Leasecomm Settles Scam Charges, Cancels $24M In Customer Debt

from the another-scam-averted dept

The FTC has settled charges with a company called Leasecomm which tricked thousands of people to buy their scam get-rich-quick products. The scam is a little complex, which is why Leasecomm probably thought they could get away with it. The way it worked was Leasecomm convinced people to go out and "sell" their fraudulent products via misleading seminars, spam, websites, and other "get rich quick" methods. They had people sell these products via deceptive means, hiding what they were really getting, and keeping the fine print well out of view. When people realized they were getting scammed they naturally refused to pay. At that point, Leasecomm took them to court in their home state of Massachusetts (far away from where most of the customers were) and won judgments against those people (totaling $24 million). They then tried to collect on those judgments by taking the victim's wages or draining their bank account. Basically, they used deceptive means to sell fraudulent products, and then sued people who didn't pay. Of course, in this settlement, Leasecomm admits to no guilt (why is this always the case?). However, they've given up trying to collect the $24 million in debt. Going forward, any cases brought against the people they scam have to take place in the "customer's" home state. So, I'm sure plenty of people will still fall for this scam until someone has to come along and sue them again for deceptive sales practices. Of course, the people who fall for some of these scams need to accept some of the blame for agreeing to sign up for something based on greed - without understanding what it is they were really getting.