Complaints
This profile includes complaints for Avalara Inc's headquarters and its corporate-owned locations. To view all corporate locations, see
Customer Complaints Summary
- 121 total complaints in the last 3 years.
- 42 complaints closed in the last 12 months.
If you've experienced an issue
Submit a ComplaintThe complaint text that is displayed might not represent all complaints filed with BBB. Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business.
Initial Complaint
Date:12/06/2024
Type:Status:AnsweredMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
We have charge incorrectly on multiple occasions. Subscription was upgraded with no signed contract for the update. No one from accounting department has reached out to us after multiple calls and emails to correct the billing issues. Account Manager does not help rectify issue or push it along to get fixed. There is no clear manager or supervisor to speak with. All the call centers are over seas dealing with people who do not speak English. They are handling taxes for us and dont live in this country!! There is a major problem with Avalara!! This issue has been on going since July 2024! Do not do business with this company. You can never speak to anyone when you call! Emails go unanswered for weeks.
Business Response
Date: 12/16/2024
****, thank you for bringing these concerns to our attention. We apologize that getting in contact with our team has been a challenge. To expedite the resolution, we had our Finance team reach out with an explanation of the charges in question.
As communicated with you, when a customer upgrades, ********************** bills the account for the entire term of the new tier, and then credits for the previous tier is applied to the upgrade invoice. In this case, invoice INV ****** reflects the remaining term for the 1000 tier, with a full credit applied for that tier in the same invoice. ******************** has been charged for the 1500 tier starting from the month of the upgrade. Therefore, you are seeing a charge for the 1500 tier from 1/25/2024 to 8/24/2025 (since the upgrade from the 1000 tier to the 1500 tier occurred in August).
Please follow up with our team directly regarding any additional questions on this billing. Thank you.
Initial Complaint
Date:12/02/2024
Type:Status:AnsweredMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
Complaint: 22626777
I am rejecting this response because:This company repeatedly lies. They have claimed over and over that my account is canceled and I won't be charged or invoiced again, and assured me that my payment information has been removed from their system, but then I continue to receive emails and invoices that say otherwise. I want them to provide proof that they have deleted my banking and credit card information from their system. I shouldn't have to deal with their negligence repeatedly.
31.60 by Avalara without my authorization. I immediately contacted *************************** bank. After a few days, they refunded my debit ******** again reminded them that my account was canceled & they were to remove my payment information from their system. Oct 17, I again got an invoice from Avalara saying my account was past due & again, emailed them to remind them that my account is canceled and has been for quite some time. I was assured that "the cancellation has already been processed with case # ******** and invoice # INV-******* has now been credited." That last email was Nov 13. Then this morning, Dec 2, I received another email from Avalara that stated that my card "will expire on 12/31/2024. This credit card is your payment method for your services from Avalara." So clearly they did NOT remove my payment info from their system. This is absolutely fraud. They are trying to steal money from me and God knows how many other people.
Sincerely,
**** ******Business Response
Date: 12/09/2024
****, thank you for bringing this to our attention so we could assist. We want to apologize for the frustration as we understand how unexpected costs would be upsetting. Following your complaint, our team reach out to update that a credit for $531.60 was processed as per your cancellation request and that we have removed your credit card information from our records. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to resolve this. We wish you and your business all the best.Customer Answer
Date: 12/17/2024
I received yet ANOTHER email from Avalara this morning saying that my card on file has expired and I need to update it for my billing with them. I canceled my services with them long ago and they have claimed MULTIPLE times that they've removed my card information from their system, even though they never have as clearly stated in my complaint.
See the attached screenshot from the email this morning as further evidence.
Thank you
Business Response
Date: 12/23/2024
****, we apologize for the confusion. ************************** has been deprovisioned, however is showing active on AvaTax which explains the emails you are still receiving. We have submitted an internal ticket to have the account completely deactivated to avoid any confusion in future.Customer Answer
Date: 12/23/2024
Complaint: 22626777
I am rejecting this response because:This is not the first time Avalara has claimed that it was "just a mistake" and that my account wasn't canceled completely. I have attached an email from Avalara from the last time they claimed everything was completely canceled. Yet here we are again, with them claiming innocence. The fact of the matter is that this company is shady and full of lies. They do NOT have my permission to store my credit card info. They do NOT have my permission to charge me for their useless services. They do NOT have permission to continue to email me and threaten me with past due invoice notices because I CANCELED THEIR SERVICE A LONG TIME AGO AND I DO NOT OWE THEM A SINGLE *****!!!!!!!!
