For a total of $1500. These clips of Heather and her husband dancing and the wedding toast was what she ended up with, along with video of two other weddings. What? So when? I don't know how this video was edited, I'm not sure.
But if it's only showing their first dance and a toast, not even like the toast, just them holding up their glasses. Dude, come on, man. Wow. I want to thank you guys for coming out and rocking with me one more time.
My name is Damon with complete Media. I am going to be reacting today to a video that I found online about a wedding photographer that is being sued for not showing up. It's kind of confusing the way it reads because it says that he's a photographer, but then it also says that he's a videographer, so maybe he does both.
I know sometimes that happens where a photographer can also do video and they do them very well. But this one says that he allegedly did not show up. So I'm going to check out this video. I'm going to react to it as always, hashtag, not legal advice.
I am not a lawyer, just a guy that runs a company that provides photography, videography and DJ. And I am very interested in legal matters. And when people get sued for doing the wrong thing or when people get taken to court for doing the wrong thing, I will chime in with my thoughts, with what I've experienced, but definitely not with legal advice.
So we're going to go ahead and rock on this one right now. He just seemed to say, this looks. Like a news story. Think it's going to happen to you? And then it does. Two women say he never showed up to the ceremony.
Another says when he did show up the product was not what he promised. So it looks like, I don't know exactly what happened here, but it's probably something along the lines of again the videographer or photographer didn't show up and so they maybe reached out to left a review or something like that and then got together because it seems like multiple people are unhappy with his service.
Kakloff speaks with a group of women who say they just want to warn others. Steve and Katie. These women paid more than a $1,000 for services ranging from videography to DJs. Some of them ended up with other people's videos while others got nothing.
So obviously I don't see there's anything wrong with providing photography, videography and DJ. We provide the DJ videography and photography for weddings. The thing is you have to have the right people.
Like our DJs are not photographers, our videographers are not DJs. So you have the right talent, do the work. So that's number one. Number two, there's always room for housekeeping improvements. For a client to get someone else's wedding video, it's definitely unprofessional, but it's not the end of the world.
It's an easy remedy for that. You got the wrong clients video. Here's the other one. Here's your correct one. I'm sorry about the mistake. Maybe we can do something else to help you out because of the inconvenience or something like that.
That's not the end of the world. Unless you don't have their product, then that is. Issue. Just another note here. I am not feeling this video. I don't know if this is what the client gave or excuse me, what the vendor gave the client, but this is definitely not good quality.
I don't know how much they paid, but as they always say, you get what you pay for. Videography is going to be over $1,000 for quality work. Work. Just to say, just throw it out there. So what? This newscaster said they paid over $1,000.
Well, I'm not saying you should, but quality, it costs for quality. So I'm off my soapbox. I'm going to go ahead and check out the rest of this video. I might pause it a couple more times, so bear with me.
This is part of Sarah Tim's wedding video. A bride and groom dancing with their guests at their reception. The problem? That's not heather. She's one of three brides who says an Appleton man who runs a videography company is ripping off women.
To have someone intentionally mislead you and take advantage of you and change that memory for you somewhat is really sad. She paid one $200 to Scott Socket for a wedding video that was supposed to include her ceremony.
She even kicked in another $300 to have them come early for a first look the moment the bride and groom foresee each other for a total of one $500. These clips of Heather and her husband dancing and the wedding toast was what she ended up with, along with video of two other weddings.
What a what? So when? I don't know how this video was edited, I'm not sure. But if it's only showing their first dance in a toast, not even like. The toast. Just them holding up their glasses. Dude, come on, man.
Wow. We want to have this video of these moments that we can hear and feel again that are more than just photos. When did you realize he wasn't coming to your wedding? About an hour before our ceremonies.
Michelle Heck doesn't even have a video to remember her big day. She says Socket didn't show up to her wedding like she paid him to do. I was getting my makeup done and kind of texting him, saying I was getting nervous, having a feeling that I didn't think he was going to come.
And that's when I realized this is all a lie, that he's not going to be coming. I just don't understand how a person who seemed so normal can be so malicious. Alexandra Mosier dealt with a similar situation.
She says Socket sold her four different wedding services, and only one followed through. I believe it was $1,400. And that was going to pay for uplighting, videography, photo booth and DJ. Oh, my God.
If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. She paid $1,400. I am not tell anyone how they should run their business, but I will caution anyone who finds a vendor that is going to provide video, DJ, Uplighting and photo booth for $1,400.
That something is probably going to go wrong. If not one of those services, then probably all of those services. That is a very low amount. So I'm sorry that you went through that. I'm sorry that you got duped by this person, but there is no way that price is going to get all those services.
Only the DJ showed up. Paid one $400 for DJ. I don't know, ceremony, cocktail hour, reception. That would be about right in South Florida. One $400. Not DJ. Then uplighting, then photo booth, then videography.
Wow. Did you think this deal is too good to be true? I did. I thought it for a second, but, I mean, I had nothing to go lean back on. Alexandra says she realized something was wrong as she was standing at the altar.
Saying the vows that commit you two to each other for the rest of your life. You're thinking, where's the guy I'm paying? Yeah. I will still be forever grateful for that, because I'm still so grateful that I'm married to my best friend.
