Could they have made the fine print a lighter shade of gray?
What is a Google Biz Kit and can you make a Google Fortune with it? Is the New York Gazette News a reputable source? Check out our articles on the Easy Google Profit scam as well as Google Adworks for other examples of similar fake blogs and news sites trying to convince you to cough up your credit card number for what you think are small shipping and handling charges. Is it for real?
First off, there is no such newspaper as the New York Gazette News. Well, at least not anymore. There was a paper called the New York Gazette back in 1725, being basically the first newspaper printed in the state. It’s been reported as “a small two-page paper, poorly printed” containing six month old news and a few ads. The irony of using the name of such a paper is certainly not lost. It went out of print around 1744 and has not been hear from since. Until today that is! Check out the line in small light gray print right under the giant red logo that reads “This site is not affiliated with any newspaper publication.” and you have all the information you need really.
The New York Gazette News is back at it again suddenly, over 275 years later? This one I’ve been seeing over and over again in the ad block over at Fox News. Note, I do not actually read the “news” over at Fox News since it’s not actually news any more than the Huffington Post could be considered news. Note to Fox News, saying you are “Fair and Balanced” in your title does not actually make it so.
But I digress. The site in question being advertised is called The New York Gazette News and is pushing another work at home offer called Google Fortune. Oh, and don’t forget that you also have to buy something called a Google Biz Kit. Your financial success hinges on you purchasing both of these fine things or did you not know that?
Our good friend Mary Steadman is back at it here again, this time with the exact same picture of her and a three year oldish little girl, which someone must have determined to be the perfect picture for these sort of Google Biz Kit sites, as she appears on the vast majority of them. Woe to the real poor Mrs Mary Steadman who probably gets a constant barrage of hate mail from people who were caught up in what I call in my opinion, scams.
Seriously, we're 100% Trusted! Take our word for it!
So you click through and are brought to a site that says you can check availability of a LIMITED TIME OFFER by entering your name, address, phone number and email. Enter it and you are brought to a page where there are lots of banners and buttons with crap like “100% Trusted!” and “Secured!” to make you feel better. Take note that anyone can put up a pretty button filled with buzzwords like these. Like this one!
Ok, I have this site loaded on my side screen right now, which clocks in at 1680×1050 and it looks totally like I’m going to pay $1.97 for this something called a Google Fortune. No where so far have I seen anything specific about what I’m getting. In fact it even says “Total: $1.97″
Of course, if you scroll down to the very very bottom of the page, in the fine print you see this:
Terms & Disclosures
How it Works! By clicking “Rush My Order” I am agreeing to receive GoogleFortune for a 7-day bonus period for $1.97 billed to my credit Card(please allow 5 days for the shipping process and 2 days to try the product). If you enjoy GoogleFortune, simply do nothing. On the 7th day my credit card will automatically be charged $69.97 and every month, thereafter, unless I cancel by calling 1-877-361-8622 M – F, 8am-7pm PST. No Hassle, Cancel Anytime!Product is fully refundable within 30 days of purchase. Customer’s cancelling within their billing period will be fully refunded upon request. I also agree to the 14 day and 21 day bonus trials to Grant Members Site™ (1-877-495-1145) and Network Agenda™ (1-800-418-9320) for $19.95 a month and $9.95 a month thereafter, the trial will begin the day I accept these terms, should I choose not to cancel. For refunds please contact customer support at 1-877-361-8622 M – F, 8am-7pm PST, GoogleFortune only. Please note the following terms and conditions you accept when ordering from us: i. Prices are subject to change without notice. We reserve the right to correct typographical and printing errors. We have done our best to ensure that all information is accurate and up-to-date. Errors and omissions occasionally occur and are subject to correction. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. We will notify you via e-mail of your refund once we have received and processed. You can expect a full refund in the same form of payment you used to make your purchase within 7 to 14 business days from calling to request the refund, depending on your financial institution. Copyright 2009 Search 4 Profit, LLC.!™ – All Rights Reserved.You must be 18 years old or older to order.
Google does not sponsor, endorse, and is no way affiliated with Search 4 Profit, LLC.™ or this promotion.
Wait a sec, so you are saying you’ll refund my $69.97 if I call within the billing period? Does that include the period you already charged me for when I had no idea you were going to start whacking my credit card? And what about those other 2 charges, one for $19.95 and one for $9.95? They are not refundable are they? And I have to hunt down those numbers on my own to cancel? Wow. Just Wow.
I Didn’t Know I was Going To Be Charged Monthly By The Google Fortune People? What Do I Do?!?
- Don’t feel bad! Seems like hundreds if not thousands of people have been taken in by these sort of “negative option” offers that trick you by not clearly disclosing you are signing up for monthly charges. You were tricked, it happens to the best of us.
- In our opinion you should call/write your credit card company, report your card stolen, and dispute the charges. Basically you’ve just been internet mugged and getting these types of sites to stop charging your card is reported to be very difficult. Reporting the card stolen gets you a new card number immediately and disables the old one so they can’t charge you again.
- Monitor your credit accounts with a free month of Experian ID Protection monitoring. You just gave some characters your name, address, phone number, credit card and secret 3 digit card number. You think they’ll stop trying to take money from you just because you canceled your card number? Experian is a respected company, one of the Big Three credit reporting agencies. The ID Protection is free for 30 days and comes with a free credit report and free monitoring and a free fraud support hotline. Then it’s only $9.95 a month if you don’t cancel before the 30 days are up. I’d strongly suggest signing up for the free month, call the hotline and ask for help, then check your credit report to make sure no one has tried to change your address or open a new card using your cards details.
