You never get something for nothing. Trust me. I know.

I have been ripped off. Like a million other people, I was sucked in by a promise of getting something for nothing, and didn’t read the small print.

I saw the advert on the web one day. Free makeover and photo shoot in a top London studio. I had a look on the makeover studios website, and I liked what I saw. The photos were a bit chavvy I thought, but that was fine. Should I win, I would take classier clothes, and get them to do something different with my hair. I had a look at the prices of their photos. They cost £40 each, which was not too bad. Better than some studios anyway (I had previously paid £130 for 2 photos after a similar competition proved successful.)

And so, fool that I am I entered. I didn’t seriously think I would win, but it never hurts to try with these things. It was a free makeover, I didn’t have to buy any photos should I win, and so there was no visible harm in entering.

A week later, I was in my room, looking for job vacancies on the internet. It never felt right when I spent my student loan on a social life, and so I thought a job would clear my conscience. My phone started buzzing, interrupting my fruitless search. The number wasn’t one I recognised. I picked up to be told I had won a competition, hurrah for me. A free makeover, for me and a friend, worth hundreds of pounds I was told. As it was a competition, I would receive one free photo and the rest would be discounted. Great! Not really.

After many arguments, protests and us very nearly breaking up, my boyfriend agreed to come with me. I had paid the refundable deposit for us both, which I was promised I would get back. It was £50 for us both, but that didn’t bother me. I would get the money back and all would be well.

Wrong. The day was awful. The makeup took far too long, when all I really wanted was black eyeliner and red lips. I was taken into the ‘studio’ which consisted of a single room, done up with different wall papers and a tacky leather sofa. For the next 90 min, I did the same pose over, and over, and over until my brain went a bit numb. I tried to cut the proceedings short but only using 2 outfits, but of course that didn’t work, they just took more with the same clothes on. My boyfriend, thoroughly irritated by the whole thing, and rightly so, paced the waiting room relentlessly, making no attempt to hide his displeasure. The photographer, not getting the hint, carried right on asking me to look this way, then that way, then this way but with my head facing that way. It was getting beyond tedious.

Then came the bit I was waiting for, seeing my photos. There were so many, and they all looked the same. It was as if, rather than take any photos, the photographer had taken one, and just imposed it onto different coloured backgrounds. I chose my favourites, thinking I would be able to purchase one or 2, as a little memento of the day. After all, it isn’t everyday a girl wins a makeover and photo shoot. Then, I was informed I couldn’t buy one or 2. I had to buy a collection. £250. After the reduction. The free photo I was promised was available, but only if I bought at least 10.  The best they could do to ‘help’ me was to give the ‘privilege’ of instalments. At this point my boyfriend interjected, reminding me that I didn’t have a job yet, and that my bursary wasn’t for photo shoots. 

Despite me and my boyfriend’s best efforts, there was no deal to be negotiated. I was to leave with no photos. Which didn’t bother me too much, as the photos were all a bit, well, shit. After all, the day was free, and I would leave no more out of pocket then when I came in.

Except that I would be £50 poorer. Do you remember that refundable deposit I was talking about earlier? Well it wasn’t refundable. It was transferable. So it was less a deposit, more a monetary contract, ensuring I would buy some photos. If I didn’t spend anything, I wouldn’t get my money back, whether or not the photos were of buyable quality. I was too tired to argue. The previous night hadn’t been the best, and I painfully recalled a conversation with my mother that morning.

“Why are you going, if you’re so under the weather?”

“I want my deposit back, it was fifty pounds.”

And the moral of this story is, hit google before you give them your bank details. Or better still don’t enter these things. Every business wants to make money, and they don’t care how empty your pocket is before they pick it.