I went to freecreditreport.com to get a "free copy of my credit report. During registration, I was asked for my credit card number. It was my understanding that the credit reporting agency would not charge my card, they only needed the information to research my credit history. At the end of the registration process, I was informed that I would receive my report in the mail at my current address.
I never received anything in the mail. I even checked at my previous addresses. I never received any email from them either. Nothing.
Then, around a month later, a charge appears on my checking account for $12.95. I researched the charge and discovered that not only was I charged for a product that I thought was free from freecreditreport.com, but that I was also going to continue to be charged $12.95 every 30 days because I had enrolled in Triple Advantage. Apparently, it was in the fine print and I did not read the fine print.
I had not used any products nor services of this company. I never even received the promised free credit report. I never received any emails: nothing notifying me that I had in enrolled in anything; nothing with an ID, password, or log-in information; no receipt of payment; nothing.
Normally, when I visit a website and type in my personal info, I receive some sort of email correspondence (to at least say thank you for visiting, if not more). If I was going to be charged for a product/service, I should have been sent a receipt. I should have received an email notifying me that I was enrolled in a membership.
This, of course, was just the start of the headache. I went back to the website to log-in to try to cancel my account.in order to log-in, I must use my user ID, password, and a secret code number. I was able to type in my email address to have my user ID and password emailed to me; but there is no method for retrieving the secret code number. The site states that secret code numbers are sent to customers at their mailing address. I never received any code number, and there is no way to log-in without it.
So my next step was to visit the help page of freecreditreport.com. On the website, it says that if you would like to cancel your membership please call 1-877-481-6826. When I called 1-877-481-6826, I received a recording stating that this number was no longer in service and to please hang up and dial a number that begins with 1-876. When I dialed the 1-876 number, it says thank you for calling the Caribbean you will have been billed for this call. So I hung up immediately.
Then I called my bank, who informed that the only way to prevent further charges on my is to completely close my checking account and open a new account. This, as you can imagine, is an enormous hassle.
This is a huge scam. It is a waist of time, and it should be illegal.
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