Salon shows the ugly side of beauty

A beauty salon has been named and shamed by the consumer watchdog for using unscrupulous sales tactics that brought 61 complaints involving transactions worth HK$8.5 million.

The Consumer Council reprimanded Q&A+ Health Spa for pressuring customers to buy beauty treatments or pay large fees to enter a 'slimming spokesperson' competition that never existed, and for asking customers to hand over credit cards without giving them a chance to verify how much they were being charged.

'This company used prolonging and delaying tactics when the council asked them a number of times to improve,' council chief executive Connie Lau Yin-hing said yesterday. 'But they would not change, so now we are naming them.'

The South China Morning Post reported last August that at least two women had been forced to sell their flats to pay bills of up to HK$4 million after entering the competitions and buying treatments from Q&A+, which has branches in Mong Kok, Yuen Long, Tsing Yi and Hung Hom. They have not received any compensation, despite the council's attempts to mediate with the company.

One of the women, who lost at least HK$542,000, yesterday said she felt helpless in her fight for compensation. The 36-year-old clerk suspected the parlour had used her card without her consent for transactions worth at least HK$180,000. She received receipts from Q&A+ for services she had not bought.

'Now that the salon is publicly named, I hope more people will be alerted,' she said. Her case is being investigated by the police and she is considering taking legal action against the company.