Complaint Rating:

Company information:
American Laser Center
6200 Uptown Blvd - Suite 419
Albuquerque, New Mexico
United States
Phone: 505-823-1333

My wife, her mother, and her two sisters all signed up for laser hair removal packages at $1281.00 a piece. It came with a 2 year warranty so they felt comfortable in paying the money. After six treatments there was no noticeable hair removal and they asked for their money back. The clinic manager gave them the runaround for months. When one manager was fired and another brought in, the standard statement of "Well, I don't know what they told you but I am here now" was given to all complaints and refund requests. At one point my wife had them take pictures and send to the owner (Dr. Neel Kanase). When he got the photos he scheduled a meeting with my wife at which time he told her there were any number of reasons why the treatments were not working. They can pick ANY reason under the sun for why it isn't working, but they still wouldn't give her the money back. He said she needed to see her doctor and have blood tests done to verify none of these problems were present, so she did. All tests were negative. Fast forward a year and I (her husband) contacted Dr. Kanase personally and threatened him with an immediate lawsuit if she was not given a refund. He agreed to refund her the money, minus 10% for an "administrative fee", for which I refused. He did agree to give her a full refund, which he followed through with.<br />
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Her mother and two sisters however were convinced by Leah Blevins to continue the treatments for another year because, as she said in the meeting, "the settings were incorrect and I will be personally training the employees on the proper use of the machines." She promised them to extend the warranty out another year for the "new" treatments to work. They attended every single scheduled treatment. About a month or so ago (May/June 2009) my mother-n-law went for a scheduled treatment and was told that she would have to sign a new contract (which meant paying more money) or else she would not receive any further treatments. She did not sign a new contract and left without the treatment, which is a breach of contract by American Laser Center. Anyhow, fast forward 11 months (right before the year warranty is up) and on July 7th, 2009 she and I meet with Dr. Kanase at the Albuquerque clinic where he proceeds to not talk about the lack of hair removed, but rather how he was "hurt and lost sleep because defaming comments I made about him on the internet." When asked about the refund he stated that the industry standard 30-50% of hair removal, first time anyone had EVER heard that number. During their sales speech it was always total hair removal according to my wife, her mother, and two sisters. He stated that he would say that 70% of the hair was not removed, and since 50% was standard, he would divide the 70% by the 50% and give them a refund of 35%. They get to keep 65% of their money for NOT doing what they promised? I then asked if other clients were told of this 30-50% number when signing contracts and he stated firmly "Yes, we tell EVERYONE this." I then asked if he would mind if I asked the people in the waiting area if they were told of this number and he got VERY upset and absolutely refused, and I didn't push it any further.<br />
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Dr. Kanase then threatened to sue me personally for defamation of character lawsuit which his lawyers (Benjamin Silva in Albuquerque) were ready to move forward with, and that "those types of lawsuits get into the millions of dollars." He was obviously trying to scare me from talking to anyone else about their problems with ALC, and as you can see it did not. Trying to intimidate a potential witness is a federal crime, perhaps his lawyers neglected to mention that little fact to Dr. Kanase. I placed a call to Mr. Silva which was not returned as of yet to subpoena the proof of my slanderous comments about Dr. Kanase.<br />
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We are currently looking into a class-action lawsuit against Dr. Kanase and his American Laser Centers in Albuquerque, NM, Tulsa, OK, Amarillo, TX, Corpus Christi, TX, El Paso, TX, Lubbock, TX, and Midland, TX offices. If you would like to be included in this lawsuit, please email me and I would be happy to discuss your situation further.<br />
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James Morris<br />
nolimitallstars1@hotmail.com