Indiegogo
reviews and complaints

There are several projects that have breached Indiegogo's own terms and conditions. Indiegogo has failed to take any action against these developers despite numerous complaints from backers who have invested cash into these projects. While there are many genuine developers on Indiegogo they risk losing out due to the inaction of Indiegogo to enforce their own T&C's.

I for one will no longer consider backing any more projects via the Indiegogo website.

There is no accountability with Indiegogo. I contributed to Grayns Rice Cooker on Indiegogo. I recognize that backing a start-up comes with risks. But this campaign was a scam and Indiegogo does not seem to be helping the supporters. So this puts all Indiegogo campaigns in scrutiny - can any of them be trusted? Or can a start-up take your money and run? That is what happened with Grayns - they took our money, produced the rice cooker, sent a few cryptic updates, and then stopped. Sounds like their production didn't work out for them - but the reality is that they currently have the rice cookers for sale on their own website. So the item was successfully produced, but the campaign never fulfilled their promise to deliver. And Indiegogo is not being proactive to get backers their money. Buyer beware when buying through Indiegogo - they are a poorly run organization.

I have received multiple and numerous emails that the chair will be delivered and even one email that they are trying to contact me (they are not contacting me). The chair is yet to be delivered. Originally it was meant to be delivered in September 2021 and to date still no chair.

I have emailed the addresses i could find for the comapny on multiple occassions.

https://www.indiegogo.com aids and abets criminals. The campaign owner of the project I backed stole every backers money and fled the country. Indiegogo won't do anything or take responsibility for the incident. They profit from scams/criminal activity. I was scammed out of $299.00 on October 21, 2019. The campaign owner continuously provided updates even though they claimed that covid19 lockdowns were causing slowdowns to production. One day, they stopped providing updates and vanished with everyone's money. Indiegogo does not do enough to prevent these situations or to respond/refund peoples money. I have reached out to Indiegogo for support on this issue and they declined to do anything about it.

See the following Reddit for more information on what happened and how this has affected others:

https://www.reddit.com/r/dunescam/comments/uxlw8x/dunecasecom_gone_missing/

Item not delivered, Scam? or DayooSmart is having troubles delivering items?

4/21/22 Update #9 from Dayoo Kitchen Steam Cleaner & Dishwasher indicates home delivery between 4/19-4/26/22.

5/5/22 Contacted DayooSmart inquiring the status.

5/5/22 Received email from DayooSmart informed me that delivered the goods to FedEx and created the label.

The tracking number is FedEx [protected].

5/16/22 Contacted DayooSmart informing there is no progress in shipment.

5/16/22 DayooSmart updated me the status saying, "Yesterday, FedEx replied to us that some of our goods were stacked in the corner of the warehouse."

6/2/22 From DayooSmart: We are really sorry to keep you waiting and understanding your waiting mood. We actively contact FedEx every day. FedEx had found our goods in their warehouse, they gave us the reason because the printer was out of ink when they printed the shipping label, we had some of the goods because there was no shipping label so they couldn't deliver, FedEx told us that they needed a little time to deal with this problem internally, and we are waiting for FedEx to give us a reply.

6/13/22 From DayooSmart: Sorry for the inconvenience. Last week FedEx told us that 225 shipments were found in their warehouse, but we need to return our shipment to our warehouse to reprint the express label. We really want to solve this problem as soon as possible, but unfortunately, FedEx's work efficiency is too slow. We have been urging FedEx every day, could you please help us urge FedEx to return our goods as soon as possible? Our FedEx account is: [protected].

6/13/22 I contacted FedEx, but there was no help, and I was suggested to contact Indiegogo and/or shipper. I told DayooSmart about it. They never replied to my email.

Leaf,

I have NEVER received my paid for order. I'm an early backer of the LEAF MASK with ORDER #30262. I was very excited to see such an advanced mask being made and paid over $300.00 for 2 of your masks plus extra filters. That was OVER A YEAR AGO !

I have had NO FOLLOWUP from LEAF to my repeated requests. All I get are emails advertising your products for sale. If they have products for sale, then they have products to fulfill backer purchase.

Please apply pressure to LEAF to fulfill backers orders. And please do not ever allow them to defraud people on Indiegogo again.

Ron Landon
4926 E. Weldon Ave.
Phoenix, AZ 85018

Did not receive my item. I was one of the first backers of this one and was quite excited being a rice-eating diabetic. Up to now I haven't received it. The grayns website is already selling them online. I absolutely think I was scammed and indiegogo does not provide any resolution, the project owner is impossible to contact. I want my money back or just send me my itrm

I was naïve for supporting over 10 campaigns on indiegogo trusting that my hard earned money was being used to support legitimate start ups. However, one campaign in particular which is a color changing waterproof light called Lumin8, harass basically stolen my money with the failed promise of an item that I was allegedly supporting. What they sent me does not work and after many many months I've repeatedly trying to contact them they have ignored my request for a refund. Indiegogo has also ignored all of my attempts to contact. I paid $300 for nothing. For a piece of junk. And there are other campaigns that I contributed to that are showing themselves to be scams. Indiegogo Will not respond.

