Complaint Review: Essentials Kenny ID#TP610 - Nationwide

I received a phone call from a man representing a prize package that I had won through my Visa account. The prize package included magazine subscriptions, 50% discounts on local businesses and a emergency car service. He said that I had 801 points on my visa card for being an excellant customer. He said that I would receive this "Essentials" package for free and that there would NEVER be a charge on my card.

He said the following confirmation would state that there were fees involved but not to worry about that as that did not pertain to me but to those who had 500 points or less. He said I should say Yes to all the confirmation so that I could receive this prize package.

He stayed on the line the whole time it was being confirmed and was keying in my phone number and was stating my last four digits on my Visa credit card. I was talking to a pre-recorded confirmation system as the woman did not ask if I understood and it had a hollow sound like a recording. I should have stopped it in the middle but I went ahead with the confirmation, everything was happening so fast. There were fees being spoken about $149, $10.95, $1, $96 and I was being urged by this man to say yes. Which I did because he said I wouldn't be charged.

I feel like a fool. So at the end I made him give me the 1-800 numbers that were being spoken about for cancellation, he repeated 3 different phone numbers, 1-800-283-3956, 1-800-565-3827, 1-800-809-3795.

I called the 1-800-283-3956 and was told they were the magazine company that sold Star, National Inquirer, US Weekly and that what I said didn't sound legitimate so they gave me the phone number of their supervisor a Edwina Hay at (212)-484-4245. I called and got a voice mail. I don't know whether or not she will call back.

Then I called the 1-800-809-3795 phone number and talked to a woman named Courtney ID#TP949, I told her that the man had said I would not be charged ever, and that then the confirmation went on to state charges $149, $96, $10.95 today, and $1 for sending out the package, she was pleasant and said that didn't sound right, that these offers were for a 30 day trial offer and that the $10.95 was a monthly service charge and the $96 was a yearly service charge, I asked why would you pay a monthly service charge and then a yearly service charge on the same account? So she said that you wouldn't it would be either monthly or a one time yearly charge due to the way you want to pay it as some people want to pay monthly and some people want to pay yearly. I didn't like the fact that I was lied to so she transferred me to her supervisor Kenny ID#TP610.

Kenny acted helpful but stated that the telemarketer must be new because that is NOT the offer. He said that the offer is for a 30 day trial and that after that if I don't cancel there would be a charge on my Visa.

He said, "why did you say yes?", I explained that the telemarketer with an foreign accent maybe from India was saying that I should. Kenny said that should of rang bells and whistles and why did I confirm because no-one gives something for nothing. He said that he couldn't do anything about it until the order was processed in 3-5 business days. I said isn't there a US law that says you have 3 business days to cancel an order? He said yes, but I can't do anything about this until I have the order. I said I could give him the confirmation number and he said that wouldn't do any good until the order was processed. I feel like this may have been a stall technique as this would allow them to say I confirmed and did not cancel in the three day period allowed by law.

I called them within the hour that I ordered to cancel and I feel they should have taken down my information to call me back when it processed to show that they were cancelling the order if they are legitimate. He said call me back in 3-5 days and I will do something about it then, he said he would be looking into this as soon as he got off the phone. I told him I would be contacting the Better Business Bureau about what happened because I was Lied to about it being free forever to me. I didn't get anywhere except that he said there is a 30 day free trial. I am concerned that I will not be able to cancel this service and that I will be charged in the future for this. Is there anything else that can be done?

After I got off the phone I immediately hit *69 on my phone and was told a number of the last caller. As I had not received any other calls between the telemarketer and my phoning to cancel I wrote down this phone number it was 1-559-222-2944. This was a voice mail box and I could not make out the name. However, this is the telemarketer's phone number. If it is needed in the class action suit use it. This is the phone number of the man who called me, he never gave his name but I doubt that he thought I would use *69 redial to get his phone number as it shows up on my caller ID as unavailable. Because I have blocked unavailable calls on my phone he had to confirm his number in order to get through to me. The phone system gave me this number.

When I call Kenny back I will give him this number but for now I will try to find out who it is through reverse directories. If I need to sue this company for charges this man will be first on my list.

In any case I feel this Lying to a consumer is WRONG! I have notified my Visa account and tried to stop this order. What else can be done? I wonder how many other people have been swindled by a deal that should have sounded too good to be true. When a company offers you a deal like this ...... take heed you don't have to order and maybe you could say as I should have, "Send me information about this and if I am interested I will contact you about ordering, but I will not pay for anything before I can look over the potential charges in writing."

If the business is legitimate this should not be a problem but if they hesitate to send you the information without charge then run don't stop to say no and hang up.

By the way they use the web address, www.geopath.com which is also not true. If they have a web address it would have to have something before geopath.com as this is a web server not an individual web page.

I don't know yet whether I will be able to cancel this service without being charged. As this happened today, that is on Saturday, October 18, 2003. In any case this company needs to stop telemarketers representing them with false promises.

Beth

Albany, Oregon
U.S.A.