Be extremely cautious if you consider doing business with House Key. They made a number of agreements they did not keep.

 On September 13, 2006 I purchased $4073 worth of furniture from House Key on Duval Street in Key West, Florida. Due to an extremely sad and unfortunate event in my life that occurred a few days after this, I no longer had need for the furniture.  

I called House Key, told them of my situation and asked if there was any way I could cancel the order as it had not yet been shipped. I was willing to abide by whatever their decision was, as I knew I had already purchased the furniture and really had no choice other than to abide by whatever decision they might make regarding my request for a partial refund. I agreed to the first proposal they made, which was for me to pay a $600 restocking fee and receive credit on my card for the balance. 

A number of weeks passed and I noticed that I had not received the promised credit to my account. I called House Key several times, and finally spoke with them sometime in October. They told me that they did not have the funds available to credit my account at that time, but offered to do so as soon as they could. Again, I agreed to their proposal. Several more weeks passed, and I still had not received any credit. Meanwhile, interest was accruing on my credit card account as I had not paid the $4073 while waiting on the credit.

 I again called House Key several times before speaking with someone who was able to answer my questions. This was in November. They said they still did not have the funds to reimburse me, and offered to pay me $500 per month until the $3473 was credited to my account. Once again, I agreed to their proposal.

 Several more weeks passed, and I contacted my credit card company to see if any credit has been issued to me from House Key. It had not. So I called House Key and told them that I needed to file a dispute with my credit card company in an effort to rectify the situation. I needed to clear up the almost $200 worth of interest charges that had accumulated on my account since September due to the fact that my account had not been credited as they had told me it would be. They said that would be fine. I told them that if I could get the account credited in this way, there would be no need for them to send me the $500 per month they had agreed to earlier. I was told that would also be fine. 

After calling and faxing the credit card company with the details, they agreed to credit my account for the $4073 and removed the interest charges. A few days later, in mid January, I received a letter from my credit card company with a copy of a letter written by House Key to them, and was informed that the charge had been returned to my account at the merchant's insistence.

 Upon receiving the letter, I called House Key and told them that we were right where we were 4 months earlier - they had the furniture and my money, and I had neither. So, in an effort to help settle the matter once and for all, I offered to accept delivery of whatever pieces they could not sell. I was told that would be "a blessing". I asked that they review the order and see if there might be any pieces they could keep, as I had no need for any of it and really not even the available funds to pay for it. I also asked that they contact me with that information and a cost for shipping the pieces they did not keep. They agreed to do so. 

Two days later I received a call from a shipper in Key West requesting over $1800 in shipping costs. He said that he had been told by House Key to pick up the ten pieces and ship them to me and needed my credit card information. I called the cell phone of the House Key representative that I had been trying to work all this out with, and he answered the phone by asking who I was. When I told him, he said that he could not hear me and to call him back. He never answered another call I made.

 I then contacted the shipper and asked if I might shop for a better price on shipping the furniture since $1800 seemed like a lot of money to ship $4000 worth of furniture to Alabama. He said that would be fine. I located a shipper who would ship me the furniture for a little over $1100 - about $700 less than he had quoted me. Before I could call him to set that up, I received an email from him informing me that if I chose to use a different shipper, he would charge me $150 for picking up the furniture from House Key and $50 per day in storage fees. I emailed him back and told him that I would pay for the shipping and that he could collect the other fees from House Key since he had picked up the furniture on their instructions and without my knowledge. 

Later that day, when I called to confirm a pickup time for the furniture, the shipper informed me that he had spoken with House Key and that they would not pay him for his services or storage fees. He said that he would not allow anyone to pick up the furniture that coming Monday until he received $350. If I didn't agree to this, he would continue to charge me $50 per day. 

Obviously, I had no choice but to agree to his demands. I paid the $350. Plus the $1100+ in shipping. Plus the $4073 for the furniture. Then, when the driver delivered it a few days later, there was a $75 art print listed on the original invoice that was not included in the shipment. I faxed House Key a copy of the invoice and told them I had not received the print, but never heard back from them. 

Allen McBride
Munford, AL