Purchased on 2-2-21 and have received no information on shipping. I've sent 2 emails to email listed with no response. mailto:[protected]@zenblanketco.com.
When I searched for website of business I received information in attachment below. Further research revealed company is a scam from Switzerland. Complete fraud.

I had booked on October 12, 2019 PrinCube-The World's Smallest Mobile Color Printer
$180USD
PrinCube First 72Hrs Special

Permanent Ink Cartridge x2

Estimated delivery: November 2019

However, till date no communication has been sent by the campaigner about its delivery. it all appears to be fake and fraud, I request you to take action against them and ask them to refund my entire amount with delayed interest.
regards
Aneesh Mittal

NexFan launched a campaign on Indiegogo and has raised $1, 234, 692 USD by 14, 375 backers. They have failed to provide shipping information for most backers, and those who have received the fan are commenting about being ignored when the product doesn't work as expected. NexFan have been unresponsive and Indiegogo states that "Indiegogo does not guarantee that the perks offered by the campaigner will be produced or delivered. " leaving a lot of people to deal with the company while we can't organize to do so. They started selling the product on Amazon and other websites for less money, which also means that there was no discount on Indiegogo.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/nexfan-ultra-portable-ac-with-powerful-cooling/x/23604645#/

I bought two of the queen sized weighted zen blankets for my autistic daughter, as weighted blankets are great sensory tools. I never recieved anything. Not even any of my money back. I will be starting a class action lawsuit against Indiegogo for not appropriately vetting their startups (as the man that created this one had been involved in previous scams), and the man himself. I encourage anybody that has been affected to join me.

Hi admin,

I pledge an order for 1 unit of grayns rice cooker with pledge id: [protected] last june 2019 with their promised of august delivery for early backers.

They are initially providing updates and answering my queries but currently not receiving and not responding to my emails anymore.

I am afraid that this maybe a scam as I am an early backer and supposedly received the item last august but up to now no update whatsoever on my order.

Another amazing scam story which unfortunately means I will never use:
https://www.indiegogo.com or
https://www.kickstarter.com
again!

Have a read as it is better than a crime story:
https://www.breakit.se/artikel/17260/the-swede-created-a-400-000-indiegogo-scam-is-this-his-next-project

