Events & Adventures

December 18, 2015 found me at the E&A office, signing a contract. I knew it was $$, but I’d checked with a few friends who really enjoyed it. I sat through the sales pitch and signed on the dotted line. Literally as soon as I got in the car and before I was out of the parking lot, a friend called me. «DO NOT DO E&A!» So more due diligence when I got home and I decide from that I need to put a hold on it. I go back to the contract. I could break it inside four days for like $ 400, OR if I sent a certified, return receipt letter to them by THE NEXT DAY, I’d get all my money back, within 30 days. So, off to the UPS store I go. $ 15 later, I’ve got it sent.
The rep calls me the next day. I tell her that I’m doing further due diligence. I was glad for the call as I now knew they had signed for the letter.
30 days later, no refund!
35 days later, no refund!
So I call. Turns out it’s 30 BUSINESS DAYS, not 30 calendar days.
So I wait until 32 business days and call them. But the office issuing the credit received it some 8 – 10 days from when the Bellevue office received it, so the 30 business days is from then. No, I say. They received it on December 19. It should be 30 business days from then.
Bottom line, I got the refund today. 49 calendar days, 35 business days from when they signed for the cancellation. Sigh…

Total sales pitch, anyways I ended up meeting someone not through them and am in a relationship and they will not let me cancel… Never even made it to an event… Sure glad they are charging me 2200 for the year. I can’t speak for the events but the business model makes them crooks.

Wouldn’t be a bad club if the prices weren’t outrageous. Not to mention the extreme sales tactics. Join meet up.

I want to say I joined back in March 2014 hoping to make friends out of my then group of Friend’s, yes it would have been nice to meet a lady but I soon found out I was back in High School, get to know someone and the next thing you know she is telling all the other women about you and yes I mean everything you say, it more of a gossip club then anything, yes I’ve made some good friend’s but refuse to day out of the club, be warned

Know before you go: this is an expensive organization to join and they will want you to join on the spot. Unless you have $ 3000 to put down and then want to pay a $ 30 monthly fee plus extra fees for 75% of their events, this is not the place for you. They will make it sound very convincing but there is no backing out once you sign up even if you only put a few hundred down.

Wow I had such an odd experience I just had to share…
I entered my contact info on their website after hearing one of their radio ads for the 1000^th time. Then I decided to check Unilocal.After reading a lot of the negative reviews I decided not to pursue a membership before I even talked with anyone at the company. WITHIN 30 MINUTES I received a phone call from someone from the company around 8pm. I thought that was creepy fast and a bit later than I’d like to receive a solicitation call, but whatever. When the woman identified herself, I told her that I had signed up but I after «talking with friends» I had decided not to *CLICK* pursue a membership. She literally hung up in the middle of my sentence! And no, the call did not drop because I heard the phone clang against the receiver when she slammed it down (well not exactly slammed but she certainly didn’t try to hide the fact that she hung up on me haha). She also never called back, so I’m sure it was on purpose. I literally laughed it was so absurd. Good luck to the people who decide to sign up!

I frankly hardly write online reviews. However, I’d like to at least warn others about this so-​called company. I will admit that I, like others, fell for their tactics, and therefore, it is my responsibility to have dealt with them. However, E&A is also a serious scamming company. Here is a summary of the main issues with this company. I should’ve known better when it comes to points 1 – 3, but points 4&5 are serious issues with this company:
1. High pressure sales tactics. Others have explained the high pressure salesman approach, as in a «deal» is offered that will not (under any circumstances) be available unless you sign up on the spot. Classic. I should have known better.
2. Demeanor and attitude of the salesman. I’m a professional who deals with people daily, and I have never seen or experienced a more awkward (or frankly sleazy) interaction as I did during the initial interview that lasted 1.5 hours with the sales guy doing most of the talking. Insultingly, the salesman played on the fact that I was single and interested in potentially getting to socialize better (since my work is all time consuming). It was uncomfortable, to put it mildly and I should have walked out right then and there.
3. The contract cancellation terms. Others have alluded to this as well. There’s a 24 hour cancellation window, and cancellation must be via a letter in the mail (which is absolutely ridiculous), and a 3-​day cancellation window with a $ 400 penalty. After which, for lack of a better way to say this, you can kiss your hard earned money good bye.
Now, here are the big problems that I’d like to warn people about:
4. Lack of the company’s transparency regarding their services and what the very hefty «membership fee» includes. Not at any point in time did the salesman inform me that events involve an additional cost. For some really nice sounding ones, this can be as much as $ 70 – 80 or more. It is when I saw that the same day I signed up, that I decided to cancel pronto.
5. Refunds. This company failed to return my money within the contractual 30-​business day window (which is an obscenely long amount of time). I had to call Visa, file a dispute and request a charge back, which they very efficiently agreed to, and that’s how I got my money back. The E&A office was difficult (if not impossible) to reach, and every time a different person was on the other end with very vague information throughout the cancellation process.
You have been warned.

