WESLACO – A Rio Grande Valley woman wants a party rental company to refund her deposit.

Marissa Ross visited a forum on social media to rent a waterslide for her daughter’s birthday party.

Ross said a woman responded to her posting stating she worked with an inflatable rental company. They exchanged text messages and agreed to meet in person.

“She walked up to my car and she wrote me a receipt and said, '$25 deposit,'” she said.

Ross said they agreed the waterslide would be delivered around noon.  

“The day of the event they never came to leave the waterslide. I called continuously but she never answered. Not even a text message,” she said.

Ross said her calls and texts to the business have gone unanswered for almost three weeks. She said she went online to warn others about her situation.

“Other people started coming forward… It just might’ve been $25, but it could’ve been more for other people,” she said.

CHANNEL 5 NEWS spoke to another woman who said she paid $40 for the service. Her calls and text messages also went answered.

Dolores Salinas with the Better Business Bureau said the women could file a police report for theft of services.

“She can report them to Facebook. The fact that they’re out there advertising the services and they’re out there not delivering the services they’re offering,” he said.

According to Salinas, a person should always research any business.

“Get references. Ask you friends and relative. Who have you used for this type of service, and hopefully it’s been people that show up and they go ahead and they provide the services you’re paying for,” he said.

CHANNEL 5 NEWS called the same number Ross had dialed. After several unsuccessful tries, we decided to text instead. We explained who we were and what we were trying to find out. They declined to meet in person for an interview.

However, they said they tried to contact Ross three times on the day of the scheduled delivery. The company added they let Ross know about their cancellation policy: the delivery is automatically canceled if customers don’t answer the day of the event.

There was no contract agreement, but the company said they would be willing to refund Ross her deposit.

Ross said she will do more research next time.

“When you’re looking for something like that, if you’re going on Facebook that you make sure that you check them out because you don’t want to lose your money,” she said.

Salinas said people concerned about doing business with a company can log onto bbbsouthtexas.org and view business profiles. The profiles allow someone to view any history regarding complaints the BBB may have.