NBA Experiences — Local services in Charlotte

This non-NBA company misled my family and charged us $700 despite having official staff tell us the charge would be refunded. They completely ruined my birthday.

I'll provide more detail on my story below, but I wanted to share 3 very important takeaways from my really frustrating experience with them that left me without $700 and a couple weeks of really terrible customer service that boiled up on my actual birthday morning. To summarize they claimed that workers with NBA Experience badges and apparel on at the NBA Experience front desks at the main experience hub were not actual employees and could not make refund promises (even though they did), so my refund request was invalid despite me completely changing my Sunday plans.

1.) Business Dishonesty and Lack of Transparency and Responsibility - This was the most frustrating part of my experience with them. I paid NBA Experiences over $700 for an NBA Champions Club experience. Unfortunately, due to a flight cancelation, this experience was no longer possible for being redeemed and I contacted NBA Experiences weeks in advance about it. No response at all despite 5-6 calls, a couple emails and several voicemails. I took matters into my own hands and reported the issues in-person to an NBA Experiences desk the day before my experience explaining my guest could no longer make it and if they're provide a full or partial refund for the $700. They verbally agreed to the full refund and that I would be receiving an email about the situation.

Fast forward to the next day where I hadn’t gotten any sort of email, I called NBA Experiences guest services and the same rep Kalah picked up explaining she would investigate the situation. This was while my actual experience was happening which was a two-hour timed event. I had already made other plans because of the refund promise and I could not leave my two young kids (6 and 4) by themselves, and even if I wanted to, there were no ins/outs at the NBA convention we were at. Guest services explained I needed to wait for a decision, never mentioned it was 100% certain it wouldn’t be refunded, and allowed my event time (and $700 that we paid) to expire that afternoon just before the NBA All Star Game.

Fast forward further on my actual birthday morning on Feb 18, guest services had the nerve to finally get back to me and let me know a refund would not be honored because the NBA Experience workers I had talked to were actually contractors and had no authority to make any refund decisions. How was I supposed to know that? Why did all of these calls, emails and work happen allowing this event (and my $700 paid) to expire without NBA Experiences taking full ownership of the confusion of the situation for who they hired? This is simply unacceptable and not showing any sort of transparency or responsibility for the situation. Had the NBA Experiences reps on-site told me something else, I could have found an additional way to make the event I paid for and better planned out my birthday. Instead, I was left with a $700 charge where I did NOT get what I paid for and was LED TO BELIEVE that a refund has been done.

2.) Their customer experience "team" consists of just one person responding back to calls and voicemails. Every phone call I made to NBA Experiences was always to the same person, even after they required me to leave a voicemail.

3.) Extremely High Prices without any benefit to early birds - Prices for all most events, notably NBA Experience ones, were extremely pricy when they were first presented to me, an NBA season ticket holder, but they got rapidly cheaper (about 50-60% cheaper) as you get real closer to the end date. People might think they're saving a lot when purchasing a package early, just like it's mostly the case for Ticketmaster, but that is incorrect. There's also no price protection, making the most hardcore people pay way more than the ones who want to casually go a few days prior.

I am extremely angry at the way I have been treated and misled here and will be pursuing further options to ensure this...

I am a travel agent and I must say interacting with this organization for my clients has not been pleasurable. Firstly, they are completely unorganized and don't provide enough information surrounding their packages. The information is elusive and vague. When I signed up to get more information, someone named Kevin emailed me with a calendar invite to talk and didn't even show up on the call. It's been over 6 months and my clients didn't get clear instructions for the NBA experience package until 3 days prior. They purchased general admission ticketd which included full day of game access, pool party at the Wynn Hotel and the NBA lounge. We were trying to get a better understanding of the time if the pool party and even the day. After months of trying to get a response, they finally call the week of to tell us the pool party was 11-6 yet the games start at 1 pm. How do they expect my clients to enjoy the full experience? It would make more sense to provide the pool party experience on a separate day. They spent over $600 for an experience that they cannot fully enjoy. The staff was not knowledgeable and didn't have a clue about what they are selling. I have dealt with the NFL and never had these issues. They would not refund or be flexible. I do not recommend purchasing any experience. They are trash! Would really give a 0 out of 5. I will not send my...

Horrible services, I cant get my tickets and the event is in 2 days. Nobody answers phone, left many voice mails and sent many emails. some agents answer phone and said they will leave message to guest services. Nobody contacts you back unfortunately. If I can give them zero stars I will, I am updating the review. The event is this Wednesday and today is Monday and I have not received the tickets yet nor have been refunded. Everytime I can make it to even reach someone , I start from point zero and the communication has been horrible. Dont waste your money, this is probably one of the worst customer service experiences I have ever...