I have to say that E&A has a great sales pitch and great salesman/​saleswomen. But thats where they get you. If I could go back in time and not sign up I would. I moved from Hawaii to Seattle as a single father of a 2 yr old living in Federal way. I was looking for something that would help me get out and meet others and that’s what I did.
So let me ask you this… if you meet someone you really like either from E&A or somewhere else… shoudn’t you be able to cancel? E&A is where SINGLES can get together and have fun. I am no longer single now, I have a gf I have no choice but to keep paying… I’m stuck paying them. Every contract says you have 3 days to cancel with a written certified document stating you need to cancel.
PLEASE SAVE YOUR MONEY AND DONT DO BUSINESS WITH EVENTS AND ADVENTURE. TELL YOUR FRIENDS AND OTHERS. THANK YOU

I am still shaking from my horrible experience with Events and Adventures in Bellevue. I completely felt pressured to join and luckily I went with my gut and didn’t fall into their money trap. I had no idea going in how much money it was to join, which should’ve been my first sign that they don’t post any of that information on their site. I was bombarded with personal financial questions and had the main manager (Nicole, I believe?) try to convince me to «just put it on a credit card» and told me «that I make more money than most in a year» after she fired question after question to me. I respectfully told her and the other recruiter, Nicos, that I didn’t feel financially comfortable with this decision and wanted to go home and think about it. They kept telling me that this «deal» of «$ 1000» off the steep $ 2995 fee to join wouldn’t be there unless I signed up on the spot.
The whole thing made me feel extremely uncomfortable and I’m so happy I listened to myself telling me that this seemed sketchy. I actually had to tell the manager when she asked me what financial things have come up this year that it was none of her business. After she left, Nicos apologized but then sketchily offered to re-​meet with me when she wasn’t there on a different day if I decided to come back to sign up and still give me the deal by tricking the system and putting my middle name into it instead of just my first and last name to think that I was a different person. That is how desperate they are to have people sign up.
My advice to you is to avoid this place all together and if you do somehow miss all these terrible reviews you see on their Unilocal page, I hope that you listen to yourself and don’t give into their scare tactics and financial promises that you make enough money to join. The whole thing that’s even crazier to me is that you pay all this money to join without have even tried to go to an event with them to see if it’s a good fit. The way this whole thing is set up is completely ridiculous.
I called and let corporate know of the terrible 2 hours I wasted at the Bellevue office, but who knows if that will ever reach their office or anything will be done about it. I wanted to make sure to put a review out there in the world warning people that this is not the route to go!

I joined E&A (as they like to call it) at the end of November 2014 thinking that it would be a fun way to get out and do things with the bonus of meeting other singles in the area.
It’s true that they are very pushy sales people and it is A LOT of money. If I could go back in time, I never would have joined. I asked if I could go home and sleep on it and was told that this ‘great deal’ would not be here tomorrow. BIG MISTAKE on my part for being spontaneous. NO Refunds if you change your mind… even if it’s the next day.
Most of the events cost extra money on top of the thousands you just spent to «join the club». The average cost for an event is around $ 30.00.
One of my first events was a movie at the Imax science center which cost me $ 29.00. I didn’t meet anyone. I went into a theater and watched a movie! I could do that for a lot less money on my own or with friends.
One event I went to I felt like I was hanging out with 10 of my parents friends. Seriously. All VERY nice people, don’t get me wrong. But if I wanted to hang out with my parents and their friends then I would do that. I was hoping to meet people my age with my same interests.
I’ve seen 3 months worth of calendar events at this point and I have to say that I’m just not impressed with the options or the cost!
If I have any advice at all… join online meet up groups that share your interests. It’s the same exact thing but without the insane ‘membership fee” that will put you out thousands of $$.

