I recieved an invitation in May to participate in a business opportunity by Mr Mahaffey. He stated that he was putting together a website where merchants could go and search for merchant account services, much like one would search for travel on sites like Expedia etc. He was looking for people who would be interested in owning affiliate sites to promote.
These sites would be state specific, and the merchant services providers listed would pay a small commission when someone asked for information about their services through these websites.in addition, an affiliate could purchase the rights to earn from the master site if someone in their state asked for information from that site. This was not a "get rich" type of thing, but was to be an easy way to earn a small supplimental income.
I purchased three sites, for Oregon, Washington, and California, plus a mirror of the main site. Total spent
$396.
The sites were to launch on June 7th, but did not. There were to be training calls, but they never materialized. There were some audio files sent on a couple occasions, done by Mr Mahaffey, which had some general information about how the merchant services industry works and other information pertaining to this business.
Replies to emails and pohone calls became few and far between, and it got to be that the only time I would recieve and "updates" would be after sending an angry email. Never a direct reply to me.
Then the launch was slated to be July 21st, but did not happen. The website (www.b4uswipe.com) does exist, but is not fully functional, and still has a notice about updates taking place on July 27th
When things were not moving along, I began to get suspicious.
I asked for a refund, as there was a "double money back guarantee" mentioned in the original email
Mr. Mahaffey agreed to the refund, sent me an invoice stating that the refund would be paid on Sept 5th. That date came and went with nothing paid. He told me he mailed a check on the 7th, and would send me the tracking number. I never got a tracking number or a check.
He then agreed to pay me via Paypal. Still I recieved nothing. Then he came up with the lame excuse that Paypal's refund policy prevented him from paying me. I don't know what this had to do with anything, as I had not paid him with Paypal to begin with!
He then said I should contest the charge with my credit card company, which I could not do as it had been more than 60 days since the charge. I had only paid some of the payment on my card anyway. The first $99 was paid by check.
This guy sounds very honest and professional. He certainly knows programming and the merchant services industry. He is also a pathological liar. Nothing he ever told me came to pass, and there were always lots of excuses.
Bottom line: I have given this guy $396 and have nothing to show for it but lies and excuses.
I would like to know how many other people have been taken advantage of by this crook!
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