In the summer of went onto Intelius.com and entered a person's name and city, and clicked on People Search ($7.95). My credit card was then charged $7.95. After the site responded, I then changed the city (same person), and again clicked on People Search. A message came back instantaneously saying that my credit card was debited $49.95, which is the price for a Background Report, which I did not request. So I was overcharged $42.
Later the same day, I called Intelius and was told that they would refund the $7.95, but not the $49.95. But I was not refunded the $7.95. They lied to me again in an e-mail on 7/20/07, saying that I wasn't charged the $7.95. When my June bank statement arrived, I noticed that I was charged the full $57.90. I mailed them a copy of my bank statement, to show that I hadn't been refunded anything. No reply. After that, I tried to reach them by phone again, but without success, and they have ignored all of my other communications.
If Intelius has its software set up so that people like me will automatically be dinged for $49.95 for a second search in the same city, even though they never clicked on "Background Report, " then that, it seems to me, really is a scam, and a lot of people are subject to being overcharged.
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