- Vertrue
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Vertrue Incorporated, headquartered in Norwalk, CT, is a consumer services marketing company.[1] The company again received an "F" from the Better Business Bureau for making unauthorized charges to its customers' credit cards.[2][3] In 2010, Vertrue and two of its subsidiaries were found guilty of defrauding nearly 500,000 of their customers in Iowa.[4]
Contents
Organization
In the annual report, submitted to the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, in November 2006 the President and Chief Executive Officer of Vertrue is listed as Gary Johnson.
Vertrue have a European division called Adaptive Affinity, based in Edgware UK, and led by Andrew Millet.[5] They have a number of brands in Europe including VP Rewards, Premier Club and highstreetmax.com. All of the brands specialise in positive option selling, where customers of other companies, for example Amazon.co.uk or Lastminute.com find that by not un-clicking a box during a transaction they will be signed up and billed for the memberships which is stated in the terms and conditions.[6][7][8] The branch agreed to change its sign-up methods in June 2009.[9] Adaptive Affinity Ltd began a process of attempting to force the removal of negative comments from their customers, by posting legal letters to a number of websites in September 2010. [10] [11]
Lawsuits
Vertrue faced a class action lawsuit at the Middle District Court of Tennessee in which Margaret Wike claimed that Vertrue violated federal law by enrolling her in a discount club and charging a monthly fee to her debit card.
The district court granted summary judgment for Vertrue, concluding that EFTA’s one-year limitations period barred Wike’s claim. Wike sought leave to add RICO claims to her complaint, alleging that Vertrue had ensnared Wike and “hundreds of thousands” of other consumers in a deceptive marketing scheme. The district court denied Wike’s request, concluding that the proposed amendment would be futile because Wike could not show she was injured “by reason of” Vertrue’s alleged racketeering activity, 18 U.S.C. § 1964.[12] Wike appealed both rulings and prevailed on the summary judgment ruling but the appeals court decided not to rule on the failure to provide leave to amend complaint to include racketeering charges.[13]On behalf of Iowa, state attorney general Tom Miller sued the company in May 2006, saying it was signing up customers in a way that violated Iowa's Buying Club Memberships Law.[14]
Vertrue has sued the Wikimedia Foundation in 2008 in Connecticut over the contents of the article on the company in Wikipedia.[15]
References
- ^ Oldenburg, Don (2006-05-06). "Same Old Scam, Every Month: Credit Card Charges for Purchases You Don't Remember". Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/06/AR2006050600160_pf.html.
- ^ "Company Reliability Report: Ventrue, Inc.". Better Business Bureau. 2009-09-19. http://www.bbb.org/nebraska/business-reviews/advertising-direct-mail/vertrue-in-omaha-ne-107000028.
- ^ Pilon, Mary (2009-08-14). "FreeScore.com: More Credit Score Confusion". Wall Street Journal (blog). http://blogs.wsj.com/wallet/2009/08/14/freescorecom-more-credit-score-confusion/.
- ^ Connecticut Company Liable For 20 Years Of Consumer Fraud In Iowa, Hartford Courant, March 25, 2010
- ^ http://www.oft.gov.uk/news/press/2009/75-09
- ^ Penman, Andrew (2008-07-10). "Mysterious credit card charges from HighStreetMax...". Daily Mirror. http://blogs.mirror.co.uk/investigations/2008/07/mysterious-credit-card-charges.html.
- ^ "You and Yours: Cash back or cash out?". BBC Radio 4. 2008-01-30. http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/youandyours/items/03/2008_05_wed.shtml.
- ^ Levene, Tony (2008-11-15). "Capital letters: There's no such thing as a free business card". The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2008/nov/15/capital-letters-consumer.
- ^ "Online discount scheme agrees to change sign up process". Office of Fair Trading (press release). 2009-06-24. http://www.oft.gov.uk/news/press/2009/75-09.
- ^ "Online shopping firm HighStreetMax tries to gag complaints". Daily Mirror Newspaper. 2010-09-16. http://blogs.mirror.co.uk/investigations/2010/09/online-shopping-firm-highstree.html.
- ^ "Adaptive Affinity requests deletion of over 190 consumer comments". ConsumerDeals UK. 2010-09-10. http://www.consumerdeals.co.uk/news/2010/09/adaptive-affinity-requests-deletion-of-over-190-consumer-comments.html.
- ^ "Margaret Wike v. Vertrue, Inc., Adaptive Marketing, LLC and Influent, Inc. (CN:08-5905)". MoreLaw.com. 2009-06-02. http://www.morelaw.com/verdicts/case.asp?d=40318&n=08-5905&s=TN. Retrieved 2009-11-30.
- ^ "Margaret Wike v. Vertrue, Inc., Adaptive Marketing, LLC, and Influent, Inc., 566 F.3d 590 (2009)". US 6th Circuit Court of Appeals. 2009-06-02. http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/09a0194p-06.pdf. Retrieved 2010-02-15.
- ^ Huffman, Mark (2006-05-31). "Iowa Sues Vertrue For Consumer Fraud: MWI, Essentials, Secret Escapes Use "Free Trial Offers" To Lure Consumers". ConsumerAffairs.com. http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2006/05/ia_vertrue.html/.
- ^ "Ventrue v. Wikimedia Foundation". State of Connecticut. http://civilinquiry.jud.ct.gov/CaseDetail/PublicCaseDetail.aspx?DocketNo=FSTCV084014816S. Retrieved 2009-11-24.
External links
Categories:- Companies based in Fairfield County, Connecticut
- Credit
- United States company stubs
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
