Posted: December 23rd, 2009 | Author: Joe | Filed under: Debt, Scam | Tags: Debt, debt settlement, Nationwide Asset Services, Scam | 5 Comments »
Here’s an MSNBC article that showcases why debt settlement and debt consolidation companies are often scams.
The article profiles a nurse named Judy and her experience with a debt settlement company called Nationwide Asset Services.
Judy was $30,000 in debt, divorced and raising 5 children. She’s the text book mark for debt settlement companies like this.
She was contacted by Nationwide Asset Services in 2006. Here’s what she says about that in the interview:
“They told me I’d be debt free in 18 to 24 months and my credit would be better than it was before I got into the program,” Orlando, 52, recalls.
Sounds great. The problem is that it isn’t true, or if it is true then it’s only because she would pay off the debt and get her finances in shape afterward so that she would not get back into debt again.
Here’s the big, red warning sign of a scam:
“Orlando agreed to pay a $1,300 enrollment fee and send the company $350 a month. They told her to stop paying her credit card bills, cut off all contact with her credit card companies and to change her phone number, which she did.”
Most debt settlement companies will charge some fee, but any debt settlement company that tells you to stop contacting and stop paying your creditor is running a scam and playing a dangerous game – with your financial well being!
She ended up paying Nationwide Asset Services about $10,000 over a 2 year period, and they lowed the balance from $30,000 to $3,000. Sounds great, but they didn’t tell her that the interest and late charges were still piling up, and since the credit card companies weren’t getting paid, they put a lien on her home!
See, the problem with companies like Nationwide Asset Services is that they charge you a lot of money to do what you can do yourself, and they jeopardize your home and financial future while doing it.
In May of 2009, New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo sued Nationwide Asset Services for “false advertising and fraudulent business practices”. One of the main points of that lawsuit was that only 0.33% of the customers ever got the 25-40% debt reduction they were promised.
“People think they’re reaching out for a helping hand, and it turns out to be a hand that pushes them further under,” Cuomo said at a news conference.
For their part, Nationwide Asset Services released this statement:
“Right now our local attorney is currently reviewing a copy of the complaint and at this time we can not comment on the allegations contained in it.”
As of this posting the company is not accredited with the Better Business Bureau and they have a BBB rating of “F”
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Posted: October 27th, 2009 | Author: Joe | Filed under: Scam | Tags: Opinion, proflowers, Rant, Scam, spending | 25 Comments »
I can’t believe it and I’m a bit embarrassed to admit it, but I was scammed. I used Proflowers.com recently to send flowers to my wife (our anniversary) and my mother (her birthday) and thought I got a great deal. The flowers were beautiful, and they seemed to last forever. It wasn’t until two months later that I realized I was scammed!
Here’s how it happened.
At the end of my order process, I was asked if I wanted to sign up for additional coupon offers from a 3rd party service. Since I make it a rule to try to spend as little as possible at all times (ask my wife), I selected “No thank you” and continued with my order.
Despite my having selected “No thank you”, I was enrolled in this bogus program anyway.
The program is called “Easy Saver“, and as near as I can tell they charge you $14.95 a month to grant you access to a web site that contains coupons.
The problem is that not only was I being billed for a service I wasn’t using, I was being billed for a service I didn’t even know about! I was never contacted by the 3rd party (Easy Saver) to congratulate me on my enrollment, much less notify me of how to make use of their program. They seem to exists solely for the purpose of skimming $14.95 off unsuspecting proflowers customers.
I’m lucky I noticed the $14.95 charge on my credit card with an odd business name next to it:
“$14.95 ezsver rw 1-800-355-1837″
It was only after I went back to the previous month that I really became suspicious. There I saw a charge for $3.95 – and that was the month after my proflowers purchase appeared on the credit card.
I called the 1-800 number to talk to “ezsver” and that’s when I discovered they were really “easy saver rewards”. I asked the customer representative who easy saver is and how they got my credit card number. She told me that they partner with a number of popular Internet and 1-800 companies, like proflowers…
All in all, there were 2 unauthorized purchases beginning 1 month after my proflowers purchase – 1 charge was a small, almost unnoticeable $3.95, and after that came the monthly $14.95.
I must say that the customer rep at easy saver was very pleasant and very helpful, and I was able to cancel my “subscription” as well as have the previous charges reversed without any problem. But the way the whole thing went down is what bothers me the most.
The fact that proflowers signed me up when I explicitly opted out, and the way that easy saver never sent any correspondence to inform me that I had been entered into a subscription service bothers me so much that I will not be using proflowers again, nor will I be recommending their services to others.
