AQUIRELists - ListAppenders - Acqmail - Ian Fisher - Mark Johnson - Andrew Robinson email list append fraud, paid services not received Albany, New York
I was contacted by Ian Fisher from AcquireLists on November 13, 2008 with an offer to append email addresses to our customer list. This means that we would provide AcquireLists with our customer list (after they signed a non-disclosure agreement) and they would give us any email addresses they had on file for those customers.
AcquireLists ran a test append for me. I gave them some customers for whom I already had email addresses to see if AcquireLists was able to find the same addresses. The test was successful. Here is the series of events that followed:
November 18, 2008: Received a quote of $8750 to append
email addresses to our customer list
November 21, 2008: Sent full customer file
to Ian for appending
December 8, 2008: Sent existing email file to Ian for
de-duping and received adjusted quote according to the new total of customer records.
December 17, 2008: Check for $9,641 FedExed to Acquirelists
January
13, 2009: Received appended file
April 1, 2009: Sent first email blast to COMPLETE list (though state segmentation was used starting in February). Received a slew of complaints about incorrect information. Checked Acquirelist file and found inconsistencies (e.g. email address for a dentist in Texas was appended to the customer record of a customer in Kentucky). Further research indicated that MOST of the records were incorrect. Ian asured me that he would send me a corrected file within a week.
April 20, 2009: No updated file received, emailed Ian for a status update.
April 27, 2009: Ian responded and promised the corrected file by April 29.
May 11, 2009: No updated file received, emailed Ian for a status update. Received an apology from Ian.
May 28, 2009: No status update or file received, emailed Ian again.
June 5, 2009: No status update or file received, emailed Ian again.
June 15, 2009: Spoke with Ian on the phone and received email follow-up promising the new file by June 17.
June 22, 2009: No status update or file received. Emailed Ian for an update and requested a refund. He responded that I would have the file before 3:00 PM EST. Received new file, which was still FULL of errors. Emailed Ian and Mark Johnson with a sample of the errors I found.
June 23, 2009: No apology or explanation received. Called Ian and voice mail was not working. Called main office and received only a voice mail -- left a message. Sent Ian an email requesting a proposal or refund.
July 15, 2009: Sent another email to Ian expressing disappointment in lack of professionalism and requested communication. I mentioned that I would be forwarding the case to our attorney.
July 24, 2009: Received an email from Acquirelist's sales team. They offered me a canned list with a "value of $8,000" for the discounted price of $3,500 because of the problems I had experienced before. I responded that I had already paid $10,000 for a project I never received, so I didn't see why I should have to pay anything more. I mentioned that if AcquireLists would like to void the old contract and just send me the new list as a replacement, I would be willing to compromise. They replied that I should just pay the $3500 since it was a great deal. I told them I would gladly pay $3500 after receiving my $10,000 refund. Otherwise, I was not interested in a new list, but our original project.
AcquireLists sent me half of the $3500 list free of charge. I
asked if they were unable to complete the original contract. They responded that I would receive the
project in 6-10 days. (By the way, the custom list was not useful to us--it was specialists and our market is general practitioners only.)
August 13, 2009: Sent a reminder that my project was overdue.
September 10, 2009: Sent an email that I still had not heard from the team.
November 2, 2009: Sent the above timeline to every email address I had for AcquireLists (general sales email address, Ian Fisher, and Mark Johnson--the data delivery coordinator). Asked for a refund. I still have not heard from them and they do not return my voice mails.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Melanie
South Jordan,Utah,
United States of America
ACQUIRELists - ListAppenders - Acqmail - Ian Fisher - Mark Johnson - Andrew Robinson email list append fraud, paid services not received Albany, New York
#2Author of original report
Tue, November 17, 2009
I was contacted by Ian Fisher from AcquireLists on November 13, 2008 with an offer to append email addresses to our customer list. This means that we would provide AcquireLists with our customer list (after they signed a non-disclosure agreement) and they would give us any email addresses they had on file for those customers. AcquireLists ran a test append for me. I gave them some customers for whom I already had email addresses to see if AcquireLists was able to find the same addresses. The test was successful.
Here is the series of events that followed:
November 18, 2008: Received a quote of $8750 to append email addresses to our customer list
November 21, 2008: Sent full customer file to Ian for appending
December 8, 2008: Sent existing email file to Ian for de-duping and received adjusted quote according to the new total of customer records.
December 17, 2008: Check for $9,641 FedExed to Acquirelists
January 13, 2009: Received appended file
April 1, 2009: Sent first email blast to COMPLETE list (though state segmentation was used starting in February). Received a slew of complaints about incorrect information. Checked Acquirelist file and found inconsistencies (e.g. email address for a dentist in Texas was appended to the customer record of a customer in Kentucky). Further research indicated that MOST of the records were incorrect. Ian assured me that he would send me a corrected file within a week.
April 20, 2009: No updated file received, emailed Ian for a status update.
April 27, 2009: Ian responded and promised the corrected file by April 29.
May 11, 2009: No updated file received, emailed Ian for a status update. Received an apology from Ian.
May 28, 2009: No status update or file received, emailed Ian again.
June 5, 2009: No status update or file received, emailed Ian again.
June 15, 2009: Spoke with Ian on the phone and received email follow-up promising the new file by June 17.
June 22, 2009: No status update or file received. Emailed Ian for an update and requested a refund. He responded that I would have the file before 3:00 PM EST. Received new file, which was still FULL of errors. Emailed Ian and Mark Johnson with a sample of the errors I found.
June 23, 2009: No apology or explanation received. Called Ian and voice mail was not working. Called main office and received only a voice mail -- left a message. Sent Ian an email requesting a proposal or refund.
July 15, 2009: Sent another email to Ian expressing disappointment in lack of professionalism and requested communication. I mentioned that I would be forwarding the case to our attorney.
July 24, 2009: Received an email from Acquirelist's sales team. They offered me a canned list with a "value of $8,000" for the discounted price of $3,500 because of the problems I had experienced before. I responded that I had already paid $10,000 for a project I never received, so I didn't see why I should have to pay anything more. I mentioned that if AcquireLists would like to void the old contract and just send me the new list as a replacement, I would be willing to compromise. They replied that I should just pay the $3500 since it was a great deal. I told them I would gladly pay $3500 after receiving my $10,000 refund. Otherwise, I was not interested in a new list, but our original project. AcquireLists sent me half of the $3500 list free of charge. I asked if they were unable to complete the original contract. They responded that I would receive the project in 6-10 days. (By the way, the custom list was not useful to us--it was specialists and our market is general practitioners only.)
August 13, 2009: Sent a reminder that my project was overdue.
September 10, 2009: Sent an email that I still had not heard from the team.
November 2, 2009: Sent the above timeline to every email address I had for AcquireLists (general sales email address, Ian Fisher, and Mark Johnson--the data delivery coordinator). Asked for a refund. I still have not heard from them and they do not return my voice mails.