Luckily I Didn’t Get Taken By These Guys, But What Can I Do To Help?
- Click Here to Share this on Facebook! Hit “Post to Profile” to warn your friends.
- Use the “Share This” links below to Digg or Twitter or Stumble or Reddit or Email or whatever service you use to share this so that other people might see it before they get scammed too!
- Email this link to your friends.
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
After reading an article about this so called great opportunity and the success a Tucson lady had with it, I hate to admit I ALMOST fell for it. I did spend the $1.97 — it was a worthwhile expense to learn that “if it seems too good to be true, well it is!!!” When it came to the fine print you get caught in a scam :
“Monthly Service fees will commence 7 days from the date of this purchase, and will be billed monthly thereafter. After the 7 day trial you will be billed $79.90 monthly for the continued service of the website. No refunds will be given for failure to use the requested and provided services. We reserve the right to transfer your billing to a third party Merchant of Record. This authority will remain in effect until revoked by me. You may cancel at anytime by writing to 230 West 400 South, Suite 173 Salt Lake City, UT 84101 or call 877-484-8016 or International customers please call 00-1-646-205-0216.”
To say the least I imnediately called and cancelled, spoke to a real person, got a cancellation # and everything
I just want a job, after being laid off of work since April it is getting harder and harder to keep my spirits up and be able to pay my bills
Hi Joy, so sorry to hear that! Did you access the 7 day trial at all and what did you find?
I hate to say it, but other people have reported that even though they call and get a cancellation number, they have still been charged at least once. I would strongly suggest you report your card lost and get a new card number as soon as you can to help prevent this.
Thanks for the info. I almost got suckered into the scam but I had a feeling something was wrong when I tried to leave a comment and it never got posted, which led me to do more investigation about this Work From Home scheme. After googling it, I found out that it was nothing more than a scam.
Just to answer — no I did not access the 7 day trial — it just wasn’t worth it, I decided I will make money the normal way I will earn it!
But there is another scam out there dealing with Purely White (teeth whitener) and Cleanwhites. They claim use a promo code to get low shipping costs and the product free but then 10 days later you are charged the ful price which is $80++ There again, NOTHING is free
Just to let you know, keep your eyes open and read and do your internet research as it all pays off
I just fell for this and bought the 2 kits but it just seemed fishy after I signed (a couple hours ago) so I called to cancel both. Got cancel #’s but I canceled my credit card anyway. I couldn’t even find a google # to contact anyone but got the phone # from my bank that was charged. It’s different from the ones above if anyone else has a hard time gettting a phone #. 866-481-8192. Supposedly everything was canceled. Very frustrating!! At least it was just the trial deal and not the whole monthly payments.
I got caught into it. Thought Google, gotta be okay right, WRONG. Pay $1 and get info. Didn’t read the fine print and lost the further website. 4 days later here is this $129 pending in my checking acount. I called the number listed on the account. Sorry she says, you had a 3 day limit to cancel. Went to the bank and changed my debt account and now have to fight to get it back. When will I learn!!!! Now it’s down to a dollar and the charge is over $129. Why isn’t Google going after them for using their name. They gotta be racking it in from suckers like me.
I TOO “ALMOST” GOT TAKEN BY THIS GOOGLE WORK FROM HOME FOR $1.97. I CAUGHT IT A COUPLE HRS. AFTER I SIGNED UP. I BEGAN E-MAILING & THE FOLLOWING DAY WITH THE PHONE CALLS. THERE ARE TOO MANY PH#’S TO TRY TO CANCEL THIS THING. THE NEXT THING I KNOW THERE WAS OVER $100.00 ON MY C.C. THAT I DID NOT APPROVE. I STOPPED IT COLD. HAD TO GET A NEW C.C. ISSUED TO ME & NOW MY C.C. COMPANY IS GOING AFTER THEM. I SAVED EVERY PIECE OF INFORMATION & E-MAILS. I RECOMMEND EVERYONE SAVE ALL OF IT, BECAUSE IF YOU GET TAKEN, YOU’LL HAVE YOUR CANCELATION E-MAILS LIKE I DID, TO BACK YOURSELF UP WITH. THIS AD IS STILL OUT THERE, & I DON’T KNOW HOW GOOGLE IS STILL REELING IN THE PEOPLE. SHAME ON THEM. I’VE READ EXCUSES FROM GOOGLE, BUT THAT’S B.S. I HOPE NO ONE ELSE GETS TAKEN LIKE I ALMOST DID.
I applied for a “Personal Assistant” job, and got a link to the New York Gazette News article about Mary Steadman and Google fortune…alarms went off in my head for several reasons…first of all, why would any company pay someone 5Gs a month to post links on a website? Anybody can do that.
So I then looked at that NY Post Gazette or whatever it is, and it was obviously not from a real newspaper page-there’s no date and title headers and footers, no other articles listed, etc. So I Googled “New York Post Gazette” and found this website. Look, people, this is obviously a scam! It’s never gonna be this easy to make good money.
My question is, why doesn’t Google do something about this? Their name is being used to scam people!
Says the dude who is pushing an ID protection service.
LOL
Unfortunately, I fail to see what’s funny about having money stolen from your bank account, your credit card and identity information sold on the black market, your credit ruined for years to come, and hundreds of hours of your life wasted trying to correct it all. All because someone down on their luck was tricked into giving up their credit info.
I assume “Matt” must be one of those shady people who arrived here searching for how they could get in on this scam.
Check out Google Kit Scams Are Breaking The Law, Don’t Call The Victims Names for our response to this type of troll.