I've been receiving ASHRO catalogs for years. Recently, I decided to open an account and place my first order for two dresses.

Immediately after placing my order in February 2010, I received a communication that one of the two dresses I ordered would not be available until May 2010, months away. I was given the option to wait for the backorder, or, to cancel the order.

I immediately cancelled the order for the dress and indicated that was too long a period to wait for a back order.

Instead of getting a confirmation that the order was cancelled, I received an whiney "please don't cancel" offer to the effect of "Oh please don't cancel, how about if we give you a discount, instead?" I declined the offer, and for the second time, cancelled the order.

I got another email which asked me to reconsider cancelling and giving me up to a 25% discount. Completely irritated now, by this ploy to keep the sales ticket high, I wrote back and immediately cancelled the order for BOTH dresses. I didn't want EITHER dress.

The response was that it was too late to cancel both dresses, because one had been shipped, but, I could return it immediately for credit.

I received the dress on February 22 and returned it immediately, at my own expense. The confirmation tracking number indicates it was delivered to Customer Returns on February 25, 2010.

Now, today, March 22, nearly a month later, I received my first ASHRO billing statement for the account I opened when I purchased the dress. Naturally, it's for the dress I returned immediately, which, incidentially, was of extremely shoddy quality and quite ugly in comparison to the catalog photograph.

What's worse, the statement -- the FIRST statement I've ever received from ASHRO -- shows not only a charge for the dress I returned, but A PAST DUE FINANCE CHARGE ON THE PRODUCTS I RETURNED AT MY OWN EXPENSE.

They now want $97.05 for the dress and $1.42 in interest charges on a dress I had in my hands for 5 minutes. I've already spent $7.80 in postage to return it, I've kept nothing, and they claim I owe them $100.

I knew, from the outset and the way they tried to prevent me from cancelling the order, they'd pull this stunt -- I just could bet money they'd foul it up and they did.