Chicago, ILIt's Just Lunch is a dating service that claims to offer specialized match-making services for its professional clientele. However, many former clients and employees argue that It's Just Lunch is less than professional and fails to honor its contractual obligations.
Over the past few months, many complaints about It's Just Lunch have been posted at ConsumerAffairs.com. Although these complaints are client-specific, the problems they mention have been brought up numerous times by various people.
Some of the complaints include:
Women Colleen of Calgary, Canada, complains that she was bullied into taking a lunch date that she did not want and was told when she phoned It's Just Lunch with her concerns that she was not open-minded and needed to change her attitude. It's Just Lunch actually threatened to cut their contract with her. Colleen says that the matches It's Just Lunch tried to send her on were poor and the conduct of It's Just Lunch employees is "deplorable."
Susan from Texas only recently signed up with It's Just Lunch but after two months still had not been sent on a date, despite being promised six dates in six months. She tried contacting the company, but the phone numbers she had listed for It's Just Lunch were both disconnected.
Debbie from Florida actually worked for It's Just Lunch and says that she was told to sign up just about anyone willing and not to send them on any dates until the cancellation period (three business days in Florida) had passed. She also says that training includes telling customers that their branch has hundreds of clients when in fact it has much fewer than that.
Amazingly, Debbie says that there is discrimination within the company. Although employees are told to sign up anyone willing, she says that they are not supposed to take African Americans, overweight people, or women who are over 50 years old (men can be signed up at any age because they are willing to date younger women).
Cathy from Arizona says that she has dealt with four different employees since joining It's Just Lunch and been set up on dates by people who had never met her. Cathy also complains that she was set up with both married men and men with small children, both of which she told It's Just Lunch she was not interested in.
Men
Robert of Kansas complains that It's Just Lunch did not honor its contract and did not meet the criteria he specified when filling out information on potential dates. Furthermore, the company ignored a request made by a licensed clinical psychologist to cancel the contract because of his psychological condition upon entering the contract.
John of Virginia says that he was pressured to accept dates and one of the coordinators used foul language when he disagreed with something she said.
Rob of Maryland says that the last few women he went out with from It's Just Lunch told him that they went on the dates to help out the company. According to Rob the women went on these dates for extra money and to keep the men from complaining and bring in new clients.
Protecting yourself
According to ConsumerAffairs.com there are a number of things people can do to protect themselves when dealing with dating services:
Research, research, research. Sites such as ConsumerAffairs.com and The Better Business Bureau can give you a lot of information on dating service companies. You can find out what the general complaints are, whether or not these complaints have been resolved, and how customers (and sometimes former employees) feel about dealing with those dating services. You can save yourself a lot of heartache and money by researching a company before signing up with it.
Get everything in writing. Sometimes employees will make promises verbally that are never written down - those are very difficult, if not impossible, to enforce in court because they're hard to prove. If an employee of a company like It's Just Lunch says that you will be refunded your money if you are not satisfied, make sure he or she puts that into the contract. Refusal on the part of the employee to do so is a warning sign that the company will not honor the employee's promise of a refund.
Read your contract carefully and ask any questions you have before signing. If anything in the contract is unclear, clarify it before you've put your signature on the contract. Make sure any verbal promises are put into the contract as well - do not let them tell you that extra clauses can be added into the contract later. Make sure you agree with the contract 100% before signing it.
Get references from the company and follow-up with them. Ask the references for positives and negatives about dealing with the company.
Ask if the company does background checks on its clients and if it says it does, get proof. According to ConsumerAffairs.com, It's Just Lunch does not do background checks because the company claims its clients are professionals who do not need background checks.
Contracts It's Just Lunch has a contractual obligation to fulfill the number of dates it promises its clients in the time specified on the contract. Employees at the company should also be doing their best to remedy any complaints customers have about the services rather than ignoring them or bullying their clients. If you have paid It's Just Lunch to set you up on dates but the company has not lived up to its end of the contract, contact a lawyer to discuss your options.