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Posted: August 1st, 2009 | Author: Joe | Filed under: Scam | Tags: income at home, pyramid scheme, Scam, work from home | 28 Comments »
I know, I know, like you didn’t know it already, right?
Well it’s one of those thoroughly obnoxious radio ads I hear day in and day out during my commute, so I thought I sign up and check it out. But first, the ad.
The Radio ad:
“Financial Freedom Awaits You!”
“A simple way to earn ‘quit your job’ kind of money”
“One of the few work at home companies with an A+ BBB rating”
Here’s the details:
They mention being an A+ BBB rated company, but they don’t specify what that company is or what the affiliation is – not even on the website they direct you to.
Speaking of the website, incomeathome55.com redirects you to: Premier Team Online Home Business System website https://leadingincome.com. Incidentally, Premier Team Online Home Business System IS listed in the BBB, but they are not accredited and have an F rating.
Anyway, the Premier Team Online Home Business System website provides additional flashy, marketing type logos and text proclaiming the multitudes of people who now make 6 figure incomes with their “system.”
About 23 pages down, at the very bottom is a form section that asks for your personal contact info so they can “rush your free kit” out to you.
On June 29, I singed up for :
Free Online Package – Video, Workbook, and Audio
Package $0.00, Shipping & Handling $0.00
(the DVD package required $9.95 shipping, and I wasn’t down with that.)
Within a few minutes I received an email:
“Dear George, (I never use my real name for these things, until I’m sure it’s a real deal)
Congratulations for ordering the Home Business Information Package! Your Personal Mentor will be contacting you soon to send your Free Online Package. You will also receive a confirmation email. Be sure to check your screened mail if the confirmation does not show up in your email inbox.
For fastest service contact your Mentor now. Below you will find their contact information.”
A couple hours later I received a follow up email, containing a link to a 30 minute video title “The 5 Key Elements to Financial and Time Freedom in a Depressed Economy.”
The video was really nothing more than a number of testimonials from people who got rich using the system – with the following phrase floated at the bottom on the screen:
“Income applicable to the individuals (in examples) depicted are not average”
No doubt.
Anyway, the video opens with a guy on the beach talking about how great and wonderful and transformative the system is. It them goes into more glitz and glam about being wealthy and free, and ends with the obligatory testimonials.
The testimonials are filled with the usual stories of everyday people who were fed up with their mundane and stress filled jobs. They were tired of working to “make somebody else rich” and went off on their own. Within 6 months of using the system, they were able to quit their day jobs. Pretty standard stuff really, where these type of scams are concerned.
So the video references these “Five Rules of Financial and Time Freedom”, and asks if they really work, but takes forever to actually outline what they are. Instead, they talk about the “rewards for playing by the new rules” and show lavish lifestyles, big houses, SUVs and yachts. – they even threw in some women in bikinis and island resorts! Again with the caption “Income applicable to the individuals (in examples) depicted are not average.”
Eventually they do get to the Five Rules:
1. Find a large and growing industry
2. Have a consumable product that people need.
3. Create income leverage (get paid for other people’s time)
4. Follow a proven model for success.
5. Associate with successful people.
In short, this is a complicated, maze-like pyramid scheme designed to keep stringing you along with abstract promises of a better life and vague references to “the new rules” of wealth, retirement and so on. I suspect that all roads eventually lead to a collection point where you sign up and fork over your hard earned money to get a video tape of how to make your own “work at home” sites and string unsuspecting people along to buy a similar kit from you, and so on…
The large and growing industry is a pool of suckers who are disgruntled with their 9-5 jobs and dream of getting rich quick with some new method or technology (like a work at home kit on the Internet!).
The income leverage is the pyramid scheme. You likely get more residual income (commission) for signing up a certain number of suckers and have them work for you signing up ever more suckers.
The proven model of success is the “system” that you follow. Sites like these give you a template or pattern to follow. You create some unique branding to make it look just different enough, and the more unique and different it is the more suckers you will likely attract.
Associating with successful people ties back into the pyramid scheme. You want to stick with the person who signed you up (your “mentor”) because you view them as successful. That means they get to keep a higher number of suckers under them, and hence earn more money.
UPDATE: Since originally writing this post, incomeathome55 now redirects to http://radio.theonlinebusiness.com/goland45/CITADEL-STRM-45. The mere fact that the site keeps changing is a major scam red flag!
UPDATE (3/15/2011): It’s been a while since I heard the radio ads and I had forgotten all about Income At Home. It seems like they disappeared for a while, but have come roaring back. Since I originally posted this on August 1st, 2009 they seem to have done a lot to get their act together as the Better Business Bureau now rates them at A (since3/4/2010). It looks like they aren’t a scam after all, or are have ceased whatever practice(s) gave them an F before….
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