Author: Ben Popken

The lawsuit stemming from our post from last year, “10 Confessions Of A Cash4Gold Employee,” is all over. At the beginning of February, Cash4Gold stopped suing the two ex-employees Michele Liberis and Vielka Nephew. And just this Sunday, the Florida Attorney General announced they’ve opened a civil investigation into Cash4Gold. It seems you can still speak truth to power after all.

Without any settlement, Consumerist was dropped from the lawsuit back in September, though the legal action did not deter us from continuing to report the story. ComplaintsBoard reached an out-of-court settlement and was dropped from the case. Where Michele Liberis’s original post was on their site it now says, “Due to several reasons the information has been removed.”

Vielka Nephew said she was glad that the tribulations were over. “But unfortunately the stigma attached to the ordeal is another story. If you Google Michele or myself, we are forever associated with Cash4Gold,” she said, “as the ex-employees who were sued by their ex-employers for breach of contract.”

“There is a pattern of complaints from consumers who allege that they are not paid nearly enough for the gold they send to Cash 4 Gold, some checks are as small as .07 cents,” said the Florida Attorney General in filing the case. Their announcement continued, “Consumers also state that they have contacted the company within the 10/12 day period and were not satisfied with their checks and wanted their gold returned, only to be told it was already melted. Others allege that when they send the check back to the company for the return of their gold, the gold never arrives back. Numerous complaints allege that the company says they never received the gold or that the envelope was empty when it arrived.”

Last month, NY Rep. Weiner called for an FTC investigation into Cash4Gold.

Cash4Gold did not return Consumerist’s repeated requests for comment. However, they did tell the South Florida Sun Sentinel, “We are and will continue to be a leader on the partnership between law enforcement and the mail-in gold buying industry we pioneered.”

PREVIOUSLY:
Ben Popken On Today Show: Beware Mail-In Gold Services
Congressman Demands FTC Probe Of Cash4Gold
Cash4Gold Hit With Racketeering And Fraud Class Action Lawsuit
Cash4Gold Drops Consumerist From Lawsuit
Cash4Gold Threatened Jail If Negative Comments Weren’t Removed
Cash4Gold Defendant Liberis Files To Vacate DefaultCash4Gold Activates Magical Press Release Machine
Internet Alerted To Our Cash4Gold Investigation

DOCUMENTS AND LINKS
Agreed Order of Voluntary Dismissal (PDF)
Agreed Order Dropping Def V. Nephew as Party (PDF)
Defendant Vielka A. Nephew’s Motion To Dissolve Temporary Injunction (PDF)
Complaint against Liberis, Consumerist, ComplaintsBoard (PDF)
Complaint against Nephew, Consumerist, ComplaintsBoard (PDF)
ComplaintsBoard post
Cockeyed post 1
Cockeyed post 2
Cash4Gold’s old TV ad
Cash4Gold Super Bowl Ad
10 Confessions of a Cash4Gold Employee [Consumerist]
Beneath Cash4Gold.com’s shiny veneer, a dull reality [LAT]
Beware Cash4Gold and other gold-buying ripoffs [Yahoo! Tech]
Good Morning America [GMA]
Cash4Gold’s Public Relations Companies Attorney Accuses Me of Defamation [FMD Consumer Blog]
Nightline interviews Jeff Arononson
Cash4Gold customer video about low checks
Cash4Gold’s blog response to ComplaintsBoard post
Cash4Gold’s Fire Bureau citations (PDF)
Police report on Cash4Gold’s 10/03/08 shutdown by city inspectors
Cash4Gold BBB Report
Original lawsuit against Liberis (PDF)
Order against Liberis (PDF)
Liberis’ responses to Cash4Gold’s questions (PDF)
Temporary injunction against Liberis (PDF)
Defendant Michele Liberis’ Motion to Vacate and Set Aside Default (PDF)

Looks like Goldman turned the Parthenon into a gunpowder magazine for a second time; Greece’s recently revealed debt crisis is rattling the world economy and familiar culprits are at play: Wall Street banks, off-the books loans, derivatives, and other occult financial instruments. I guess we blame the consumer on this one too?

For instance, in a deal brokered by Goldman Sachs, Greece used swaps to trade away the rights to airport fees and lottery proceeds for money. Since they weren’t recorded as loans, the true size of Greece’s liabilities and deficit was hidden from bond buyers and regulators. Now the truth is out and the market has turned on its former darling.

Hmm… sounds similar to the American sub-prime meltdown, for which the “greedy American consumer” was first eviscerated. Let’s instead hold up the banks to their supposed fiduciary responsibility. There’s a reason why cops prefer to bust dealers instead of users.

Wall St. Helped to Mask Debt Fueling Europe’s Crisis [NYT]

Rob emailed Steve Jobs to tell him that until Apple fixed reader Joel’s account that had been billed $50,000 for iTunes purchases, he wouldn’t buy another Apple product. Replying via iPad, Steve Jobs told him, “I wouldn’t believe everything you read from places like this.” Ohhhh snap! But it wouldn’t be Jobs who had the last laugh…

“From: Rob M
Date: Tue, Feb 9, 2010 at 6:31 PM
Subject: Re: Consumerist — Apple gouging iTunes customer for 50,000 on Amex. Apple won’t help. Will Steve Jobs?????
To: Steve Jobs

Read the article here. http://consumerist.com/2010/02/revolutionary-new-apple-service-bills-your-amex-card-for-nearly-50000-in-music.html

I will no longer purchase from iTunes until I find out how Apple ultimately resolves this and will encourage friends to do the same.

