Complaint Review: Net Detective

after paying $29 for the basic net detective, i found that i could get no information and had to subscribe to the net detective plus. that was $10 for a 3 day trial and then $29.95 on the fourth day and every thirty days until i cancil.

my first problem was that i could no longer logon to the web site. i called and was told that they were making changes in the site so they changed my password and offered me and extention of my trial period to three months. i later got an email extending my trial period to two months. that inconsistancy was another clue that all is not what it seems.

i have also been able to get more accurate information without paying for it and more specific and accurate information on the person i am trying to locate.

i started looking for one person - the reason i enrolled in the first place. what i found was generic information that could have applied to any person on this earth. information about previous addresses was basically the same list i got when i typed in the person's name. john smith was listed with different addresses as john j smith, john a smith, joan smithson, etc. i guess that this person changes his name and sex often enough that they were able to track that information - not! i think that you get the idea.

they have no avenue to using the social security number for location of a person. that would be the easiest way to locate a specific person.

i began to play around with the program making my inquiries with information i knew was true. one search was for my name. i got several with my name and others who were as above. different middle initial, different last name, different first name, etc. the information i found was exactly what i had given when i registered. next i tried to use my phone number. i got another person's name - one that i knew because i got so many calls for this person and this person continued to give my number as hers until i caught her and was helped by a nice young computer repair man to resolve that situation. this telephone number was her phone number over 5 years ago. my name did not appear on the list - even though it was in the system. i then looked up information about this person and found another address and phone number but no one on the list had my phone number. i gave up at this point.

using addresses, names, phone numbers i continued to verify that this web site is a real rip-off. there is no system of cross referencing the information in their system. you have to search in several different sections to obtain all of the information you need. when i call the numbers given in the lists 80-85% were disconnected - the same with the emails.

i live in an apartment complex. one of my test searches was to put in my address. nothing came up. then i put in the basic address without apartment numbers, still nothing. next i just used the street, city, state and had a lot of hits. a portion of them were the answers to the previous questions and should have come up during my original searches. last i did a search using the names of friends in my complex and using 9 names, i was able to add to my list 6 names and addresses that were not part of the other searches i did. talk about time consuming. you have to know what question to ask in what search area.

i am in the process of gathering information and will be canciling my subscription within the next few days. i will also call my bank and stop any withdrawl by this company from my online account so that i will not be charged for any further services. they will get a call canciling my membership that i will tape. they will get a follow-up letter canciling my subscription with some of my data in it and a list of reasons i am canciling.

i could do a better job of organizing that web site just by asking my sons some basic questions on web design. i can do better using yellowpages.com.

Sui_generis
Sacramento, California
U.S.A.

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