOSS VIOLATING HIPAA PRIVACY LAWS? (Part 2)
February 3rd, 2008 IS PURE WEIGHT LOSS VIOLATING HIPAA PRIVACY LAWS? (Part 1)
January 31st, 2008 Pure Weight Loss Adds Insult to Injury Part 2

WHAT DO YOU THINK? YOUR COMMENTS AND INSIGHTS ARE APPRECIATED.

PHOTO CREDIT: Marchivist.   Licensed under Creative Commons.

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(FranchisePick.com) Just when it seemed like complaints of unreturned Cuppy’s Coffee franchise fees were a thing of the past, this allegation surfaces on Rip-off Report allegedly from Rolando in Bueno Park, CA.

Cuppy’s Coffee Franchise Complaint on Rip-Off Report

ELITE MANUFACTURING, CUPPY’S COFFEE AND MORE FRANCHISE BUILDER’S CONTRACT SCAM FORT WALTON BEACH Florida ELITE MANUFACTURING

Phone: 850-243-7021

548 MARY ESTHER CUTOFF #334
FORT WALTON BEACH, Florida, 32548
Submitted: 2/8/2008 8:16:43 AM

Rolando BUENA PARK, California

We verbally enter a franchise agreement with Cuppy’s Coffee and More base in Florida to build a store in California by there builder who reside at the same address, Elite Manufacturing, LLC. The catch was, Elite will pay the franchise fee of $25,000 if we put the down payment of $37,900 to build the store, the following day, which we did. Cuppy’s Coffee and More never send a UFOC franchise agreement which is a clear violation of the FTC. The franchise was cancelled because we can’t find a lender to finance building the store.
When I asked for our down payment from Elite MFG representative, in which the contract clearly states, that down payment will be return to purchaser if we can’t get finance. Now there representative find a loophole in there own contract and said that it did not say that we will return the down payment in full. That there VP of operation made a mistake by not putting the down payment in an escrow, so they can return the down payment in full. He is blaming there Vice President of operations. READ ON

WHAT DO YOU THINK? ARE YOU FAMILIAR WITH CUPPY’S COFFEE OR ELITE MANUFACTURING? LEAVE A COMMENT.

Photo licensed under Creative Commons. Photo credit:

SideShowMom

(FranchisePick.com)

A good story by Newsday writer Richard J. Dalton provides an all-too-familiar example of a Central Islip couple who could lose $2,200 in advance payments now that the Pure Weight Loss has closed all its centers nationwide. The article also provides information on state rules requiring bonds from health clubs and other member-based businesses - and how Pure Weight Loss (formerly LA Weight Loss) got around them.

Source: Newsday

Pure Weight Loss customers await refunds January 9, 2008

BY RICHARD J. DALTON JR. |richard.dalton@newsday.com

Nancy and Glen Urban of Central Islip have lost 113 pounds combined through Pure Weight Loss, formerly called LA Weight Loss.
Now they worry they may have lost a lot of money and the support that helped them lose the weight, because Pure Weight Loss, based in Horhsam, Penn., shuttered most of its locations last week.
The Urbans are concerned they could lose $2,200 in advance payments, joining many other consumers awaiting refunds.

In 2004, the corporate-owned locations of the LA Weight Loss split off and became Pure Weight Loss, which operated at least nine locations locally, from Forest Hills to Sayville, all of which have closed. Independently owned Pure Weight Loss locations in the southeast will remain open.
After the split, the franchise locations kept the LA Weight Loss name. That chain does not operate locally and could not be reached, but news reports indicate it will remain open. Read the rest of the story.

WHAT DO YOU THINK? LEAVE A COMMENT BELOW.

Also check out:

PURE WEIGHT LOSS REFUND INFORMATION

HOW MUCH DOES PURE WEIGHT LOSS OWE YOU?

PURE WEIGHT LOSS CUSTOMERS: SHARE NEWS & OPINIONS HERE

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