Time to step up and fix customer service problems.

Sincerely,

Rob M

On Tue, Feb 9, 2010 at 10:48 PM, Steve Jobs wrote:
I wouldn’t believe everything you read from places like this.

Sent from my iPad”

Hardee har har. But, the next day an iTunes specialist solved Joel’s problem. Turned out that Joel had purchased iTunes Plus for his entire music library. Apple is reversing the upgrade and refunding the charges to his account.

So, Steve Jobs message is, “don’t trust blogs, but verify in case they’re right.”

We’re not offended. We don’t believe everything we hear from people like Steve Jobs either.

PREVIOUSLY: Revolutionary New Apple Service Bills Your AMEX Card For Nearly $50,000 In Music

A Seattle area Walmart was evacuated this weekend after a man released “stink bombs” and “super fart spray,” according to the police. 75 customers and employees were forced to flee the stinky Walmart after the suspect threw vials of foul-smelling liquid onto the floor and sprayed a can of a product called “Super Fart Spray.” After apprehension, the 51-year old man said he did it as joke and he thought it would be amusing. He was not arrested. [Seattle P-I] (Thanks to GitEmSteveDave!)

“Tiny Love” wind chimes are getting recalled because when you open them they are filled with stabby metal rods. Also, because the people opening them up would be the babies in the cribs over which the chimes are suspended. [CPSC via Safety Blog]

Sally is 20 years ahead on her 30-year mortgage. So why is Bank of America about to foreclose on her?

Sally writes: “So, at the end of last year, Bank of America made steps to purchase Countrywide. Upon doing so, they began moving all of Countrywide’s loans over into their system. My home loan was transfered in December. I was a Nation’s bank customer. It was bought by Bank of America as well. I’ve let the account stay with them. It shows I’ve been a member since 95.

With my mortgage, I usually use the online payment option. Oddly, I found my mortage seemed to be listed under a different account than my bank. A phone call said they’d clear it up. I made my payment and thought nothing more of it. Come January, I logged in and found out the December payment had never been made for unspecified issues. Also, my January payment was now late because it would not let me make a payment on the site. But, I could see everything under the same account now. However, using my BoA account number (been the same for 15 years) did not get me access over the phone. I had to use the new mortgage one. I finally got to a human who said he’d remove the late charges, make the payments and all should be fine next month.

Now February is here. I’ve gotten a certified letter from BoA saying they are going to start foreclosure on my house on the 18th of this month because my loan is in default. Checking online, I see the payments were made but the late fee still applied to January. I still can’t pay online, it says to reference an error code 98. I call the number and speak to someone yet again. They say the foreclosure notice can be disregarded. Get my payment made and get transferred to IT to get the error code removed. Stay on hold. The IT department says Error Code 98 means the mortgage department lacks some key info and the error will only be removed when the mortgage department gets it.

Recap. I’ve spoken to the mortgage department 3 times in as many months. They’ve never informed me they are missing any info, only promised to set my account right. Which, they now say they can’t do. They say IT must do. IT says they can’t, the mortgage department must do it.

I’m getting dizzy from the run around. I’ve decided I’ll be mailing in any future payments – starting today. In the past, I’ve always added additional principal. In fact, I’m about 20 years ahead of paying off my 30 year loan. I’ve been planning on paying it off this year or the next. With the website errors, I’ve been unable to add extra principal. So, Bank of America is enjoying the extra interest they’ve been getting by keeping me unable to pay extra down on my house, plus the late fees they are trying to add. And of course, using their ineptitude to try and take the house itself within 3 months of buying the loan off Countrywide.

Needless to say, I’ll be putting my entire tax refund on the house and I’ll be working diligently to get my finances away from Bank of America as soon as possible.”

Sally has already found a solution to her problem: just mail in all her payments. It’ll a be a long time, if ever, before Bank of America fixes theirs.

Want ugly furniture? How about a teardrop filled with frog eggs? Want an ugly table to put ugly stuff on? We’ve got that! This is a parody commercial for a real store filled with hideous furniture.

It’s no Montgomery Flea Market, but it’s worth a chuckle.

(Thanks to c-side!)

Jeremy won’t be buying any more Vizio TVs. He bought an HD one for $650 , then after 18 months of use, it began flickering on and off and then wouldn’t turn it on. The CSR told him it would cost him ~$300 to send it in to repair the power supply, nearly half the purchase price, as the warranty expired. Jeremy thinks a TV should last longer than a year and a half, and so he wrote an open letter on his blog to William Wang, CEO of Vizio TV.

“At this point, due to financial reasons, I am going to have to go back to my now 11 year old television and use that, until I can afford to purchase a new LCD TV,” writes Jeremy, “Which, given my understandable disappointment with Vizio, will be another brand.”