It's the best thing in the world. But it sucks to have to look back and just think about that. Alexandra and Heather filed a lawsuit against Socket and small claims court. Both won their money back, plus court fines.
So far, they haven't gotten any of it. We went to Socket's house to ask him why he's not paying them back. He didn't answer the door, but he did talk to us over the phone. My name is Rebecca Clough. I'm a reporter with TMJ Four.
His answer to the lawsuits. We are currently in the process of trying to get everybody's refund back to them. Nine different people took socket to court. Wow. Eight were founded. One case was dismissed.
A judge ordered socket to return more than $14,000. Socket says a majority of the people who sued him are canceled contracts. According to court records, a judge found in favor of a woman canceling because Socket misrepresent.
Bennett his emotional work shared is a. Misrepresentation work for any of the women that actually had us booked. Take into consideration that half of the people so far that we've seen online that say that we didn't show up and stuff like that were never actually customers or clients of ours.
Socket says a competitor is writing bad reviews and trying to ruin his reputation. It's ruined. These women disagree. He can't explain all of us away that we're trying to take advantage of him and make him look bad.
Right. So I'm sure that it happens that a competitor will go and write a bad review to kind of make it so that your competition looks bad. I'm sure that happens. But you had, what is it, eight or nine lawsuits against you with more than $14,000 worth of refunds that you have to give back that's not made up.
So if eight or nine of those people, even the one that their case was dismissed, they can still write a review about you in their mind, they had you booked. In the eyes of the law, allegedly, they didn't have you booked, but they can still write a review about you as long as what they are saying they feel is truthful.
So the. Dude. Dude. Wow. That is bad. Bad mojo. I'm just going to finish this video up as there is a lot of us. He says he's working on paying you. I have also heard that several times every weekend.
I think we're getting paid. I don't know about you, but that's next weekend. Thursday. It's in the mail. Are you angry? I am, yeah, very angry. Socket told us over the phone he has many happy customers.
He said he would email us a list. We have not heard back. These women say they checked popular websites for reviews and never saw any issues. We've posted those links to TMJ Four. Rebecca clough today's.
TMJ Four. All right, so what I want to do live here is I want to check out some reviews from this particular vendor. These are going to be actual reviews. I am not going to say whether they're true or not.
I am just reading them. And I am going to also make a statement about something afterwards. But I do want to just see if this is his competition or if I believe it's his competition or if I believe this is actually clients here.
All right, so I'm going on Wedding Wire and wedding Wire and the Knot are the two most popular wedding websites and they would have reviews on there. And typically Wedding Wire and the Knot, you have to go through a process.
You can't just like Yelp, just say, hey, I'm a Yelper, and I'll go ahead and make a username and then start reviewing people. You have to actually have a wedding date. You to have your email and all that other stuff.
Incorporate your fiance's name, the entire thing. So it's not something like a real simple process. It does take time to actually create a profile on there. So I'm going to go ahead and read it's. Interesting, this one.
On wedding wire, what they do is. I'm just going to go to the newest. I'll go to the newest ones. So in wedding wire, you can actually check reviews by the highest, the lowest, the oldest and the newest.
So we'll check on the highest first. So he has one five star review from two plus years ago. So between two and three years ago, the rest of them probably are not because it's only showing one five star.
And then it says the highest to lowest. So five star, then one star. So he has one five and the rest are ones. All right, so we'll start with this. First one was actually somewhat recent a couple years ago.
It says absolute garbage. Did not even bother to show up on our wedding or call ahead to tell us the issue he had after the wedding. Come to find out that Scott Michael, the name he gave us, has a habit of this at this point, trying.
To get a refund. We have been given the runaround multiple times. Cashiers check in the mail. I'll send it tomorrow. Continually avoiding calls. Stay as far away as possible. That's number one. And the title is ruined our day.
That was from Alex. This is from Sarah W. It says. Do not hire this business. I hired Scott for my wedding when he was operating under the previous business name magic Focus Photography and cinematography.
I later chose to cancel his service because I found someone who appeared to do better photography. I was due, as stated in the. Contract, to receive 50% of the original. Deposit back from Scott. He lied once saying the refund was in the mail and it never came.
I inquired with him multiple times and he has still not given me my refund backed back. In the three months since I have canceled his service, I know many other people have had similar situation to mine with Scott Michael slash socket.
Do not hire this man for your wedding. Avoid him at all costs. Next one. 2019 June. This man is a scammer. He has used three different business names. Ours was magic. Focus photography he gave us a false name.
He didn't show up. This company and person is a scammer first he gave us a false name. Scott Michael on my daughter's contract. And I guess this is from Julie. Okay, so that's the mother of the bride on my daughter's contract.
Where was it? Contract. But his name is actually Scott Michael Socket. He took our money, did not show up for my daughter's wedding. He gave us an excuse of his car breaking downs and sending a replacement person, which never happened.
This was a once in a lifetime event. He does not care. He is a scammer and a thief. Scott Socket promised a cashier's check for the refund but he never did. I had to try and start a summons and complaint court in three Wisconsin counties with no luck as he keeps moving it on the run so I can't have him personally served.
