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THE PEOPLE’S CHAMP — Andrew Cuomo goes after GameStop, Barnes and Noble and 20 other online merchants for “tricking customers”
NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo never sleeps.
GameStop has been deemed a possible culprit, by Cuomo, for slamming unknowing on-line customers with extraordinary fees and account charges. The Attorney General’s office has issued a subpoena to GameStop, (not to mention 21 other online merchants) for their relationship with “membership discount clubs”. Included in the list, but not limited to, are Webloyalty, Affinion/Trilegiant, and Vertrue.
Allegedly, the merchants have been “tricking customers into accepting offers from third party vendors, which then siphon money from consumers’ accounts.”
Some other noteworthy names invloved are Barnes and Nobles, Expedia, Pizza Hut, Staples.com, Travelocity, and Classmates.com. Cuomo has openly stated his belief that a majority of the plus-$1 billion these “clubs” rake in, comes fraudulently.
University of Minnesota Law Professor, Prentiss Cox on MSNBC:
Retailers that sell their customers’ account information so that the customer can be charged for a membership club by stealth should know that they are participating in a marketplace scam. Data from public enforcement actions over the last ten years and from the recent U.S. Senate Commerce Committee investigation suggest that the number of consumers who know they are club members and know they are paying for this purported privilege range between about 0 percent and 5 percent.
Every retailer and bank should be held responsible for selling their customers’ account information to other companies, especially when the deceptive results of this arrangement are so obvious.
VP of GameStop, Chris Olivera confirmed the subpoena and intends to cooperate with the Attorney General’s office.
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It’s a shame people are dumb enough to sign up for these membership clubs. I’ve seen these things and have always recognized that if you put in your email address you are signing up for a membership with a re-occuring charge.