We have fallen victim to a magazine scam know as the Community Reading Club of Fort Lauderdale also known as CRC/AWI. We have been receiving many calls from representatives of CRC whom ask to speak to my wife about her account. When I asked who was calling and what it concerned, the reply was either they would call back later when my wife was home, or that it was so and so from CRC and needed to speak to her about her account. Finally one evening shortly after Christmas, my wife was available to take the call and the person stated that her account was past due and that if she didn't make a payment that it was going to be turned over to a collection agency. When I took the phone and asked who was calling the guy at the other end identified him self as Mike Johnston of CRC/AWI. He proceeded to tell me that she had accepted a verbal agreement to purchase five magazines from his company over a five-year period. He further told me that the fees for this service totaled to $1298.70. I told him to cancel this agreement and he stated that that was not possible now due to the fact that my wife had not done so within the allotted 48 hours. I then told him that this was a bunch of crap to send me a copy of this verbal agreement in writing. On January 2nd we received a letter indicating the clubs services and their fees and that the payments would be deducted on the 26th of each month. The really bad part of all of this is that these people somehow got my wife's Visa account number and has billed her for the monthly payment of $49.95.
Now this is how I think this all started.in late October of this past year, my wife decided to help a co-workers child by subscribing to a magazine club to support a school function. The club, which appears to be ligament business as I will describe later, is named the Community Reading Club of Denver but who's reverse phone listing, is for a A Subscription Service Center out of Arvada, Co. I have contacted this company several times and have always gotten a person who was willing to help. I found out in talking to them that they have had many complaints by customers of similar kinds of scams. They asked if I would fax them a copy of the information that we had received from CRC/AWI, so that they could do a follow up investigation of their own. This reading service came to my wife at the low price of only $819.98 due in 14 installments. I was able to confirm with this company the magazines that she had chosen and this is important because since her order was placed in October for five magazines we have received seven of which only three were of her choosing. The other four I was explained to me by a CRC representative were free advertisement copies from the publisher. Here is the best part of it all, these services are Non-Cancelable and failure to pay will result in the account being turned over to a collection agency.
Bottom line to everyone is due the math. These so-called subscription services are ripping you off. These are examples from the magazines ordering cards that can be found inside each copy.
OK 2 years $147.00
Home 10 issues $10.00
US News 51 Annual $20.00
Working Mother 9 Annual $9.97
Woman's Day 14 Annual $9.99
ESPN 26 Annual $26.00
These six magazines would cost you $149.46 a year or about $747 over a five year period. Do yourself a favor and pick up a copy of a magazine that you think you may like and then subscribe to it directly. You don't need to subscribe to five at a time, you'll get only the ones you want and you can chose not to renew it at the end of the first year.
I am in the process of filing a complanit to the PA bureau of Consumer Protection.
0 comments