Splash Studios reviews and complaints

Please please please don't be fooled by these people! Absolute rip of merchants, they rush through the photos with poor and dated affects. When you come to do the view see the pictures with charming music, BOB the the salesman does the hard pitch, no time to think about it now or never! Price lists only seen at the last minute! Scam Scam scam! How they get away with it is beyond belief, believe me you can get pulled in, they do this everyday of the week!

Awful place, my little girl had photos done, I was told to come back to splash to review her photos when I was brought in a room told the disc would be 700 pound to buy with all her pictures on! And that I was getting an amazing deal. When the sales man/photographer could see I was unimpressed he then said to me "don't tell any of your family or friends but I'll take £500 of the disc for you so it won't be £700 no more you can have it for £200". Total con! Anyway after much pressure I bought 1 picture and asked for that along with my free photo with the package I bought in lakeside! After 4 months no photos have been made I get no answer upon calling! I'm considering going down there, but it's not easy to get to as it's plotted on wasteland and no bus runs near! Stay well away from this company .

This place was unbelievable! I would liken their sales technique to that of a time share sales man. Absolutely outrageous and the amusing thing is when I mentioned it at work, 2 different people asked if it was splash in Basildon as they had experienced the same thing. Emotional blackmail, buy this CD for £800 or we destroy the photos tonight.

We paid £10 for a pet photoshoot at a dog show. We were told this would get us a photoshoot and one 10x8 photo, but advised we would need to make a £20 deposit when we booked, but this would be refunded automatically once we turned up. The person who booked us in also confirmed this.

On the day of our shoot, all went smoothly, the photographer was very good with our cats and patient, and took some nice shots.

When we went back to view the photo's, we met the infamous 'Bob'. He set a slideshow going with all the photos, and asked us to tick our preferences on a sheet. We had already decided we would get one individual photo of each cat, and one of the two together.

We came up with about 10 photos, then went back through and narrowed it down to 8. Bob came back in, and started pushing for us to buy all the photos on a disc, for £400, or a large multi-photo print or canvas. We said no, as we already knew we only wanted 3 photos. Once he realised we were not going to make a huge purchase, Bob offered to throw in 'all 8 photos for £150' (£150 was the price for a pack of 5 on the list). We feel this was an attempt to rush us out, as we were not going to make a big purchase, but we caved in to Bob's pushy manner, and agreed to pay £150 for 8 photos, and signed a page stating this.

No reference was made to our 'free' photo that we would have got for the original £10, or the £20 booking deposit, which should have already been refunded on the day of our shoot. Since the £150 covered all 8 photos, we should have got this £30 back.

When my husband came to collect the photos, he mentioned the £20 refund had not arrived, nor the initial £10. The staff member said the £20 should have been automatically refunded, but he would put it through later. He said he would have to ask his manager about the £10, and would confirm by phone. He then picked up a scrap of paper with our card details on off the desk, to check they were ours! These could have been picked up by anyone walking into the studio!

Two days later, I got a voicemail from Bob, saying we had paid £150 for 5 photos (as the pack on the list), Photo 6 was paid for by the original £10, and he had thrown in two other photos for £20, as our refundable deposit. This was totally untrue, Bob had not said this to us at all, and the £20 should have been refunded before the sales meeting, as promised three times!

We were very annoyed by this outright lie and underhand behaviour to squeeze an extra £30 out of us, and called to speak with Bob. He was busy but we were promised a call back in 30 mins. 45 mins later, we called again, and Bob was available. We explained we were disappointed by the lie left by voicemail, and the failure to return our refundable deposit. If we had known they intended to charge £180, we could easily have dropped 3 photos, to pay just £150, but as we were rushed and pressured, this was not explained.

We asked for a full refund in exchange for the photos, as the memories had been so tainted by the unpleasant dealings. Bob eventually agreed to this, and I confirmed that we would return the photos that weekend, in exchange for a full refund. Bob agreed.

When my husband returned the photos however, Bob said he would only refund the £20. My husband pointed out this was yet another change of events from Bob. The studio manager was then called, who was very aggressive and rude towards my husband, accusing us of having copied the photos and 'trying to get something for nothing'. My husband was unable to stay, as we had an appointment to keep, so he left, saying we would not leave the matter,
and would get our refund as promised. The manager then threw open the office window and shouted abuse at my husband across the car park. My husband is a rugby player, but he felt intimidated by this behaviour, and was very relieved I had not experienced this.

We emailed the studio to complain about the overall experience, the lack of honesty, the pushy sales tactics, the lies and backtracking and the aggressive and threatening behaviour. We again asked for what Bob had promised, a full refund, otherwise we would share our experience in online review forums.

We then received aggressive emails from the manger (Trevor) threatening us with legal action if we posted any reviews! Eventually they provided the piece of paper we signed to order the photos - but as I then pointed out this paper did state £150 for all 8 photos, no mention of the other £30, and asked for the refund. We had no response for a few months, then another threat of legal action if we posted reviews.

We have written this off as a bad experience, but would warn anyone else to steer clear of this studio, unless you plan to spend over £400 for the photos!

I can provide the full email trail if required - pm me for details.

Interestingly, the positive reviews on review sites are written with the same spelling and grammar errors that I received in the emails from Trevor...what a coincidence!

I have recently visited this establishment, my daughter wanted to surprise me by having a shoot done there..What a complete RIP OFF! I used to sell Timeshare in the 80s and I could see all the old tricks being used here to sell up the worthless packages, No Upfront pricing, buy now or regret later tactics, personal and emotional tricks to make the customer feel unworthy if they decline. But worst of all their complete rudeness and bad attitudes . My advice to anyone thinking of going there is DONT. The pictures are an abomination of bad photo shopping most of the shots were so bad they looked like an example of "how not to do it" The pixels in the airbrushing were so big the outlines of the skin looked like steps, and some of the shots where they have tried to enhance teeth whitening, quite frankly looked ridiculous. The location of their studio is a very difficult site to get to unless you are able to drive, it is in a industrial complex with skip company's and car breakers close by. Very handy really because the pics are only good for the skip!

I think Splash's sales techniques are shocking - a relative of mine was given a shoot for a birthday present, although the shoot went well, told to come back 2 hrs to view the photos, just for a man to initimate her for the next hour and a half, ignoring her request for a price list!. Eventually she signed the contract just to get out of there, £750.00 for a disc is a complete rip off! Where do you come up with your prices? it costs what 25p for a disc? erm 1hr in photoshop to make them look good £50.00 tops. Please ... you obviously prey on the gulible.