HOUSTON -- Dozens of you are asking Amy how to resolve complaints with one of Texas' largest retailers, Conn's.

So many consumers have come forward, we've learned the Texas attorney general is investigating and the Houston Better Business Bureau is taking steps to give the appliance giant the boot.

KPRC Local 2 investigative reporter Amy Davis is revealing the problems she's uncovered that have led to this.

"How many of you have waited more than a month for Conn's to come out and make a repair?" Davis asked a group of Conn’s customers gathered at KPRC Local 2’s studio.

All six customers raised their hands.

Matthew Blanton has waited the longest of those in the group.  He’s given Conn's eight months to repair or replace his loveseat.

“Every time they call me and say, 'Hey, do you want to make a payment today?' I ask them, 'You want to replace my loveseat?'" Blanton told Davis.

Everyone in the group called Local 2 when, they said, Conn's failed to fix furniture, appliances and TVs, even though they all paid extra for repair service agreements.

"I’m tired of getting the runaround," said Vanessa Murphy. "We pay good money to all these companies and purchase agreements and no one's following up on the agreements."

"It's pattern," said Dan Parsons of the Houston BBB. "It's an ongoing practice that has not stopped. That's the operative word."

The pattern is what caused the Houston Better Business Bureau to begin the revocation process to kick Conn's out of the Houston BBB.

Consumers filed 1,978 complaints against Conn's in the last three years, but the majority of complaints, 1,154 or 58 percent, were filed just in the last 12 months.

Despite a warning from the Houston BBB in March, Parsons said the complaints continued.

"In the 30 days, they could have turned it around," Parsons said.

"A month passed away, and I couldn't wait any longer," Conn’s customer Hidalgo Nunez said.

When Nunez purchased a new home, he bought all of his appliances from Conn's with extended warranties. But when his refrigerator went out eight months later, he said Conn's kept him waiting more than a month.

For four weeks, his family used a small cooler for groceries and to keep his son's medicine cold. Nunez finally gave in.

"Well my wife was about to kick me out of the house if I didn't buy her another refrigerator," Nunez said.

Nunez took his broken fridge back to Conn’s for repairs, but when he called to check on the status, Conn's told him they had no idea where it went.

"I've never been treated so bad," Nunez said. "Plus, paying for being treated that way."

"It has been very difficult to try and reach resolutions with any of the complaints we have been receiving," said Robert Johnson with the Texas Consumer Complaint Center.  

The Texas CCC is based at the University of Houston, where attorneys and law students take consumer complaints and try to help them work out their issues with the businesses.  Johnson said call takers have noticed an upswing in the Conn’s complaints in the last several months.

"It's how they've treated all of the consumers that we have heard from," Johnson said.

"Have you ever been hung up on by a Conn's employee?" Davis polled the group of customers who came to the station.

Several raised their hands and nodded yes.

"They just hung up the phone?" Davis asked Keri Jordan.

"Yeah, and then when you call back, they say, ‘Sorry, we got disconnected,'" said Jordan.

By phone, a Conn's spokesperson said it is aware of its customer service issues and it called many of the accounts we've heard "unacceptable."

Conn's is based in Beaumont and it said it lost many of its employees after the hurricane, which caused long waits for repairs and service calls.

They said they have hired more technicians and are working seriously to address these problems.

We should mention the BBB of Southeast Texas is not dropping Conn’s membership. It gives the business an A-plus rating.

In the meantime Conn's said it is cooperating with the Texas Attorney General's investigation.

As you might have guessed, the Houston bureau and the Southeast Texas bureau of the BBB are in disagreement on this issue.

At the start of 2009 most BBB's nationwide changed the way they rate businesses by assigning a letter grade. The Houston BBB stayed with the old method of rating a business satisfactory or unsatisfactory.

No matter which rating system bureaus use, the number of complaints received and resolved for any business will be the same no matter where you check.

Conn's customers who purchased extended warranties cannot file a lawsuit against the retailer because of an arbitration clause in the contract. That's why the Texas Consumer Complaint Center said if you find yourself in the same situation as the customers in our report, you should file a complaint with the AG's office.