Sincerely,
**** ******Initial Complaint
Date:11/21/2024
Type:Status:AnsweredMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
Please see attached for the terms we were sent to me on 1/30/24 regarding our renewal that was coming up in March of '24. There is no mention of $1245 fees. Rather there is an overage fee of $0.47. I am disputing this with my credit card company and we are canceling our service with them. This fee they charged us is fraudulent and not what we signed up for. Note that this information is being provided to you for others so that other companies know to proceed with caution and hopefully don't have the same issues that we are having with them. Note that I am pursuing this directly with them and I as mentioned... disputing it on my credit card.
Thanks again... and hopefully you can help others avoid this fraudulent billing practice.
Business Response
Date: 11/26/2024
****, thank you for sharing your concerns with us so we could assist. In 2019, the agreement your team signed with Avalara included a clause that AvaTax subscription would be auto-upgraded to the next Transaction tier upon exceeding the number of Transaction in the existing plan. For more information on auto-upgrades, please see our Terms and Conditions: *******************************************************;
We understand your team requested a usage audit to confirm the upgrade was necessary and so our team met with yours on November 22 to discuss your usage. After performing the audit, we have confirmed the usage is legitimate. The majority of your usage comes from API calls received via the WooCommerce connector, which is not managed by Avalara. If your team wishes to reduce the number of API calls, you can work with ******** who manages the WooCommerce integration.
Given that the usage and auto-upgrade are valid per the signed agreement, the upgrade is valid, and we are unable to offer a refund. However, we understand your Account Executive and their management have indicated they will work to explore potential discounts and have scheduled a follow up call with your team on December 12.
Business Response
Date: 12/12/2024
****, thank you for your patience as weve worked to resolve this matter. We understand how unexpected costs would be upsetting and we apologize if billing expectations were not made clear. Following your meeting with your account team, ********************** has agreed in good faith to offer a $1,245.87 refund for the charges against the auto-upgrade. Additionally, we are downgrading your account from 500 tier to 250 tier. As agreed in conversations, ******************* will be responsible for the overages. Please follow up with our team directly regarding updates on this resolution.Initial Complaint
Date:10/31/2024
Type:Status:AnsweredMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
Complaint: 22498543
I am rejecting this response because: I have not heard from anyone in the last 7 days that say how they will fix these issues. I got an email taht we are going to work on fixing but that is it.
Sincerely,
******** ******* point of contact to expedite this matter.Business Response
Date: 11/08/2024
Volodymr, thank you for sharing your concerns with us so we could have our team look into the matter. We want to apologize for the frustration youve experienced with account support and we are working with our account management team to find a best course of action moving forward. We understand our Customer Excellence team has been in communication with you to provide updates on the requests you have submitted and our appropriate teams are engaged in researching the invoices you've outlined as potential double charges. We sincerely appreciate your patience as our team works to learn more and resolve.Business Response
Date: 12/09/2024
Volodymr, your Account Executive reached out to you on November 26 to inform you that the previous requested refund related to Professional Support has now been extended and will reflect on your account soon, as well as the breakdown for INV-*******. We understand that youve requested to review these charges in full during a call, and that you were able to schedule with Account Executive. Please continue to work directly with our ****************** team, as they are most equipped to support you moving forward.Initial Complaint
Date:10/29/2024
Type:Status:AnsweredMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
Complaint: 22485964
I am rejecting this response because:
The Blank records that you are referring to represents 88% of the billing that is overstated.
If Avalara is billing Hawk for doing work or providing service, PLEASE LET ME KNOW what service was provided. Specifically what data was sent and what data was received by Hawk.
Without some support details we can not validate you claim that anything transpired.
If no data was sent or received what service did Avalara supply to support its billing.Sincerely,
*** *******Business Response
Date: 11/08/2024
***, thank you for bringing this to our attention so we could assist. We apologize that you did not receive timely responses regarding your usage concerns and we appreciate you giving us the opportunity to support. Following your complaint, a member of our Customer Excellence team reached out to you and performed a Usage Audit against your account for your current usage term to date (04/17/24-11/03/24). From this audit we were able to confirm that your usage is showing correctly on the Usage Report. This means that we are correctly tracking the amount of activity between your system (Drupal) and AvaTax. The detailed breakdown of this Usage Audit was communicated with you on Nov 4. Weve attached the email chain here for your reference.
