A year ago I was contacted at work and told I was selected to participate in a special magazine offer targeted toward scanning coordinators in my area. A woman named Lisa said I could choose five magazines to try out. I chose the magazines and understood that I could discontinue subscriptions at any time. The program was to last for 3-5 years. I understood that I would get a contract or some confirmation of this transaction. I never received anything in writing, only magazines. Suddenly I started receiving phone calls from this person both at home and at work, saying I needed to pay immediately or they would send me to collection and ruin my credit report.
My mother took most of the calls at home, since I was usually at work when she called. Lisa was rude to my mother, implying that I was lying about what had transpired. She repeatedly said that she had a tape of me complying with the terms of a 5-year contract, to the tune of $700-$800. I can't remember the exact amount. The harassment continued non-stop for about a month. I contacted the Better Business Bureau to make a complaint, since she had told my mother that they were a legitimate company and members of the Better Business Bureau. The only imformation the bureau had on them was numerous complaints. My mother contacted our lawyer, who suggested notifying the Attorney General's office, which she did. They sent a letter to the company but received no reply for a month or two.
Meanwhile, I told Lisa that I would pay for the magazines I had received, but she said there was no way that I could get out of paying for these magazines since her company had already prepaid the subscriptions. My mother was very upset about the whole situation, so she got on line, got the phone numbers of all the magazines, and cancelled every one of them. A spokesperson for Interview magazine had never heard of such an arrangement before and said there was no way they (IMS) could keep me from discontinuing magazines.
The attorney general's office also suggested putting in writing that I no longer wanted these magazines. I sent them a letter, which came back to me as being undeliverable. I finally received a notice from the attorney general's office saying the company was willing to accept around a $200 payment instead of the $800 they said I owed them. There was no reason to pay for magazines that I was not receiving any more, since they were cancelled. I kept getting notices from IMS, but no more phone calls. My mother did happen to call the company to see what they would say about what kind of business they were running. She was very rudely told by a man that if she wasn't a customer of theirs it wasn't any of her business what their companyy was about.
Then I got a collection notice from 231 West Main St., Suite 208, Carpentersville, IL 6010, without any business name, claiming I owed Direct Reader's Guild $780. My lawyer sent them a letter demanding that they stop trying to collect money from me, claiming that what they were doing was illegal in Ohio, and telling them he wanted them to pay for his fee. I didn't hear anything more about it for several months and thought at last the problem had gone away. Then, the week Christmas I received a collection notice from a different company, Tate & Kirlin Assoc.in Philadelphia, saying I had until December 25 to pay 1/2 of what I owed, $405 in order to resolve the debt. This time the creditor was listed as IMS of Great Lakes. This company's phone number is 877-982-001. I haven't replied to this notice to this day because I'm tired of this whole thing. I'm waiting to see what happens next. After reading the report from California, I am not so worried about my credit report, but it still bothers me that I may get other threatening notices for this unjust claim against me and I hate to think of all the other people who are being harassed by this company and nothing is being done about it.
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