The positive reviews are plants. This is a waste of money. Most if the people are already couples or are bitter and lonely but not looking for a relationship. The club is way more money than you think. 2 k to join, $ 30 fee per month, and then many if the outings have high fees. Do not join.

Events and Adventure, is it really worth it?
Price: *
If you’re reading reviews right now, and you still haven’t figured out that E&A is freaking expensive, then there’s something wrong. They sign you into a contract for payments, which means by the time that you’ve figured out whether you want to keep going or not, you’ll be locked in so that you have to pay no matter what.
The way it was explained to me when I joined was that the dues are there so that they can put money toward events so that you don’t have to pay full price. Like a trip to disney land might cost you $ 400, but with them it would barely cost $ 250, and something as cheap as a $ 5 entrance fee would be waved and you would be able to get in for free. Looks like I was lied to because I finally did my research one day out of curiosity, and found out I was still paying full price for my events, and sometimes I even had to pay more (I was livid when I realized this). The only discounts we ever received were things that places normally give like group discount.
Events: ***
The events they have are actually pretty decent, but the problem is that sometimes the best events are too far, but that’s not really E&A’s fault. They do their best to keep fun events going, and making sure the calendar is full of something fun, though admittedly sometimes there are a lot of not so interesting events. They do a pretty decent job of having plenty of alternative «Free» events as well, but sometimes even those require a $ 5 – 20 commitment fee.
The reason why events gets a 3 star instead of a 4 is largely because they have hosts who plan the events, and the hosts are all members. So you have members who are paying to not plan events who are… planning events? (Does that make sense to you?)
People/​Members: ****
The other members were nice, and real easy to get along with. For those who are turned off by the interview, it’s specifically to weed out obvious creeps, people with issues, and douchbags. That being said, the unfortunate thing (especially being a 26 year old) is that the average age in the club is around 40. My entire year here I’ve only met a handful of women my age, majority of them I only ever saw at trampoline dodgeball so it was difficult to get to know them.
Overall: **
The price is such a huge negative that it trumps a lot of the good that the people bring in, especially when you still have to pay full price for events. Over the past year there are a lot of events that I’m glad I went to because I wouldn’t have otherwise, but unless you make loads of money, and are willing to chill with 30 – 60 year olds, and are up for a minimum 1 year commitment, then I would highly recommend going somewhere else.

I should have known based on the fact that they are not up front about their membership fees from the start. I figured it would maybe be a monthly fee plus the individual fees for events. I did not expect the overhead of $ 3000 plus the aforementioned costs (for the minimum package deal). When I said it was way too much for me, I was given «the deal,» which was $ 1000 off and an extra 6 months. The catch? I had to sign up then and there. I made it clear that I wasn’t willing to make a decision about spending that kind of money on the spot, and I needed some time to think things over, look at my finances etc, and that was when the fun began.
My interviewer began turning all of my words back on me, saying I obviously wasn’t as committed to taking a different avenue to meeting people as I said I was, that it only came down to $ 29/​week and if I couldn’t invest that amount, then I wasn’t serious about my future and meeting a partner, and that if I wasn’t willing to jump right in immediately then maybe I wasn’t right for this club. This went on for about 20 minutes, with her getting visibly more angry each time I put my foot down and said no. When I finally got up to leave, she shoved her hand at me to shake and stared me down angrily.
I understand that it’s a for-​profit business, and the pricing structure is what it is. Some people may be fine with paying that, but it’s just not for me.
I’m mostly upset with the manner in which the sales pitch was handled. First of all, what ever happened to being upfront about what something costs? Even a car has a sticker price that you can look at before you ever have to talk to a sales person. But I get it, that’s how they sucker a lot of people in who aren’t able to stand firm (and I’ll hand it to the girl, she had some great arguments — I might have been suckered in myself, but I literally could not afford it responsibly).
But if I say no, then let it go. Tell me you hope to see me in the future if I change my mind. Be nice, so that I’ll want to come back. Don’t get angry and chide me like I’m a child. Don’t tell me how to readjust my finances so that it would be affordable. Don’t tell me it isn’t a lot of money when you break it down. Don’t question my commitment. And let me go after the first no. Hell, let me go after the 10^th no. Because I may have gone home and thought about it and done some adjusting of my budget after deciding that yes, I want to go for it. Now I can say without a doubt that my answer is no.

