Naivité Revealed January 14, 2009

I am angry enough that I think my fingers will have cramps after about 2 minutes from the fast and furious typing I will do. I am angry at these people out there who find every way possible to scam you (don’t worry, I hear your comments already)…but most of all I am angry at myself. Angry at my stupid, naive, embarrassingly blind trust that nahhh…this is fine! I don’t need to read the fine print…nahh…I’m smarter than that…

Even though I’d rather keep this little secret all to myself, I will put myself out there because 1. sometimes I just love to torture myself, 2. I will ALWAYS be an honest shmuck and 3. I believe strongly in sharing ones mistakes with others so that these others (you) will not make the same mistakes.

Keywords: Free trial.

You know, in the age of credit card fraud and identity theft, I always thought I was safe. Yes, I use my credit card to order books on amazon or sign up for netflix or bid on an item on ebay. I always seem to be “a bit” careful but honestly, I never think that I will have a problem with that. So far I haven’t (with these examples). But a few weeks ago I was really dumb. Really (maybe it was that lying on my back for 3 weeks thing that affected my reasonable brain functions). And I am so embarrassed about this that I don’t think I can even tell you what I ordered. But it was a free trial of “something”, in a pill form..that is “good for you” (oh my God! I can’t go on!)…and the offer was that you only pay for shipping and handling. A measly $3 or $4 for something FREE! woohoo!

I knew after I placed my online order that it was probably one of these tricky ones where you actually have to CALL to cancel the order or else they automatically charge your card every month and the hell begins. And the charge is not for $10 or even $20…it’s for $80+ !! ok, so I get the product (ok, 2 products) in the mail and I think…great! maybe I will now lose the 5 to 10 lbs I can’t seem to shed (ok…embarrassed again!). So I DO read the fine print and sure enough it says that if you don’t cancel within 15 days, you get charged and they send you more of this wonderful wonder shit drug.

So before being responsible and making that dreaded phone call (I just KNOW the hold will not be 1 minute only) I go online and do a bit of research. I wanted to read a bit more about this product supposedly associated with Oprah (NOT! she only mentioned it once on a show of hers that I didn’t even watch). Lo and behold I find a site called complaintsboard.com and suddenly there is a combination of fireworks coming out of my head and a growl in my stomach that makes me feel like I am going faint. Oooohhh…the complaints and horror stories. I read the 2 pages and already HATE those people who say that they are glad to have found this site BEFORE they went ahead and placed the order.
Note to freakin’ self: always research before placing an order for something that sounds too good to be true.

So I run to the phone and dial the first number. I eventually get through and this woman in the Philippines actually tries to convince me how good this product is for my health after I tell her 3 times that I want to cancel it. I keep calm (thinking about Jerry Seinfeld and the hotel wake up call guy) and just repeat thank-you-but-no-thank-you-please-cancel-this. She eventually gives up and gives me a 15 digit cancellation number. I take a deep breath,say thank you and hang up.

Good. One down. One more to go.

I dial the number and get this message: We’re sorry, the mailbox is full.

That’s it! I swear! I actually begin to laugh…well, more at myself really.

So I go back to the site to see what else people complain about and what they did. One person writes that even though she canceled the order, got a cancellation number, she still was charged. Several people say that the only way they were able to stop this was to cancel their card and get a new one.

That is what I end up doing. Well, the good thing is that I hadn’t yet gotten charged the 80+ dollars…so this was all preventative. I am embarrassed to call my bank (what do THEY care!) and explain to them why I need to cancel and order a new card, but I still do it. And it is done. For now.

In the process of looking at my account more carefully online, I find an unfamiliar charge of $12.95. I call the number listed next to it. And here is what I hear: well ma’am…back in August you requested a credit report at creditreport.com (fine, true) and you did not check off the box that says that you do NOT want credit report monitoring service to charge you $12.95 a month to monitor your report. Are you f—–g kidding me? I don’t even want to look back to previous months. I close my eyes tightly and calmly tell the nice lady to please cancel that account.

This was a bonus slap in the face. The icing on the cake that made me run to my blog and “share” my story with you.

And why again? because right now I feel like a complete idiot, but more than that I want to warn those of you out there that think (like I thought) that they pay attention to these kinds of things…that they are “smarter” than most people…that this kinda stuff doesn’t happen to them…

Well..it happened to me. Thankfully my story is not as bad as some of the others I read about…
Now my eyes are open a bit wider. And I will now think twice about typing those wonderful 16 digits that get me closer to instant gratification…

Best thing: When I called the credit report people, the woman asks me for my Social Security Number…and I, with an authoritative and strong deep voice say: oh no! I don’t give my social security number on the phone!

Pathetic.