You would never guess from their attractive catalogs that this company is unethical. I have, however, just found on my credit card bill, a charge for "Appleseeds Reward" in the amount of $14.95. The Reference Number is 6972, which -- according to my credit card company -- indicates some kind of "subscription."
I have ordered from this company twice (and returned both items because they were oversized), but I certainly never "subscribed" to any service of theirs.
I tried to telephone Appleseeds, but there is no one there on the weekend, and today is Saturday.
I then tried to place this charge in "Dispute" with my credit card company, so that I could go ahead and pay the balance of my credit card bill. But it turns out that these phony "subscription" charges cannot be placed in Dispute. And guess what -- this is legal (so I was told by my credit card company) under the recently passed Federal Credit and Billing Act.
On Monday I am going to contact Appleseeds through my credit card company dispute department and try to get A to cancel the charge. I am also going to file charges for fraud against Appleseeds with my State (VT) Attorney General's Office.
Appleseeds issued my a credit card that I never applied for. I've tried the customer service number on the credit card and waited forever 3 times.! I want to cancel the card and there seems no way to get through. I have not activated the card. Do I have an option of just cutting it up and throwing away? Or do I need it as evidence if anyone uses it to charge items to this account they created in my name?
I've found the same charge on my credit card bill and went to the website for Appleseed's to find out how to discontinue the subscription (I don't remember even subscribing). Nothing. I've sent communication via their online site to request Appleseed's to discontinue the "subscription." It will be interesting to see how they respond and will make all the difference as to if I continue to shop online with Appleseed's.
I would be interested in finding out how your complaint was resolved.
My 92 year old mother placed an order 4 years ago. As she is now incapacitated, I was reviewing her accounts and came across this charge for 14.95. For 4 years they have been billing her and she did not know it - that is over $700! Called customer service and they agreed to credit ONE MONTH. I told them i was calling the attorney general, which I will, and they said I would have to talk to a supervisor, but they were all busy. Waiting for call back now, but what a SCAM! I hope nobody buys anything from these CROOKS!
They have 22 million names of elders in a database. They bill elders $14.95 per month without authorization. They claim this is a "rewards program". The "rewards program" website is a list of dead links.
After calling their corporate offices to get their physical address for the attorney general complaint, they sent a full refund. That said, the AG said they could do nothing about it and that under the new "consumer protection" banking rules that went into effect a couple of years ago the credit card company can bill even on closed account numbers if it is a recurring charge. What lobbyists got that done we will never know but what a scam