Go Internet.Net Mercury Internet or Venus Voicemail Nationwide Scam Check your phone bill You could be next Philadelphia Pennsylvania
This is a warning to small and medium business owners and consumers across the country. This company, GoInternet.net aka Mercury Internet and Venus Voicemail are pulling a huge scam across the nation. You are probably already being billed without your knowledge. This company fraudulently signs small and medium business owners up for Internet services that 99.9% of the time had no idea they were being charged for the service. Consumers are being billed for a voicemail service that they have no idea about.
Let me tell you how it's done. I used to work there. I know. I didn't participate in the scam but I found out how it worked. I couldn't work there knowing the scam they were pulling.
First, this company hires telemarketers every single day. They expect, at least 50 new employees to be in the training class everyday. This is because they have a huge turnover and hire drug addicts, ex-convicts, and other miscriants of that nature for the telemarketing department.
Second, telemarketers are promised bonuses per
signed up customer. This service is not a worthwhile service so it is really hard to sell. The company provides a website with 24 hour tech support and email accounts but the thing is. you had no idea you had a website that may or may not represent your company
correctly. All of this for $29.95/month. Sounds good, right?
What the telemarketers do, since it is a hard
to sell the service at that price considering
you can make your website and maintain it yourself for free or for a lower cost, is call the business or consumer and tell them that they have a package that is waiting to be delivered to your home or business and they need to verify your name and address. Most people, being naive, give there information and WALLAH!! You have internet service!!!!
You are now being billed $29.95 a month for a service you had no idea you signed up for. The kicker is this. The company has to send the consumer literature in regards to the service. Most people think it's junk mail and throw it away. What they don't know is that, you are not charged for the first 15 days but if you do not call and cancel within in that time, BAM!! you are charged. It's all in the literature.
I used to work for the Customer Service Dept and learned of all the customers who truly had no idea they were being ripped off. I researched the claims on my own, and found that it was true. The telemarketers were scamming people and it was an accepted practice within the company. I am since out of the company but when I came across this website, I just felt the urge to let the world know.
BEWARE! NEVER give personal information over the phone. If anyone is sending you a package, they already have your name and address. Be sure to read all your mail before throwing in the trash. you may just be missing something very important.
Signed,
Disgusted Former Employee
Cleo
Phila, Pennsylvania
U.S.A.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Robin
Waldron,Arkansas,
U.S.A.
FTC hot on the trail of GoInternet.net!
#2Consumer Suggestion
Wed, August 13, 2003
Cleo,
Be glad that you no longer work for these crooks!
If you have been scammed by this company, full info can be found at:
http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2003/08/mercury.htm
For Release: August 12, 2003
FTC Charges Web Site Billing Service with Contempt
Agency Alleges Mercury Marketing-Go Internet Bills Consumers Without Their Authorization
The Federal Trade Commission has filed suit in U.S. District Court charging Mercury Marketing of Delaware, now doing business as GoInternet.net, and its principal Neal D. Saferstein with contempt of court. The agency alleges that Saferstein and Mercury continue to bill consumers for Internet-related services without consumers authorization in violation of federal law and a previous FTC Order. The FTC has asked the court for a hearing and for a temporary order to halt the illegal billing practices and to freeze the corporations assets to preserve them for consumer redress, pending a ruling on the contempt charges.
On June 28, 2000, the FTC filed its complaint in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania alleging that Mercury and Saferstein misrepresented that consumers were legally obligated to pay for the defendants Internet-related services. The complaint alleged that Mercurys telemarketers cold-called small businesses nationwide offering to create a Web page, or advertisement on the Internet, for consumers and then billed them without their authorization. In numerous instances, consumers who are billed for the defendants Internet-related services do not remember receiving the defendants telephone calls, the complaint says. In other instances, the defendants allegedly billed consumers who said they declined to buy the services or agreed only to receive additional free information. According to the FTC, the defendants never asked consumers for credit card or other payment information, but later charged consumers on their telephone bills.
The defendants and the FTC agreed to a consent order, entered by the court on March 1, 2001. The settlement prohibits Mercury and Saferstein from misleading consumers and requires the defendants to reveal all material terms of the sales transaction prior to charging consumers. It also requires the defendants to obtain express, verifiable agreement to the terms of any sale they make and requires that the terms of any recorded portion of the sales call to be consistent with the terms of any non-recorded portion. In addition, it requires defendants to notify consumers they are billing that they can cancel and requires the defendants to provide refunds to those who did not authorize Mercury to bill them.
In legal papers filed in U.S. District Court on July 30, 2003, the FTC alleges that the defendants have engaged in precisely the same deceptive and misleading practices that led to the FTCs original action billing consumers for their Web services without the consumers authorization. The agency notes that as the result of increasing consumer complaints, the FTC reviewed Mercurys business records, subpoenaed third parties, interviewed consumers, and surveyed Mercurys customers to monitor compliance with its order. Despite the 2001 Order barring the illegal activities, the conduct has not only continued, it has worsened, the FTC told the court. Simply put, defendants violate the existing order by billing consumers who they have misled.
A survey of 417 random consumers pulled from a list Mercury provided to the FTC of its current customers found that:
Less than one percent of Mercurys customers (one person) indicated that they had agreed to hire Mercury to develop and maintain a Web page for their businesses.
None of Mercurys customers indicated that Mercury had provided services for their businesses.
Most (72 percent) of Mercurys customers were unaware that a charge of $29.95 had been appearing on their monthly telephone bills.
Nearly 30 percent of Mercurys customers claimed they attempted to obtain a refund.
According to the FTC, recent complaints and company billing records show defendants even bill consumers who have asked to be placed on the companys Do Not Call lists. The FTC said the record demonstrates that the defendants are engaged in a systematic and widespread effort to defraud consumers.
Mercury also operates and bills consumers under the names Mercury Internet Services, Mercury Communications, Mercury, MIS, Mercury Internet Services Wireless, Venus Voice Mail, and/or Mercury Technologies. Using the name Venus Voice Mail, the defendants allegedly target residential telephone line subscribers.
If the court finds the defendants in contempt, the FTC will ask the court to order consumer redress and to permanently bar the illegal activities.
The original complaint, consent, and recent contempt action were filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.