Google Scam. How To Get Your Money Back!

 Thanks to a number of deceptive advertising schemes, online credit card fraud is on the rise. Get rich quick schemes have always been a mainstay of online marketing and with the current economic climate, the number of people responding is on the rise.

Two campaigns that seem to appear everywhere are the Google Link plan and the Government Grant scheme. The Google campaign promises to show how you can make $5000 a month simply posting links to the site. The Grant program promises to show how you can get money from the government and never pay it back. Both want to give you the information for free and ask only for a $1.98 shipping and handling fee.

What most people do not see, is in the terms and conditions you have opted in to a number of monthly subscriptions that, depending on the number of advertisers in the scheme, can total close to $100 per month. These memberships are automatically applied to the credit card that you used to pay the shipping and handling fees of the original requested information.

In addition to enrolling you into these worthless monthly programs, they sell your email, phone number and mailing address to direct marketers. Shortly after you make the payment for the shipping and handling charges, you will be flooded with spam emails, junk snail mail and your phone will start ringing off the hook from telemarketers who want to tell you how to make money at home.

The first time a buyer is even aware that they are being charged for monthly subscriptions is when they see the charge on their credit card statement. Typically, one or two of them will have an 800 number that you can call. The others will only have a company name and you will have to track them down by searching Google

Here is a big time saving tip. If you can find one phone number on your credit card bill, you have just found the number for all these sites. There is a customer service center in Las Vegas that handles all the calls for these Google and government grant sites.

Make sure that when you call to cancel that you start with the site that the 800 number was associated with. The agent at the other end will tell you that you chose to be in those subscriptions and then will try to resell you. When that doesnt work they will say that they will take you out of the program and no further charges will be made. Dont settle for that. Insist on a refund for the charges already made on your card.

Once you have that concession on the original site, tell them you want the same thing done on each of the other sites. If there is a site that they no longer work with, then go to your credit card company and explain that it was an unauthorized charge and there is no way for you to contact them. The card company obviously has a means of contacting the vendor and will freeze the transaction until the vendor can provide proof of a valid transaction.

The old adage of If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably isnt applies here. What is so sad is that these predatory advertisers know that these difficult times are going to drive more traffic to their absolutely worthless sites and they dont have any qualms about taking the consumers money.

Never make a purchase from someone you do not know without reading the terms and conditions. Use PayPal if it is offered as a payment option. PayPal processes the transaction without revealing your credit card imformation to the vendor. If PayPal is not an option look for the VeriSign badge to insure that the site is using a secure server. Always carefully review your credit card statements and take action on any unexplained charges.

Want to learn more? Visit our Internet Scams page to see videos on both the Google and Grant schemes.