Do you want to hang out with a bunch of couples and old people? If yes join E&A.
When I joined I was excited to meet singles my age and participate in cool activities. My experience was a very cliquish group of people. Many of them them are dating each other and it feels a lot like high school. The only friendly people I experienced were the older people. If I wanted to hang out with couples and old people I would hang out with my friends who were in relationships and my parents. Clearly I am looking for single people my age which is exactly what E&A advertises but not what you experience.
The membership fees are VERY expensive and expect high pressure sales techniques when you go in for your interview. They are open with the costs — you have to pay membership fees, monthly dues and then for almost every activity. I paid the absolute minimum upfront and I paid $ 100 per month. This excludes the costs of all non free activities. You can’t cancel either but once again you learn this when you sign up during your interview.
E&A turned over payment collection to a company called Universal Account Servicing the end of 2013. E&A has yet to update their website to reflect the fact they Universal Account Servicing is now handling payments. Universal Account Servicing is the most horrid company I have ever had to deal with. I had to call them 7 times before they finally sent me a bill in the mail. I ended up just paying off the balance that I owed so I could stop interacting with them. I relayed my experiences to E&A twice and they said someone would call me back — I have received zero calls back.

Update August 2015:
Here is my full rant about this scamming company called E&A:
I wrote my original review recently, but those events took place in 1998.
I saw some TV advertisement in the early days and thought E&A sounded great. First I called, and they refused to tell me the sign up cost. That should have been a BIG red flag, but I was in my 20s, so I didn’t realize that. I asked if the cost was $ 100, and was told «that would be a good down payment». The phone salesmen are VERY secretive and will NOT tell you the total cost. If they did, most people would hang up. Instead, they are very pushy and want you to go to their office for an even higher pressure sales pitch. I went ahead and agreed to meet in person.
A few weeks later I drove to Portland (this was in 98), and met a clean, decent dressed, major ass kissing salesman. He wanted to be my best friend, know all about me, talk about anything I desire, and kept pushing E&A. I was offered water or coffee, a place to sit, or anything to make me comfortable.
We sat down and discussed the membership. He refused to tell me the price, even though I asked many, many times. Instead, he showed me a full calendar of events, and explained every event in extreme detail. ALL 30 DAYS! I don’t care that much. I want to know how much this will cost me!
After a full hour of asking him the cost, he finally told me. $ 1800! WHAT??? Hell no. He said that most of their members are professionals making $ 30K a year. A professional who only makes $ 30,000 a year??? That is insanely low for a «professional» in anything. He said some people are shocked, but most say «yeah that’s reasonable.» I call pure BS on that.
Then he asked if I have a check book. No… why? He said to make sure I am single. I didn’t realize at 23, now but do now at 41, that wasn’t to check if I’m single, its because they want a check for the insane membership fee. Have you ever heard of separate checking accounts for married people? Most married I know have joint and separate accounts.
Anyway, I said no I don’t have a checking account (which was true back then), then he lost interest, and said if I am still interested, please let him know.
Subsequently, I posted a complaint on
(LONG since deleted), and the CEO wrote in and complained about it, said how many very happy couples they have (which I have no doubt is a pure lie), and he would like to speak to me. I said NO. You are obviously a scammer and ripping people off. The complaints web site deleted my complaint because the CEO did not want the truth revealed and because I didn’t buy their package. I don’t have to spend the money to know I’m getting ripped off.
This all happened in 1998. In 2008 I met a lady who said she had joined them recently and said it was a huge mistake, she felt ripped off, and would never do it again. I didn’t ask her for details, I just thought it was interesting she also saw them as a scam.
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Previous review:
I wrote a review about E&A years ago when I lived in Portland, OR. Exact same tactics. They refuse to tell people the cost over the phone. If they did, most people would never join. I only know one person who joined and she later told me it was a BIG mistake. At the time, the fee was $ 1800 per year, and I see they have significantly raised their rates.
After I posted my review, the CEO immediately went on and defended their outrageous costs, said how happy people are, how many happy marriages they have had, and so forth. I also found out that they consider anybody an active member who goes to ONE event per YEAR. The CEO asked for my review to be removed because I was exposing them for who they really are. He didn’t like that. The CEO did everything he could to remove any reviews.
Now I see people are finding out about them. E&A is truly the most deceptive, scamming singles club I have ever been to. But they don’t call it a singles club, it is a social club. Really? If its not meant for singles, why do they ONLY want singles, and want to make sure everybody who joins is single? Because it IS a singles club.
They charge membership AND additional fees for any event you go to. It is by far the most expensive singles club I have ever seen. Are you so desperate to be around other singles you will pay around $ 2000 just to be a member? As far as I’m concerned, they are a scam.

