Better Business Bureau

No, the issue is really the guilt or innocence of the marketers and promoters and advertisers, who use tea--specifically Wu-Yi tea--as bait to make as many as possible of the overweight portion of our population customers of Wu-Yi Source and as many as possible of their dollars their own.

How do they do that?

Wu-Yi Source, of Ontario, California, has a website teeming with testimonials, complete with before-and-after photos of men and women making such claims as "55 lbs in just four and a half months," "35 lbs in three months," "12 pounds in 1 month." Each photo ends with a disclaimer: "Results not typical. All individuals used Wu-Yi Tea with diet and exercise." The pictured individuals were also paid.

How Wu-Yi tea is grown and harvested supposedly holds the key to the weight-loss benefits attributed to it--by its promoters, at least. Grown, they say, on Mt. Wu Yi Shan, "the most fertile and mineral-rich land . . . in China," the last step of the fermentation process calls for hand-rubbing the leaves to "break them at the molecular level." "Not only does this generate a tasteful aroma and flavour, it helps to release the fat-burning catechins and enzymes so your body is able to absorb them more quickly and easily."

Wu-Yi Source never claims that drinking its tea alone will take weight off. Indeed, its website cautions against being taken in by "scam weight-loss solutions," including those that claim effortless weight loss, that eliminate an entire food category, such as carbohydrates, and that promise permanent weight loss no matter how much you eat. Wu-Yi tea, it would seem, makes the Wu-Yi plan a "powerful weight-loss plan that will work fast!"

As far as the 234 complaints (all except nine of which have been opened in 2008) to the Better Business Bureau are concerned, few even mention whether the product helped or not. The Wu-Yi complaints relate, rather, to the company's business practices.

Customers usually have a 14-day trial period. As a customer, you receive a month's supply of tea but must pay nonrefundable shipping and handling charges by credit card. If you cancel your "membership" and return the tea at your expense so that it is received by Wu-Yi before the end of the 14-day period, you will not be charged for the tea. But if you do not, you are going to be billed a monthly membership fee of $29.95 and you will automatically receive continuing periodic tea shipments.

Many complainants say they receive orders of tea and, in addition, an unordered subscription to Living Lean (described by one complainant as a "motivational program"), for which they are charged $19.95 a month. When they call to cancel their Wu-Yi membership, they are given another number they must call to cancel the Living Lean subscription. For the most part, though, customers cannot get through to speak with anyone at Living Lean. Some, at least, complain that even if they do get through, they still can't get their refund.

Sometimes Wu-Yi charges a 15 percent restocking fee, of which the customer was unaware. Despite its "iron-clad money-back guarantee" of a "full" refund, Wu-Yi quotes the pertinent part of its "terms and conditions" (which print out to three pages of very small print within narrow margins) to prove that you should have known you would be charged a restocking fee.

Although we can't find any mention of a restocking fee in Wu-Yi's present terms and conditions, they do reserve the right to change their Agreement without specific notice to the other parties. If, then, you continue to use their website, you are deemed to accept all changes whether you were aware of them or not.

Wu-Yi has responded to all complaints so far except those received and presented to the company most recently. In almost all cases of complaints that are closed, we can't be certain whether the customer was satisfied with the company's action or response because they simply did not tell us.

For many of its customers Wu-Yi tea has lost its appeal, as they lost their money. But as to Wu-Yi Source's advertising and business practices, the weight of the evidence against it is undoubtedly much greater than the weight any customer has lost. Complainants' verdict? In all likelihood, guilty!