Company calls employees nominally to complete surveys, collects dates of birth, and uses these as evidence that newsletters were ordered. Directors of my company who did not even speak with the company received newsletters addressed to them. "Continuation notices" and collections notices followed. This goes back at least to December when I started with my present company, and in January I was tasked with stopping the mailings.
Attempts to contact the company are very difficult. Customer service is automated and never connects to a live operator. The automated option to cancel subscriptions did not work, as mailings and notices continued to arrive through the spring. Contact as made with the company in writing, equally to no avail. The company contacted our marketing director by telephone and threatened to send us to a collections agency, which is when I became personally angry.
In June I found an employee, Mr. Lobaugh, by dialing extensions randomly. He seemed to take an interest in helping resolve the situation and on June 9 told me he had located our address and would suppress all mailings, under any account number, addressed to our non-profit business. He warned me that it would take a couple of weeks for the suppression to take full effect, and we did receive one mailing within that time frame, which I reported to Mr. Lobaugh.
On July 3, another continuation notice was received, and this time Mr. Lobaugh did not answer the phone or return phone calls. Again dialling extensions, I found another employee who claimed that the company had not sent us any mail since September. I laughed out loud and told her I had the materials right in front of me.
On July 7, I resumed dialing extensions, most of which did not pick up, and reached what sounded like the production line (I could hear printing presses in the background), who put me into somebody's voice mail and then would not pick up the phone when I called them back. I persisted dialing extensions until someone connected me to a Mr. Gordon, a supervisor, who indignantly defended his company against my complaints, denied that this is a scam, and maintained that there must be a "technology problem" that is preventing these mailings from being suppressed.
At his request, I faxed him a copy of the most recent mailing, as he claimed to have no record of them sending us mail. If we assume the best, that this is not a scam operation as some reports here suggest, then the company appears to be unable to control its mailings. The principle that needs to be vindicated here is the same whether this is an honest business or not: if you send me unwanted mail and I ask you to stop, you should comply to the best of your ability.
We have complained to the Pennsylvania Attorney General's office in writing and on line. We will continue to do so as mailings persist - because I have a feeling they will persist.
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