Scammed Out
Less than a month after responding to a direct mail offer for five magazine subscriptions, Mandy Criddle received an invitation to a contest she just couldn’t refuse.
An official-looking letter from Top Choice Inc. informed Criddle she could win $1 million for sending a $20 registration fee. The letter (which included an impressive-looking seal) said the company would contact her whether or not she won.
Criddle had, in the past, won prizes from contests run by charities she supported, so she entered. She sent in a check for $20 last April. A week or two later, Top Choice mailed her again asking for a $20 processing fee. Criddle obliged.
Then another $5 “activation fee” was requested. And another $15. And another, until Criddle was out about $100.
“But by the fifth one, I felt this is a bunch of crap!” says the 20-year-old woman, who is a live-in nanny for a family in Princeton, NJ — her first job away from her hometown Downey, ID (population 660).
The next envelope Criddle received from Top Choice, she sent back with “Return to Sender” scrawled across the front.
Top Choice stopped contacting her. But Criddle’s name apparently has been rented out by Top Choice or other firms, for Criddle has since received up to five “scam-like” offers by mail each day. Telemarketers call frequently, too. (Efforts to locate Top Choice for this article were unsuccessful.)
Another promotion that seemed too seductive to pass up was a Ramada Plaza Resorts telemarketing pitch for a trip to Florida, then a cruise to Nassau, Bahamas, for only about $1,000. The deal also included a “bonus getaway vacation.” The catch was, she had to pay for it immediately.
Criddle, who’s returning to Idaho this winter after a year of caring for three children, says regretfully, “I would love to go on a cool trip.”
Ramada asked for Criddle’s credit card number during the phone call. She only had a checking account debit card, with just $350 available. Ramada took that, though, and the Ramada rep said that when Criddle confirmed, they would debit the remaining $698 she owed. They asked her what date she wanted to travel. She couldn’t commit to a certain date except to say the “end of December.”
When the confirmation information arrived in the mail, Criddle was confirmed for Dec. 12, 2003. Disgusted, Criddle dialed the toll-free customer service number to cancel the trip and get her money back. But she was transferred around so many times, she gave up.
And, when Criddle called her bank, PNC Bank in Princeton, she was told because she authorized the removal of the funds the bank couldn’t do anything. Criddle says she didn’t know how to report this.
These promotions may not have been scams, but they reinforce the old saying: “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”
Ramada Plaza Resorts and its celebrity spokesman, Robin Leach of “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous,” were sued by at least eight states in 1999 for deceiving consumers into believing they had won or were entitled to free vacations. Leach and the company, admitting no wrongdoing, settled the lawsuit for $30,000 and agreed to pay restitution to consumers.