Place is a scam. They charge a ton of money. Won’t tell you how much it is until you go in and act offended when you say its way too much money for what you get. Waste of time. Horrible company to get your hopes up and think you have a chance of meeting someone with out having to pay a membership for thousands of dollars a year. paying for events sure. paying a membership fee kiss my feet (this is putting it nicely).

I’m based out of San Jose but this Events and Adventures headquarters deserves another negative review. I had to call this office because I wished to cancel my membership after being in the club 6 months and barely being able to use it because of financial limitations. Seemed like a cool idea at the time, I’d meet cool people around my age, etc. (See my review for the Santa Clara office for more clarification on this)
Anyway, to cancel my membership I had to call this office. On January 20^th, I called and originally spoke to Brittney Oyer, the member support person. She mentioned in passing that I was way past the cancellation period even though there is no such stipulation on the contract. There is a 3 day cooling off period if you don’t choose to keep the membership at all but that’s somewhat standard from what I understand. There is no limitation listed for when you can cancel, no cancellation fees, nothing.
Anyway, she ended up transferring me to Robert Bernard, another guy in the office. He ended up being my main point of contact throughout this whole debacle. He informed me that I could cancel at anytime but there would be ramifications. It turned out that I had to still pay for a membership I had no desire to use. Why? Because the contract says until paid in full. So basically saying you want to cancel does nothing. I even sent a certified letter with return receipt to verify I wanted out. Still have to pay in full. What a ripoff. By the way, I had to call every day from the 20^th to the 22^nd to try and get an update on how this should be handled.
To complicate matters, my payments were now to be handled by some payment company called Universal Account Servicing since they took over the account in December. Plus, Robert said I’d have to negotiate with them what I’d be paying to settle the account. I call them and they inform me they don’t do negotiations, they only take payments. Robert did again suggest negotiating with them after I called the office, but this time said «Well you can try but I can’t guarantee anything.» I informed him that the only way the account amount could change would be if it came from them, to which he said «Yes that is correct.» IF YOU KNOW THIS THEN WHY ARE YOU HAVING ME CALL THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE?
After 10 calls (yes 10) to the Seattle office and about 5 calls to Universal, I had to close out my remaining account balance with $ 1629.44 plus an $ 11 processing fee over the phone with Universal today. The correct total was $ 1483.05 and I told Robert that but after 3 weeks of constant calls and calls not being returned by him, I just gave up. I hope no one else has to go through this with this expensive scam of a so called company.
Expensive lesson learned. Guys, go use Meetup. It’s free and I enjoy it. Forget Events and Adventures. Save your money.