He does not have an Appleton, Wisconsin address he has listed. He has used three business names so far. He used Magic Focus Photography on my daughter's contract and also say I do wedding services and s two wedding solutions.
I would give this person a zero for review as he is a scammer and has no intention of ever showing up to your wedding. Scott Michael Scott was on Fox Six News in 2019 as many other people were affected by his scam.
Never use him or any business he is involved with. All right, so I'm going to read one more and then we'll go ahead and move on. And I'll get to my point that I said I would go over from Ashley who was married in 2018.
Scott is a fraud. He will take your money. And not give you your product. I have been told by several people that he does not show up and then he'll refuse to give you a refund. He did not show up for our wedding but never gave me I'm sorry.
He did show up for my wedding but never gave me all of my. Product I paid for. It would take several times for me contacting him before he would respond back. Once he did respond back he gave me lie after lie have why I did not receive my stuff.
I finally got my pictures but only because he downloaded them onto an online website. They are not great quality either. Anytime I try to print an eight by ten it tells me the resolution is not high enough.
I never did receive the video I was promised. He has changed his company a few. Times so bad reviews. Do not follow him. Do not hire Scott. So I just want to give some experience on my end. There was a company down here that.
Actually did similar to what Scott is doing. I thought it was just like a one off. Like I can't believe that somebody would. Be so garbage to do something like. That but I see it's actually a trend but it's more common than I thought.
So this company, they did pretty much the exact same thing. So this company, what they would do, let's say average photography is $2,000 so. They would undercut just enough to get. The majority of, I guess the conscious shoppers, if you will.
So if average photography is, let's just. Say 2000 so they would charge 1700. But then they would also incorporate more. So they would say average photography just for photo is $2,000 and that just covers you for photos.
So what I'll do is I'll include. An album and some prints for $1,700. So they would undercut and basically get a lot of clients because it's lower than the average, and you're getting more, so it seems like a greater value.
And then what this person would do is similar to what you're seeing with this other company, is he would show up sometimes, but he would not show up other times. And it was always the same thing, that his wife was in an accident.
That would be the excuse. My wife was in an accident. So this I wasn't able to show up if he didn't show up. And then if he did show up, then it would be after the fact, my wife was in an accident, so I'm not able to process your photos or edit your video or anything like that, so give me some time.
People are sympathetic, and so they would give him time. Now, obviously, if he didn't show up, again, they were sympathetic and they would give him a little time, but not as much as after the fact if he did show up.
So he would say, my wife was in an accident and I need a little bit of time. And they would say, okay, no problem. Again, if he didn't show up. So they say, okay, no problem. Give him a couple of weeks, maybe even a month.
And then a month would go by, and they would try and reach him, and he doesn't answer. And it would be that whole chase him down. And then he would finally respond. And then he would say, I would give you a refund, checks in the mail, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And then on the opposite end, when he did show up, then he just wouldn't give him a product. It was never, I'm going to give you a product with somebody else's name on it or somebody else's video or somebody else's pictures.
It would just be you don't get the product and you can't get a hold of me. My wife was in an accident. I think his house burned down. That was the other one, too. My house burned down. And he would say that multiple times to multiple clients.
And then I got wind of this because. Of a vendor excuse me, a venue down here. They were trying to help out the client, and so they were saying, hey, is there a way that you can help them out? This person, his house burned down, and we have this raw footage here that he's refusing to edit because his house burned down, and they just want their product.
And so we were able to take the raw footage and edit a video for him. And that was one of the better results. Normally. What I found, allegedly, is that he would just, like I said, take the money and run.
He would just take the money and either not show up or take the money and show up at the wedding. Maybe he recorded, maybe he didn't. Who knows? But after the wedding, it would literally be crickets.
Like, nobody would hear from him again. And I don't know if he has any lawsuits out there, but I definitely know that this same person has changed his business name three separate times, and every single time it's the same result, and they would end up finding him.
I think he kept pretty much the same name. I don't think he ever changed his name in this, which is kind of know, kind of like Scott Michael or Scott, whatever the other guy's name was. The other name, he, um anyway, so I just wanted to kind of talk about that because I have seen that down here in South Florida, and it's a surprise to me that it happens across the country, I guess, and it's more common than I realized.
So the main thing that I'm getting at is, as you saw here, is I took the time to look at reviews, so if you see somebody with all one stars, then obviously you're not going to hire this person. No matter how great of a personality they are, no matter what excuse they give you, there's no reason that you would ever hire somebody with one star.
So that's number one. So do your due diligence. Not only. The company, but with the person that you're working with as well. As you know, Scott has switched over a company. So if you look like a brand new company with no reviews, then it's a blank slate, but then stuff will follow you.
So that's really only thing that I wanted to leave you with is definitely do your due diligence. I hate to see anyone get duped out there. It's such an important day, and you really can't get it back.
So finding the perfect vendor for you is a task that you should basically take seriously. So make sure that you do your due diligence by going on the knot and wedding wire. There are actual couples that review actual vendors, and this will be the end of my video.
My name is Damon with Complete Media, and I thank you guys for rocking with me one more time.
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