The Swede created a $400, 000 Indiegogo-scam - is Zen Blanket his next project?
HÅRDVARA6 dec 2018, kl 05:30
Johanna Ekström Reporter
Two years ago, Breakit wrote about a successful Indiegogo campaign called Bioring.
The people behind the campaign had managed to attract thousands of individuals from around the world to invest in a "smart ring" that the company supposedly had developed. The campaign raised around $400, 000.
At the time, Breakit interviewed one of the people behind the campaign over the phone, a Swedish man who called himself Michael Johnson.
We did not know at the time that the founders of Bioring soon thereafter would disappear with the money without delivering any products.
Similarly, it later turned out that the PR firms they had hired to spread the campaign were never paid.
Instead, Bioring sent them a message over Skype, stating that the PR firms would never be able to track down the person behind the campaign, who now called himself "Big Mike", and that the money was in an offshore account. Reported at the time by the site Vocative.
The story could have ended there. But Breakit has, with the help of a range of different sources and formal documents, successfully been able to connect the people behind Bioring to another campaign on Kickstarter and Indiegogo, that raised almost a million dollar this year.
The new potentially fraudulent campaign has purportedly created a "smart blanket" called Zen Blanket, which promises better sleep for those who use it by lowering stress hormones.
We were given a new lead
When we interviewed "Michael Johnson" in 2016 he sent us a photo of himself. Now, two years later, a reader got in touch to tell us who the man on the photo really was. His name was something else, and he was a former student at the prestigious Stockholm School of Economics, SSE.
Our initial thoughts were that "Michael Johnson" simply had stolen the image he sent to us in 2016. But it soon turned out that there were a number of clues which led us to tie the person on the photo — whose name we have decided to not publish — to Bioring.
The American freelance journalist John Lewis from Dallas is part of a network that works to reveal scams on mainly Indiegogo and Kickstarter.
He tells us that one person, with the same name as the former SSE student, has worked hard to erase his association to Bioring ever since the campaign vanished into thin air.
According to John Lewis, the student contacted several individuals who had criticised or described the campaign as a fraud online. He asked them to delete his name, more or less menacingly.
The person in question has not had a taxed income in Sweden for the past five years. He has not been penniless, however. Documents that we have acquired access to show that a large amount of money, with connection to him, has been transferred to Sweden. The Connection to Zen Blanket
What is this person's connection to Zen Blanket, then?
The registered company behind the successful Zen Blanket campaign, which was launched on Kickstarter in May, is a startup from Gothenburg, Sweden. The campaign was moved to Indiegogo during the summer and raised in total $800, 000 from approximately 5, 000 backers from around the world.
The blankets were supposed to have been delivered in August. When they were not delivered as promised, several backers became suspicious: many have criticised the campaign and a few have threatened to file police reports.
Zen Blanket proclaims in a post on their Kickstarter page that the delays are due to the manufacturer not being able to handle the size of the order, and that they are working on a solution. Any reimbursements have not been mentioned.
In a document from the Swedish Companies Registration Office, we have discovered that the SSE student is listed as the founder of the Swedish trading company behind the Zen Blanket campaign, although he is no longer a representative of the company. He is also listed as the founder of two American companies, one in Delaware and the other in Wyoming, which are the co-owners of the aforementioned Swedish trading company.
Furthermore, the student has set up an unrelated company in Sweden with the person listed as the creator of the initial Zen Blanket campaign on Kickstarter.
Breakit finds an address
For the past two years, the SSE guy has had his residency registered in a Stockholm suburb. Since we have not been able to get in touch with him in any other way, we decided to go there and knock on his door. When he opened, we immediately recognised the person from the photo that we had received a couple of years ago.
So what did he say about our accusations?
He claimed that he did not know what we were talking about. And he was not able to explain how his signature had ended up on the documents at the Companies Registration Office.
"That is not my phone number, not my email address and not my signature. And that someone would have sent you my photo, that's just really strange", he said when we showed him the material.
He also declared that he had never heard about Bioring or Zen Blanket.
This is how far we get.
Who is guilty? And is it even a fraud?
We will leave it up to others to decide whether the Bioring case was a fraud or just a failure. It is impossible to know, for sure.
It is equally difficult to say with certainty that Zen Blanket is a fraud, perhaps the people behind the campaign actually aim to produce the blankets. They stated that they will do so during the second half of 2019.
That the former student had his identity stolen for years, by people who have managed to create a Swedish company in his name, and used his image, is similarly a possibility in theory.
How, and the extent to which, he is involved in this is impossible for us to say.
Both the Police Finance Department and the Swedish Economic Crime Authority refer to the preliminary investigation confidentiality and have neither been able to confirm, nor retract, if they know about the case and if they are investigating it.
According to Stefan Lundberg, Chief Prosecutor at the Swedish Economic Crime Authority, this type of crime is difficult to control.
"The culprit is often in one country, and those investing money in another. They might even be in several countries. That causes problems for the different countries' legal systems. Which country should take on the case? It is part of the crime plan: to make it difficult for the authorities", he says.
What does Indiegogo say?
Since Breakit contacted Indiegogo and Kickstarter a couple of weeks ago with our information about the connections between Bioring and Zen Blanket, Indiegogo has started to look into the campaign. Kickstarter has still not replied.
Breakit has also spoken to a person in Gothenburg who bought two blankets. He decided to go and see for himself whether the company really existed on the given address. He found a number of companies and offices, but no Zen Blanket.
During the course of our investigation, Zen Blanket has changed its hometown to Stockholm on the campaign page.
Update: A previous version of this article stated that Zen blanket raised $1, 2 millions, the amount they did raise was $800.000.
[protected]@breakit.se

Do not put your money in here at all. I used to crowfund a lot of interesting projects and most of them totally worh it but this project was completly a scam.
Mauricio Sabogal (phone number +[protected]) created this campain last year https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/gopet-connecting-you-with-your-precious-pet-apps-camera/x/13502953#/ and stole $2, 237 USD from 35 people including me, when I opted in with $160 for a camera.
When the project was canceled I reached to Indiegogo and they told me they already transfered the money to the crowfunder and I can only contact him regarding this; so I did. I contacted by email, his excuse is he's broke at the time (clever expending the money you don't deserve) and to wait. I kept waiting and waiting, I keep contacting him by email and wassup until he blocked me on these ones.
Do not trust Indiegogo and Mauricio Sabogal.

Be prepared for lengthy delays and lame excuses dealing with this campaign.

This is an Indiegogo funding I contributed to more than 12 months ago. To date I have received nothing but excuses and delays and pleading to stay patient. I have remained patient for a long time always giving the company the benefit of doubt. Even after they started shipping they excused themselves for somehow having overlooked my contribution.

Normally any reputable company would capitalize on the opportunity to make good and ensure product is shipped immediately. In the case of Rocketbook the owner, Joe somebody, wrote a letter pleading for me to maintain my patience and that the product would be shipped right away.

That never happened as the next excuse was related to a manufacturing challenge and shipments were halted. Again I was asked to remain patient as shipping would recommence within 2-3 weeks and my order would be one of the first to be processed.

After once again allowing the requested delay to elapse I contacted them again and was put back in the original recycled reply loop.
At that point I decided it was enough and demanded a refund of my contribution plus a 15% premium for the use of my money for more than 12 months and the aggravation, time and frustration this experience has caused.

Over the last few days I have sent a few emails to different addresses in the hope of some customer satisfaction. None of the emails have been answered and I have copies of each and every email exchanged.

Don't go near this campaign!

This company is real rip off. Zaptip is charging customers and doesn’t provide orders. We saw their advertisement and we ordered their magnetic cable. The payment was sent on the same day and it seemed that this company was ready to ship it. But later we made the research and found that this charger didn’t have enough power. We tried to cancel the order, but no one from the team replied to our requests.