We appreciate your feedback on the amount of data available in the SalesOrder records and weve submitted an enhancement request to our engineering team to better improve this experience moving forward.
Please direct any follow up questions to our Customer Excellence team directly so they may best assist you. We look forward to continuing to serve your team.
Business Response
Date: 11/26/2024
To clarify, the *** calls listed in the audit with the SO***N/OUT information were the *** calls which were captured during the limited-time (few hrs) live audit. The "blank" *** calls (*****) are not blank - these *** calls are tied back to SalesOrder records from Drupal Commerce (column N of the "Live AuditTransactions" file that weve re-attached here for your convenience). SalesOrder records are typically associated with Quotes, Estimates, Orders, etc. While these SalesOrder calls do not include transaction numbers/ID in the usage audit, per the Enhanced audit file, they are calls generated from your Drupal Commerce connector to AvaTax.
To confirm, regardless of how the data is displayed in the AvaTax usage audit ("SalesOrder" vs detailed transaction ID/numbers) - per our Terms and Conditions when an *** call is generated to the AvaTax tax calculation service, it will count towards your billable usage.
Please read the following excerpt from our Terms and Conditions that you agreed to upon signing for your subscription:
"1(a) Transaction Calculations. Fees for usage of AvaTax are based on the number of Transactions used in AvaTax by Customer. ********************** will charge a number of Transactions used each day equal to the greater of the results of (i) or (ii) below:
i. The number of Documents recorded; or
ii. The number of *** calls to the tax calculation service recorded, divided by 10.
In addition to the Transactions counted under (i) or (ii) above, every 10 *** calls to the address validation service, other than *** calls that are specifically associated with a tax calculation, will count as one Transaction."As communicated with you, Avalara does not store the data associated with these calls and is therefore unable to provide the data you are requesting. To reiterate, we have submitted an enhancement request to our Product team requesting that we update the way we capture SalesOrder transactions data to improve audit quality. However, as evidenced above, the charges are valid per our agreement regardless of the data display. Thank you for your understanding.
Initial Complaint
Date:10/25/2024
Type:Status:AnsweredMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
Complaint: 22474647
I am rejecting this response because:
Although it is true Avalara reached out to schedule a meeting to discuss resolving the issue there has not yet been a resolution. They in the past have promised meetings but never came thru. Once there is a concrete resolution we can revisit next steps.Complaint is not closed.
n February. We have had at least 5 different Account Managers since January of 2024- it is now end of October 2024, and not one has responded until I finally emailed saying I wanted to add more services to my account. Finally, someone responded. 3. The Account Manager had no idea what we were being charged for. The original invoice "Product names" do not tie out to the new invoice "Product names". They provide no descriptions for what these products are. Nor the amount or level.4. Very little communication is performed via email. All is done via Zoom. It is my belief this is so AVALARA avoids having anything in writing or documented.I have contacted Support and they are of no help. Had I known Avalara was such a difficult and dishonest company to work with, I would have never signed up.
Sincerely,
****** ********Business Response
Date: 11/04/2024
******, thanks for bringing your concerns to our attention. We understand how unexpected costs would be upsetting and we apologize if the billing expectations were not properly expressed. We also understand how the instability in account management and lack of response is frustrating and weve passed this feedback along to our leadership.
Following your complaint, **** had our Customer Excellence team and your ****************** team reach out to discuss ways to resolve these billing concerns. We understand you are working to schedule a meeting to discuss. We remain committed to supporting you in this matter and look forward to resolving.
Customer Answer
Date: 11/21/2024
Complaint: 22474647
I am rejecting this response because:
We did not receive a refund or any communication regarding said refund. Matter is still not closed.
Sincerely,
****** ********Business Response
Date: 11/21/2024
******, thank you for your patience as we've worked to resolve. Our team submitted a refund request on Nov 13 for your account and communicated this update to you.Customer Answer
Date: 12/11/2024
Complaint: 22474647
I am rejecting this response because:although I have received an email saying they will refund, I still have not received the refund.
this matter is still NOT closed.
