Question: Auwe to Tsukiji Fish Market and Restaurant! They closed down suddenly and now we have gift cards that we paid for but can’t use. I had even given some as gifts. How embarrassing! I called and went down there and got no response. What can we do?
Answer: Kokua Line has received numerous calls and emails from readers in the same boat, who are left holding gift cards for the restaurant at Ala Moana Center that shut down with little notice last month. Some said they had tried but failed to contact anyone at the restaurant, while others said they had received assurances by phone or in person that refunds would be forthcoming — but they never got their money back.
Stephen H. Levins, executive director of the state Office of Consumer Protection, said affected consumers should file official complaints with his office, which investigates allegations of unfair or deceptive business practices. “OCP does have an active investigation regarding Tsukiji Fish Market and its unredeemed gift cards,” he said.
You can download the form here, 808ne.ws/ 1UcfHAA, or call, write or go in person to OCP to get one. The phone number is 586-2630; the fax number is 586-2640; and the address is 235 S. Beretania St., 9th Floor, Honolulu, HI, 96813. Address mail to the attention of the Consumer Resource Center.
Besides your name and contact information, you’ll need to supply information about the transaction. Details and documentation such as the date you bought the gift cards, the remaining balances, receipts or other proof of purchase are needed to build the case. Provide copies only of receipts and other documents, not originals.
OCP investigates to determine whether a business violated consumer protection laws, not to resolve individual disagreements. However, investigations may bring restitution for individual victims because when OCP makes its case it generally does so by proving specific acts. “We like to recover money for injured consumers,” the form states.
Like many readers, Kokua Line got no response in our attempts to contact the restaurant directly (we left voicemails before the phone was disconnected and sent an electronic message through the comment form on the restaurant’s website.)
We did reach Keith Kiuchi, an attorney representing the restaurant owner, Paradise Inn Hawaii LLC, led by Ronald Kim. Kiuchi also said affected customers should contact Office of Consumer Protection. He said the restaurant’s owners are unable to verify outstanding balances on gift cards because the electronic card scanner has been sold. “I would direct people to OCP and if they file a complaint we will respond directly to the state, not the individual,” he said.
Kiuchi said that the owners “have a lot of claims against them; gift cards are only a small part of it.”
Hawaii’s gift certificate law, found in section 481B-13 of the Hawaii Revised Statutes, requires that electronic gift cards must be valid for at least five years and paper ones for at least two years. When a business goes under, “all factors must be examined to determine whether there is a party who will be responsible for refunding a consumer holding a valid gift card,” according to information previ- ously supplied by OCP.
Q: Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders spent so much time talking about water quality that it got me wondering: Is there lead in Honolulu’s water too?
A: No, according to the Honolulu Board of Water Supply.
“Our laboratory has conducted a series of tests for lead in our municipal water supply. Samples were taken from BWS sources, within the distribution system in the community, and from consumers’ household taps. Based on these tests, no lead was found in any of the municipal water supplies served to Oahu’s residents,” according to the board’s website.
Water quality was a key topic at Sunday’s televised Democratic presidential candidate debate, to which you refer, because it was held in Flint, Mich., where a crisis has erupted over the governmental decision to save money by using the polluted Flint River as a source of drinking water. The river water was so corrosive that it caused lead from the city’s aging water distribution system to leach into the drinking water last year.
Write to “Kokua Line” at Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 7 Waterfront Plaza, Suite 210, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Honolulu 96813; call 529-4773; fax 529-4750; or email kokualine@staradvertiser.com.
