Last evening, a young man came to my door. He represented himself as a neighbour and a student at the University of Delaware. He was attempting to get "points" for a trip to King's College, Cambridge. Purchase of four magazine subscriptions to purportedly be sent to armed forces personnel would add to his "point" total. Having been under the weather yesterday, I was susceptible to his pitch, and paid a total of $236 for the subscrptions and received a receipt for the payment which does not specify the service purchased (perhaps no such service). After he left, my apprehensiveness of this transaction caused me to both research him and the agency he represented. He was not as he represented himself, and I learned of the marketing practises of Absolute Marketing. I immediately wrote a letter of cancellation to the firm, complying with their cancellation policy. Doubtful that they would adhere to their "refund" policy, I also stopped payment on the cheque, although they, contrary to the Universal Commercial Code, state that "stop payments" are illegal. Having received personally neither goods or services from the company, I am convinced that I was within my right to almost immediately do so. They will likely not receive the paper work of my cancellation until Monday, this being Friday and will also likely claim that my cancellation was not within the 3 day cancellation window as specified on the receipt. So be it! I will not honour the payment unless I be legally required to do so! I further sent copies of my notification and receipt to Marquis Fulfillment Agency who are apparently affiliated with Absolute Marketing or their parent company as well as to the Georgia Consumer Protection Agency. I cannot predict the outcome of this situation, but I refuse to let it rest until some reasonable resolution is attained. Something must be done to inhibit this firm from its reprehensible business practises!
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