Sincerely,
****** ********Business Response
Date: 12/11/2024
******, our team has now sent an email on Dec 4 with the update that a refund for $2,750 was approved on Nov 26 for the Assisted Support which had not originally been removed from your subscription.Customer Answer
Date: 12/25/2024
Complaint: 22474647
I am rejecting this response because: we still have not received refund that was promised.this issue is still not resolved.
Sincerely,
****** ********Business Response
Date: 12/23/2024
******, thank you for your patience. Our team reached out to confirm the refund check was processed and mailed on December 20th. You should expect that you should receive the check within 7 to 10 business days, please note the holidays may cause delay. Thank you.Business Response
Date: 02/02/2025
******, thank you for reaching out to let us know you did not receive the check. After confirming with our Accounting team, we can verify that it was originally mailed on December 20, 2024.
To resolve this, we have requested that Accounting void the original check and issue a new refund check to be mailed. Once the new check has been processed, we will provide you with updated shipping details.
We appreciate your patience and will keep you informed as soon as we have more information.Initial Complaint
Date:10/14/2024
Type:Status:AnsweredMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
Complaint: 22419452
I am rejecting this response because:The email i received is just "kicking the can down the road" - i am not going to accept it to show that they did something as i feel they are riding out the 7 days i have to accept or reject. Their email told me absolutely nothing other than "they are working on it".
On October 23rd they said this (email attached):
****
"Hello ****,
Sorry for the delay! I apologize, that it's taken some time to get this resolved.
Over the week, I've reviewed the account and some of the cases that you've had and the experience you've had since you've been with us. I've put in a request to your account manager to review and process the cancellation/refund before the end of your term end (07/29/25).
I'm hoping to hear back late today/early tomorrow, in which I can give you more concrete details and next steps.
If you have anything in the interim, please let me know if there's anything I can do.
Best,
Cameron
Avalara Support
Avalara | Tax compliance done right"****
I have not heard back "late today/early tomorrow" and it has now been 4 days since receiving this email.
My resolution: Get out of the contract as they have not held up their end of the contract. I should not be stuck in something for a year when they missed the marl on their end. They are still sending me bills.
Sincerely,
he, because like everything else, **** pay did not work. Their support is not great either. I contacted their support and i got answers like this: "I see that you needed a solution for exempt sales documentation and our support team had provided you a walk around where you had to add them into file and import it, to reflect into the system." I am not paying for work arounds. I am paying for sales tax solutions. Their work around was for me to manually input all my data 200+ item into an excel spread sheet. Everything the sales manager sold to me has not been delivered. I requested to cancel because the contract was not as delivered and they said: "Your requested cancellation for Complete AvaTax Cancellation, Managed Returns has been validated and passed to Avalara Finance for completion at the end of your subscription term on 7/29/2025."If i delivered an unsatisfactory product i would be expected to refund. I am not sure what business model this is
**** ********Business Response
Date: 10/24/2024
****, thank you for sharing your feedback with us. We apologize that youve experienced challenges with the integration to our products as well as with the payment settings section of the customer portal. We have shared your insights with our product engineering team.
Regarding your cancellation request, our Customer Excellence team has reached out to provide updates on this and will continue to do so as they are available. We remain committed to supporting you through this matter and throughout the remainder of your term.
Customer Answer
Date: 11/18/2024
Complaint: 22419452
I am rejecting this response because:Every 7 days they answer this complaint stating that they are working on on rectifying this and they thank me for my patience. They are trying to get this case closed by me with a "non response". I will continue to reject this complaint until something is actually done. Right now they are kicking the can down the road hoping I give up or don't answer in time. I will not.
The screen shot from today, 11/18/24(attached), shows that they are still trying to collect money from me still. It also shows they are not connected to us so they are physically not providing a service.
I worked in corporate America for 19 years, at much larger companies than this with a lot more red tape. There are no excuses for this to be taking so long.
Sincerely,
**** ********Business Response
Date: 11/11/2024
****, we appreciate your continued patience as we are working to resolve your concerns. As communicated to you by our Customer Excellence team, we have submitted your account for cancellation and refund outside of terms. Our team remains committed to overseeing this matter to resolution and will provide updates as available.Business Response
Date: 12/09/2024
****, the screenshot provided in your rejection that youve claimed indicates Avalara was still claiming payment as of 11/18 shows an email dated for September 30 which fell before the start of this complaint.
