Here is a story I found about how the Federal Trade Commission has been penalizing the website advertised as "freecreditreport.com" for what is perceived as deceptive business practices. Before you can view your credit report on their website, you must first agree to subscribe to their monthly credit monitoring service which you must cancel before the trial period is up if you don't want to pay for it. Many people signed up without reading or understanding the terms and ended up paying for the monitoring service despite not actually wanting it.
Personally, I think it's sad that people lose money (and the commercials are unbearably annoying) but I find it hard to find fault with what the company does. Consumers went to a website and received a free credit report with a conditional purchase of a paid service.
Ads Stoke Battle Over 'Free' Credit Scores - NY Times.com
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I would say that I have to agree with you on this one, and admit, I too was fooled by this service. If there is one thing they shove down your throat with their advertising it's "free." Paying to get something for free? That doesn't make any sense, but then again so many people don't mind shelling out the $14.95/month. So is it really all that wrong?
ReplyDeletei have to say that this is a bit confusing, i think that they are giving the report free but you have to pay to sign of for a monthly fee. But i cna see how it can be made itno something very misleading, simply because people never seem to read the fine , but small print. Which always has the real truth behind the advertising.
ReplyDeleteI am definitely put at ease that the FTC has been penalizing freecreditreport.com. Firstly, I don't understand the draw of this method of obtaining your credit scores. The site lists on the tv ad that you must enroll in additional services in order to receive the actual free credit report, which isn't even free, that I would have thought would fall under false advertising. Now, most people I would assume are well aware that they are entitled to a FREE credit report from each agency on a yearly basis, so why waste money, most people do not have. Now that there are so many financial advisors in the media telling us the right and wrong ways to handle our money(such as Suze ORman, whom I think is great !) I would think people would be a bit wiser.
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