Elderly Cleaner Allegedly Pressured To Pay Over $13K For Products After 5-Hour-Long Sales Pitch

Coercive selling isn’t anything new in Singapore.

If you’re wondering what I’m talking about, it’s the ladies and gentlemen who stand outside booths at shopping malls and approach you with a free sample.

Then, they’ll pull you into their shop, sit you down and keep getting you to try stuff until you’re convinced to buy something from them.

Even as far back as 2016, these shops have been on the radar of CASE when a student was made to pay more than $600, a woman was forced to make multiple purchases and more.

Well, it’s 2020 and it seems like Covid-19 isn’t the only thing intent on sticking around.

Elderly Cleaner Allegedly Pressured To Pay Over $13K For Products After 5-Hour Sales Pitch

On 10 Sep 2020, a 63-year-old woman who works at Suntec City was coerced into making payments of $13,180 on products and equipment, according to Mothership.sg.

Known as Madam Tay, the incident allegedly happened on 4 Sep 2020 at 1pm.

She was brought into the beauty salon, Opatra, where three shop staff reportedly pushed products to her aggressively.

They had even bought food for her and gave her a complimentary facial.

At first, she was convinced to pay $1,180 for beauty products, which she paid for via two NETS payments.

Then, she was convinced to purchase another $12,000 worth of equipment and beauty products.

For the second payment, she was only able to pay $2,000 via NETS.

The shop staff told her to withdraw $10,000 from the bank and they’d even followed her to the bank.

When she was there, the bank teller felt something was wrong and tried to warn her about scams targeting the elderly to no avail.

In total, she had spent 5 hours at the shop and was allegedly confused and intimidated.

Refund Obtained, Report Lodged

Madam Tay then went home and told her son, Lim, about the incident.

On 6 Sep, they lodged a police report and the next day, Lim, as well as his girlfriend and Madam Tay, headed back to the shop.

The boss of the shop was reportedly present at the meeting too.

Initially, the meeting didn’t go smoothly, and Opatra insisted on their “no-refund” policy.

However, on 9 Sep 2020, the shop made a full refund to Madam Tay.

Nonetheless, Lim is reportedly in the midst of lodging a report with the Consumer Association of Singapore (CASE).

The shop is reportedly operated by a franchisee, and not by Opatra London.

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