I know my way around the Internet
pretty well. I can say that so far I have not had any problems other
than the normal viruses and worms that manage to find their way into
the old Microsoft based PC's I used to use, But the other day I was
almost taken in. I thought I'd write about this one, because it is so
well done, and if you fall for it, you can lose a lot of money.
I was on the Internet the other day and
found an add for a Language Learning system called the Pimsleura
method. Now I have travelled to many countries and I've always
managed to get along with my English and a few words in the local
language (Hello, thank you, etc.), but I have always felt I really
should put more effort into speaking the local languages when I visit
a country. The problem is that I am really no good with languages. I
only passed Jr. High French once and that was because the teacher
kept me in every day for weeks drilling me. This system seemed
perfect, advertising a natural way to learn. There was a video where
a pleasant girl explained the system, and she had me convinced it
would help me learn Portuguese prior to our trip to Portugal this
year. Best of all, it was a deal; only $9.99. Even if it didn't work,
I was only out ten bucks. I was almost ready to click the button to
pay my money.
I finally thought, wait a minute, lets
actually see how well this works. The internet has lots of reviews
and testimonials of anything. I went to Google and typed “Reviews
of Pimsleura Language Program.” Now be careful here, because like
most of these Internet scams, they have themselves created numerous
so called “Review” sites that extol the virtues of their product,
so look at lots of the sites and find “real” reviews.
WOW, I never did learn if the system
works. What I did learn is how one individual could make millions
using the Internet to bilk people out of hundreds of dollars.
This Internet scam works by depending
on people saying, like I did, “I'm only out 10 bucks if it doesn't
work.” If you read the fine print, and even then it isn't clear,
you will find that although it sounds like the $9.99 price is all you
need to pay, in reality you are signing up for an ongoing $64.00 a
month subscription that goes on forever. There are lots of statements
about “Money Back Guarantee.” and “No Obligations.” but from
the reviews and horror stories in the reviews of this company, they
do not work.
Basically what happens is that once you
sign up and pay your $9.99 with a credit card, they start charging
you $64.00 a month, and it is almost impossible to get them to stop.
Even if you send the product back (You pay return and shipping
fees)they deny receiving it and continue charging your credit card.
There were stories of people finally having to cancel their credit
cards because they couldn't even tell the card companies to stop
charges. All the testimonials emphasized that they found it almost
impossible to get the charges to stop.
Another example of if it sounds too
good to be true, read a real review.
