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Readers Direct tricked my 93 year old Grandmother who lives by herself and can't hear out of one ear and can barely hear with the other into subscribing to a 4 year subscription and then has added another subscription. They got her credit card number and keep charging her for things that she doesn't want. She doesn't understand when someone calls her what they are saying and when she gets a request for money in the mail she gets scared and fills it out right away because she doesn't understand what it is. My Grandmother told my Dad that she doesn't want the Readers Digest Books and Magazines. I called Readers Direct today and asked them to cancel the subscription and refund her credit card and the guy on the phone, Bob Williams, became belligerent and started arguing with me. He refused to do anything about the matter except to give me a Fax number for me to send in my power of attorney and then he would contact their "3rd Party Company" that does the verification and they would find the evidence of my Grandmother agreeing to their request for the subscription. This is such a scam! Bob Williams told me that she had 3 days to cancel the subscription and that it is past that period and the subscription is transferable but can not be canceled or refunded. This can't be legal. My Grandmother is 93 years old. She lives off of her social security. She doesn't understand. It is so sad that companies like this prey on the elderly and milk them for money that they don't want to spend and can't afford.
I had the same thing happen to me and again today Bob Williams refused to credit, and that it is a 4 year subscription. For a 92 & 86 year old couple. She can't even read the magazine, already gets the large print. They refuse to do anything. This is a scam.
I agree with the lst person who submitted this complaint.
This company is run by Mike Millar, Robert Koats aka Bob Williams, and Gavin Harris. It is located at 1625 Buffalo Ave. Suite 2D, Niagara Falls, NY 14303.
I had the same experience dealing with a call to my mother. She got charged $300 for two 4 year subscriptions to Readers Digest. You can get that type of subscription for $4 to $10 a year by checking online. I also talked to Bob Williams, and they don't give refunds, or cancel. It's their business policy. It's not real hard to see why that's the case. It appears that what they do is legal. They just happen to prey on older people, who are not mentally sharp. People like this should be put out of business.
My 90 year old mother was called by this company. She was called and signed up for a "senior discount" subscription for 3 years of Country Living Magazine for $75. The cost online is only $24! They also asked her for her social security number, which she did not give. They called two weeks later to offer her another scam. By then, she was on to them and refused. I will be calling the subscription services for this magazine to make sure that she is actually going to receive the magazine. Since she already paid her Visa bill, I'm not sure what we can do, but I will be reporting them and not paying any further bills from these guys. I'm not sure why this is legal!
i used to work for this company. i had to quit because of the horrible things the had us doing there. their real names are Mike Hegwood, Garvin Hegwood (brothers) and Robert Coates. Horrible people if you ask me. They had nothing to do with readers digest and would just assume the elderly person was getting that. everything that they had us say on the phone was a lie and they would only have us call people 80yrs and older. they are shut down as of right now. if anyone has any question please contact me here. i feel there could be a lot of law suits coming out of this and i have a lot of information on them.
My story is similar to those other reports. The victim in this case is my 96 year old mother. The subscriptions are meant to start at the end of her current subscriptions which I have recently renewed with the Reader's Digest and National Geographic, which means they will start when she is 98 years old! She was also charged the highest possible price, far more than I paid when dealing directly with the magazines. Attempts to contact the company also included faxing my power of attorney, and a series of unreturned calls to Reader's Direct. They are still in business as of November, 2012
i was just working 4 them and they are at 300 Delaware ave buffalo NY they are a scam they sold them what ever mag they could they sold a 99 year old guy 4 years of People mag and they don't even sell that mag
GARVIN HODGES AND MIKE HODGES RUNS THIS COMPANY ALSO KNOWN AS GARVIN HARRIS AND MIKE MILLER... PLEASE CHARGE BACK ANY PURCHASES MADE... THIS COMPANY IS A BIG SCAM AND THEY ARE NO GIVING REFUNDS BUT YOU CAN CHARGE IT BACK THROUGH YOUR BANK OR CREDITCARD COMPANY... BUYS LEADS AND SIGNS PEOPLE UP FOR 4 YEARS WHO HAS DEMENTIA ANS ALZTYMERS... COMPANY STARTED FROM A PAY PHONE IN AN APT BUILDING IN NIAGARA FALS NY... LAST KNOIW ADDRESS FOR GARVIN WAS ASHLAND AVE NIAARA FALLS NY... MIKE MILLER WAS ONTARIO AVE IN NIAGARA FALLS WILL FOLLOW UP WITH CELL P[HONE INFO...
I worked for this company for 2 years and I don't think it's the company that takes advantage of elderly but the greedy sales reps on the phones working for commission. As a rep I refused to sell a subscription to anyone who didn't understand and completely agree to said subscription but other reps could care less. Unfortunately there is no way for the company to completely avoid this although we are well trained to recognize when a customer can't completely understand and urged NOT to sell these people but often times seniors with mild memory issues cannot easily be recognized and we had no way to know the age of customers other than the way they sounded which can also be deceiving. It sounds like there are a bunch of disgruntled employees that are posting negative info on readers direct when in fact it was probably them taking advantage of people not the owners. Furthermore, customers that DO have issues should call readers direct at [protected] for help, trust me, they are not that bad :)
i am 99 percent sure that this company is a scam. i have been told by numerous former employees that if they quit or were fired that they were unable to get their paycheck, they would not give them their checks and when they finally did it was after a month had passed. does anyone have anymore information about this or the company itself.
There is another Readers Direct in Largo FL that does the same thing. Jennifer only hires convicted criminals who are in a work release program. She rarely comes to work and when she does she only stays for a couple of hours a day. Her customer service manager is a convicted felon for embezzling money from the last company she worked for and all of her phone reps are convicted felons as well. She just fired my daughter and her friend because she went in and said the ora around here is terrible. When we call the customers they said you just called me and I don't want anything to do with your company. This lady and her mother need to be stopped.
One owner is now in Grand Island, NY (Garvin Hegwood). Another in St. Petersburg, FL (Mike Hegwood). And don't know where Robert Coats is right now. They are all from Niagara Falls and are on Facebook flashing and bragging about how much they make from it all.
I am not sure why this is happening.
I get daily calls from this comapny and they claim that I have some payments due to them.
I had never subscribed this company and I dont know what's going on!
They are really harassing me.
This company is preying on the elderly. They got my 90 year old I there to pay $350.00 for 4 yr subscription to magazines when she was already paid up more than 3 yrs in advance. The customer service reps yelled at me, lied, and told me it was my fault for letting her know where her credit card was. My brother asked them nicely go stop calling her and the same guy called back the same day three times. They threatened. Me with harassment when I questioned their lies. Phillip Kennedy should lose his job! but it seems to be a scamming organization. You google them and the first ting to come is the BBB?