OP did nothing wrong.
He did his due diligence, asked the right questions, and if the company - who is responsible for processing VAT refunds - gives him wrong information, they should stick to their word and own their mistake.
OP executed a transaction with a company and asked them the right questions, and that company should have been able to provide him the correct information, and failed to do so - on multiple occasions. The onus is on Canyon to provide correct information about purchases from Canyon, including tax implications for those purposes. VAT is nothing new, and they should have full understanding of this, being a European company.
It's not OP who should hold the bag because yet more idiots in the world can't do their god-damn job right, which is exactly what happened and exactly why OP is in this situation.
Canyon deserves to be put on blast for this. I'm sure they did absolutely nothing with the employees who told him wrong information, they are probably telling other people the same wrong crap. If I had a company, and we told someone the wrong thing that cost them $700, it wouldn't even for a second ever cross my mind to do anything other than process that refund immediately and own my own mistake.
Last edited by puma1552; 08-06-19 at 08:18 PM.