Check your credit card for the following scam...

If you have done business or purchased items online in the past year check your credit/account statements for "TLG*GREATFN#########" for the monthly recurring amount of $9.99. I made a purchase earlier this year from buy.com and didn't notice for 4 months the seemingly innocent charge of $9.99 being applied each month. Apparently; when you make a purchase you are automatically given a "free month's membership" that, if you don't cancel, will start charging for that membership after the first month.

I succesfully disputed only two of the charges (my credit card company wouldn't go back to March of this year when the charges started). The company does not dispute the disputes--you'll always get your charges removed IF your credit card does the dispute for you.

When I called the TLG*GREATFN "800" number on my statement the CSR tried to justify what they do and admitted that they do business with buy.com as well as many other online commerce companies. It's a scam and if you Google this company you'll notice the large volume of people similarily scammed.

I've decided I will not be doing business with buy.com again because of this. Pass the word around and, if you don't already, study your statements closely. This charge was easy for me to miss because it was one of many charges and, because the amount was so low, it didn't garner my attention. The scammers count on this.


[edit on 26-9-2006 by Freedom_for_sum]

most credit card companies will remove internet charges that are under a certain amount, no questions asked. Amex is under $100 I think. I hade a three month run where I had between 3 and ten charges for 9.99 on my amex. the same two companies. I called amex and they didn't ask a single question. they simply deleted the charge. Internet fraud is so rampant they can't waste time looking into these things.

I agree Crakeur. What I find particularily troubling about this scam is that I was doing business with a legitimate company (buy.com) that knowingly does business with TLG*GREATFN. I believe the only way to respond is to avoid doing business with those companies that allow this practice to take place. My hope here is that everyone who reads this thread will relate their similar experience, if they have one, and pass the word around.

I've never used buy.com but you can be sure I won't now.