As shared with you in our last update, we submitted your refund for approval and our team followed up with you on November 13 asking you to disregard any invoice reminders you were receiving as they would be cancelled upon completion of the cancellation process.Our records show we have now completed the cancellation and officially approved the refund. Thank you and we wish your business the best.
Initial Complaint
Date:10/08/2024
Type:Status:AnsweredMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
Complaint: 22396989
I am rejecting this response because: what they have said is that they will look into this more, and they have escalated to higher level management. That is an important step but I don't want to close this complaint until we find out the result of their review, and ultimately get a confirmed resolution that we feel is fair.
Sincerely,
***** ***l the charges are valid, and we need to pay them for a much higher tier of orders than what we need, due to all these duplicated orders. (Also note: on ******* Plus, these transactions are free - it is just the modifications due to voiding that we are being charged for).Our bill for the year based on legitimate orders should be $886.44 per month for the ****** order tier, for a total of $9707.88 (another problem: we tried to reduce from 15k the prior year to just what we needed, the 7500 tier, but our account manager didn't get this done in time so we are overpaying at the 15k tier for this year). Now they have hit us with an invoice for added fees of $16,898.99, all for these duplicate orders that got re-uploaded, orders that we already paid for them to process on our WooCommerce site previously! The invoice is due to auto-pay on October 25. We just want to have these added charges removed as they are extremely unfair. This is a very frustrating situation for us.Business Response
Date: 10/18/2024
*****, we appreciate your bringing your concerns to our attention. We understand how unexpected costs would be upsetting and we apologize if billable usage and tiered pricing was not clearly expressed.
Since receiving your complaint, our team has been in contact with you regarding the accuracy of the usage billing and our Terms and Conditions which outline that the voiding of transactions counts towards usage. However, we recognize that the communication on this could have been better throughout the numerous support cases you opened and so weve escalated to our account leadership who is working towards approving a resolution with your tier levels. We appreciate your patience as we work to resolve this matter. In the meantime, please reach out to the Customer Excellence team directly for updates.
Business Response
Date: 11/05/2024
Thank you for your patience as weve worked to find a solution. As communicated with you directly, the Leadership team reviewed the case for your full refund request and made the decision to adhere to our terms and conditions as the usage billing, while unintentional, is valid. Please refer to the Service-Specific Supplemental Terms to learn more about what activity contributes to billable usage: ************************************************************************************;
However, in good faith efforts to continue our partnership, we did agree to downgrade your account to the 7500 tier at your renewal in February, in addition to offering the 30% concession ($6,243.03) on outstanding invoices for a credit. We look forward to continuing to serve your team.
Customer Answer
Date: 11/12/2024
Complaint: 22396989
I am rejecting this response because: I need to discuss this with my leadership team, but before I can do that I need to know what they claim we owe them. It is unclear how much we are supposed to be billed for this large overage fee in the first place - the discount % and $ amount provided is inconsistent with the amount we were originally told that we owed. Based on the communication I have received, it seems like we are being told that we owe a larger number than we did originally, and then we are getting a discount off this larger number. I have explained this to them an am awaiting a response - their billing system is very difficult for us to understand and it seems they are having some delays answering this as well.
Sincerely,
***** ***Business Response
Date: 11/27/2024
*****, we recognize the confusion around the billing and the concession offerings. We understand from your message on November 22 that your team was able to decipher the charges. We remain committed to supporting you should you have further questions regarding the charges on your account and the concession we have offered. Please follow up with our team directly.Customer Answer
Date: 12/04/2024
Complaint: 22396989
I am rejecting this response because: We did sign an agreement with Avalara to receive a 30% discount on the overage fees. Overall the overage is about $15k and we are taking the discount offered of $6243 USD. We still don't feel this is a fair resolution and we feel Avalara is unjustly profiting from us by making us pay for orders we already processed, which I will add, we imported to ******* and did not tag as processed, yet their connector went and processed them anyway. But it has already taken 2 months to get this far, and it doesn't seem they want to work with us to get to a resolution we feel is fair (which is to also credit us for a one-time $3238 USD "upgrade fee" they charged us as part of this). Since we have signed the agreement to accept the credit, I will resolve this complaint once we actually see the credit applied to our invoices. However, just to be clear, we will be accepting this because it's better than nothing, but not because we feel it is fair.
