May their ears fall off

The other day I was a total idiot, proof of the old adage that there's one born every minute. It took me the rest of the week to get over it, and I feel I have to tell people as a sort of penance. Think of me of The Ancient Mariner for Modern Times. The moral of the story is clear: don't answer the phone whilst trying to feed supper to a baby. Read all about my stupidity in the letter I fired off to The Guardian's consumer champion, Capital Letters, once I realised what a dolt I'd been!

Dear Capital Letters,

I had a run-in with a company called Studio London recently. They rang to congratulate me on winning a competition (which I couldn't remember entering) for a 'magazine-style photo shoot' and I gullibly went along with it, managing to drown out the sound of alarm bells going off as I gave them my bank details and authorised them to remove £40 from my account for a holding deposit (for a prize!). I then read up on the company on the internet and found to my horror that this was only the start of Studio London's machinations: people who actually went to the photo shoot wrote of parting with hundreds, even thousands, of pounds for a few photographs under the pressure of a 'hard sell' by the company.

Realising that I'd been conned, I contacted them the next day to cancel my booking and demand my money back. This they refused to do, saying that during the previous telephone conversation I would have been told about their 'no cancellations' policy. Their trump card seemed to be that all calls was recorded by them - the implication being that it was my memory versus their ellusive tape-recorder. They also attempted to guilt-trip me by saying that I had wasted one of their highly-prized bookings. Fortunately I was on my mettle by then, having already contacted Consumer Direct and received sound advice on my rights under the Distance Selling Regulations 2000.

Although the phone conversation came to a dead end (Me: I will get my deposit back. Them: I cannot confirm that you will. Repeat to fade) an email and a letter stating the law seem to have had the desired effect. I should be receiving the deposit I stupidly parted in the next 7-10 days.

Clearly I was a fool to get involved in the first place, vanity won out over wariness and cynicism, but I merely write because I want others to avoid my pratfall. I don't know if you need letters like this where there isn't an issue waiting to be resolved - except that there's a company out there still scamming people, that 's worrying enough.

Yours sincerely,
Q

Of course I put my name on it, I'm not totally loopy; I don't go round calling myself 'Q' in real life, like an MI5 agent, much as Mr Q would adore me if I did.