Saturday, June 27, 2009

Scam or Legit?

Yesterday some door-to-door salesman came by, from ECR magazine company or something like that. Bec initially agreed to get some magazines, but when she came in to get a checkbook, I said I don't like to ever buy things like that since it's impossible to tell if it's a scam. I just never buy anything if you call me or show up at my door.

The kid was understandably upset we backed out of buying, and it was a bit of a hassle to get some contact info so we could make sure nothing would get charged or sent to collections. You have to cancel in writing within 3 days? With no email or fax or website listed? It just seemed shadier and shadier as we were trying to stop. Bec did get a number and talked to somebody and sent a fax to cancel, so that should be good.


I wish I'd have thought to whip out the iPhone and start searching right then on the doorstep. The only references to the company I found were at RipoffReport.com. Bad sign for them.

And the continued magic of the Internet: according to Google, this is what is at their address in Florida. Doesn't really inspire confidence. I was expecting to at least see an office park or a "Mailboxes Etc" type store. Which building do you think is "Suite #3"?

Magazines make sense if I was making up a scam, you'd not notice anything was wrong until months later when nothing had arrived.

I'll never know if it could have been legit, but that Googling raised some big suspicions. We'd just be out the cost of a magazine. The kid earns points and will (supposedly) get a big $5000 reward for getting enough points. From Seattle, what's he going to do if some company in Florida decides to not pay?

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