Sincerely,
***** ***Initial Complaint
Date:10/08/2024
Type:Status:ResolvedMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
I am not completely satisfied with the resolution but I can probably live with it. I still prefer Avalara would void that anto-renew term that I was not aware of. I appreciate their understanding and effort to negotiate.
I have used many other online applications that have been designed in a way that are very much user friendly. When customers sign up, these sites give customers popup clear messages specified that customers are about to sign up for an auto-renew service but they can turn this auto-renew feature on/off any time they want in their control panel after signing into their account. When customers sign in into their account, the auto-renew feature is listed in the control panel, which can be turned off with just one click. This is very easy to implement with the technology these days. Obviously, Avalara does none of this and makes cancellation rather complicated and convoluted. What alvalara choose to do is waste customers' time, energy, and money on the one hand, and cost their resources, reputation, and customers on the other.
I believe If Avalara is working towards being respected for a superior customer service, they should have void this auto renew term for me and credit the invoice for $895.66 without any condition. With this solution they offer, I am probably still going to have a negative opinion toward avalara and this story is going to be told many times among my social circle, my family, friends, students, business partners.
One more thing, I would like to make it clear that I canceled the service with Avalara effective Jun 08 2025. No Renew Afterwards.Business Response
Date: 10/18/2024
Hongyi, thanks for sharing your concerns here. We understand how unexpected costs would be upsetting and we apologize if renewal expectations were not clearly expressed.
As per our Terms and Conditions, your account was automatically renewed upon completion of the previous years subscription and included a price increase. Avalaras mission has always been to serve global communities by offering the best tax compliance products possible, designed for use by customers of all sizes. In that spirit, while our largest growth segments have been in the mid-market of business sizes, weve historically priced our offering at the lowest tiers of service to meet the requirements of small businesses as well. Unfortunately, were now unable to sustain those prices while appropriately serving the needs of all customers in line with the economics of our own business.
However, while we are unable to cancel your subscription mid-term, we have decided in good faith to offer a one time adjustment for the annual pricing to $121 and credit the invoice for $895.66 that you received upon renewal. Additionally, our team has processed the cancellation request for a service end date of June 8 2025, confirming your account will not renew next term.
Please follow up with our support team directly for updates regarding this concession.
Initial Complaint
Date:10/04/2024
Type:Status:ResolvedMore info
Complaint statuses
- Resolved:
- The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.
- Unresolved:
- The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.
- Answered:
- The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.
- Unanswered:
- The business failed to respond to the dispute.
- Unpursuable:
- BBB is unable to locate the business.
Better Business Bureau:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID 22379426, and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me with the exception that there is an additional invoice attached for $25 dated June 2024 that we are also disputing since that is for Avalara services to file small business returns. We have not received the benefit of any of those services and had to file our own return recently.
We will be happy to pay the other open $19 invoices that are due and owing.We also need written assurance from Avalara that our contract is terminated and we will no longer receive any invoices or services from them unless we were to choose to sign up with them again in the future.
number of ways. Our proposal is to pay the remaining $19 invoices because those would be fair to pay as long as we were actually billed correctly (there seems to be some confusion about that). Other than that, it is our position that we should not be forced into paying for another year of service since the service was cancelled on us with no realistic options other than to pay for a more expensive service. We just want to be made whole in this situation and since we are not going to receive services, why would we pay to receive nothing in return? That is just putting extra money in Avalaras pocket and not looking out for the best interest of the customer at all. Please take it under consideration that we are not receiving any service from Avalara at this time and that we want to walk away from doing business with Avalara because the service was terminated through no fault of our own.
Sincerely,
Michael DatelleBusiness Response
Date: 10/14/2024
Michael, thanks for bringing this to our attention so we could assist. We recognize that our team was not consistent in communication with you regarding your cases, and we want to apologize for this frustration. The lack of response may have led your team to believe that Avalara canceled your services as stated in your complaint. Since we received your cancellation after renewal, per our Terms and Conditions we renewed your subscription for the 24-25 term and subsequently billed you for this service. However, our team recognizes that we did not express expectations clearly and we have therefore submitted a $925.18 refund request to leadership for approval. Please reach out directly to our team with any questions regarding the concession process. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to make this right.
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