Pretty much a scam. And what’s worse is this firm preys on the sad and lonely and pathetic. Let’s face it if you have to pay for your friends then there just might possibly be something wrong with you. I joined while feeling particularly vulnerable after a bad break up with a terrlble person who made me get rid of all my friends so that she could have me all to her terrible self) Long story short I thought it would be a great way to meet some new people and I was told by the A and E sales staff that everybody who joined was super awesome and supercool and that there were tons of cute chicks and that everybody was single and they showed me tons of pics of super hotties that I would go on to never see again in real life at a real event, but I digress.
I went to around 3 events… a game night, a valentines dance and a «fight club» night, (little known fact that events and adventures is Seattle’s leader in underground fist fighting.) (just kidding).
Anyway, the events were packed with nerds and worse than that, clickish nerds. Guys who became friends because they’ve been in events and adventures forever and who are just about as good at «freeze out» as anybody else in Seattle, imagine bizarro world sleepaway camp. Plus if you are even moderately attractive they freeze you out even more because they need to protect their territory for the one or two attractive girls whose social lives are so terrible that they have to show up at A and E’s game nights or other events so that they can be a big fish in a small pond. (note: I still sorta hooked up with one of the two cute girls at that first event and even though the second girl was cute and a lawyer she had a thicker moustache than I did)
I also was tricked into paying around 1800 bucks for a year, I figured what the hell, I’ve spent 1800 dollars on worse crap (a brooks brothers trenchcoat comes to mind). By around the 3^rd event I realized what a terrible mistake I had made and tried to get my money back. No dice, that contract you sign is locked down tighter than Prince’s recording contract with Columbia records. So in essence I paid like 600 dollars per event to show up and hate my life and hate myself for ever having joined. I was surrounded by the types of guys who were picked last at recess or not at all only now they ruled the land, imagine a world where the dungeons and dragons guys rule the school and football players get beat up on the bus. There were too few girls to mention and most of them looked like 12 miles of bad road. So in essence save your money. Join a church group, join AA (it’s free and they have great coffee), join a rotisserie softball league, stay home and spam chicks on OK cupid stopping intermittently to take care of your own needs with your rich fantasy life.
*note 2: every positive review on this site is from a fake Unilocaler and A and E insider. How do they pay for all that radio airtime? Your 2000 dollar donation to their commission/​advertising fund. That’s how. Don’t be duped.

This group is one of the biggest scams I have ever seen. First you apply, then you must «interview» with the company. After your long winded interview they «INVITE YOU» into their private club. The club’s dues are close to 4k annually, then $ 40 a month, plus you have to pay for most events and drinks. So I do not know where the dues even go. They will then give you an incentive on how they can break you a deal for $ 3k down and 4 free months…
You cannot meet any member before you pay, you cannot see any of the events to see if you like the group, and you cannot cancel early if you find out you are not a fit in the club. Personally to me that means SCAM. As an old sorority girl, I understand paying for social groups, but you at least meet the sisters, and you have a pledge period where you can cancel at any time!
When I explained that although, I make good money, I do horse rescue where most of my money goes to, the employee told me that my priorities just where not straight enough for me to meet new people. I apologize for donating my life and money to charity… but if members would rather drink at happy hour than do a good deed, that is not the spot for me!
BE CAUTIOUS! There are high pressure sales techniques if you do not know what you are looking for. They will pry on your failed relationships, pitfalls, and financial growth if you let them. If you want to meet new friends than PM me… and I will get a group to go out and play whirly ball at cost!

I moved to Seattle from SF and was stopped in my dating-​tracks by the Seattle Freeze. What the hell, Seattle?!
I joined up with E+A after being invited to watch brom-​coms with cats 3 times in a week. That’s not a date, that’s a waste of a sunny day. Even a waste of a rainy day.
Wasted days no more. With an event almost everyday, I can get out and scratch my social itch any old time with Events and Adventures. Cool peeps, cool events, always a good time.