They don’t make ’em like they used to.

An Open Letter to William Wang, CEO of Vizio TV [Somewhat Daily Words]

Amy’s neighbors won’t stop parking in front of her house. They say that parking in front of their own house “spoils their view.” Problem is, they live on the corner and there’s shrubs so the cars also spoil Amy and her husband’s view of oncoming traffic when they pull out. They’ve tried various tactics ranging from the passive aggressive to accidentally knocking the neighbor’s bumper off, but they still plop their cars park in front of Amy’s abode. Dear readers, what can she do to get them to stop?

Amy writes: “Hi Ben,

We live on a small suburban street and the neighbors across from us have a ‘thing’ against parking in front of their own house. Despite having a 1 car garage and driveway, they have more vehicles than space and don’t like parking in front of their house because it spoils their view. Their solution is to park in front of our house. We hate it, and have hated it for the last 11 years we’ve owned our home. In the summer, we handle this by turning on our lawn sprinklers to encourage them to move (total p/a move on our part, I know, and it doesn’t always work). We have a driveway next to our kitchen that is shielded by shrubs and it’s not always easy to see what’s on the corner when we pull out (and not lit by street lights). The other night I drove my husband’s work van and pulled out and took off a good piece of the neighbor’s bumper (an older Honda) because I undershot the curve.

I did the right thing: rang the neighbor’s bell, showed them the damage, agreed it was okay to call the police, gave a statement to the police, etc.

I’m paying for a new (or new-ish) bumper on a ’95-ish Honda.

But the neighbor is still parking his Honda in the exact spot and we’re really annoyed. Does he want to get hit again? When Spring comes, does he really want his passenger side shot by jetting streams of water?

Any ideas? Their headlights flash into our children’s room at night, annoying them and inspiring our 2 schnauzers to bark. Our kids hate it because they’re afraid of hitting the car(s) with their balls and toys and frankly, we’re sick of the eye sore and the risk of hitting them.

Should we put a note on the windshield? Knock on their door for a heart-to-heart on parking etiquette? Put up parking cones or stash our garbage cans in the spot they park(my step daughter’s suggestion)? Mention the risk of hitting them again?

What say ye?

By the way, they’re fairly nice people but have a Jersey-Shore mentality (we live in RI, in the same town as Jersey Shore’s Pauly DJ)… just to give you an idea of the mentality we’re dealing with (frequent use of double negatives, argumentative dialogue, etc.).

I like to live in peace, but I don’t want their car in front of my house anymore. My husband doesn’t want to say anything – he told the Mother it was a hazard for them to park in front of our house when we spoke with the police, but she ignored his comment and the Honda is still parked there every morning and night.

Thanks!

-Amy”

How about you drag your husband over there by his ear and have a sit-down where you ask them straight up to stop parking in front? I don’t know why he’s reluctant but little games and hints aren’t going to get the message across.

Finding frogs in your weight watchers food or snakes in your TGIF or mice in your Pepsi is one thing and alerting the authorities for infomational purposes is one thing, but please don’t plant rats in your soup in the hopes of extorting a half-million. Because you will be caught, like Debbie Miller of Wisconsin. Here brilliant scheme was defeated by a microwave.

[restaurant owners] The Dollers kept the rat after the extortion attempt. Insurance investigators sent it for testing and determined that not only wasn’t a wild rat, but rather a domestic, white rat that had been cooked in a microwave. The restaurant doesn’t use microwaves.

Woman found guilty of planting rat in meal at Grand Chute restaurant [Postcrescent] (Thanks to cyclenu!)

How many different ways can you screw a man? Vince couldn’t make his Bank of America mortgage, because they fired him after 21 years of service in the due diligence department. Even after he did a short sale 5 months ago, Bank of America still hasn’t cleared it off their books. Now the illegal debt collection calls start. Is new CEO Brian Moynihan powerless to stop his own company from shaking down its own employees? Let’s find out!

Another problem is there was still a remainder Vince owed after the short sale. He’s been trying to pay it down with his unemployment checks, his only source of income, but he just wishes the collection agency would stop calling at 4 in the morning days in a row (which are both, by the way, violations of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act).

Vince should sue the collection agencies in small claims court for their violations of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. Debt collectors are not allowed to call you at 4 in the morning, and are not allowed to keep calling just to tell you to hand over money, and are not allowed to collect on an invalid debt. For only a $50 filing fee and representing himself he could probably get a few thousand dollars. Heck, if he sued everyone who’s been violating FDCPA in calling him, maybe he could pay the whole deficiency off.

It’s been five months since he completed the short sale. Even an executive customer service rep pledge to resolve the situation was inefficacious. Is big man Brian Moynihan capable of reining in his own company, and he is a big enough man to bestow clemency and forgive the deficiency Vince may not be able to repay for years? You, know, for old-times sake, considering the man put in twenty-one goddamn years?

Here’s Vince’s letter:

“January 17, 2010

Bank of America
Brian Moynihan
100 N. Tryon Street
NC-1-007-18-01
Charlotte, NC. 28255

Dear Mr. Moynihan,

First of all, thank you for taking the time to read and respond to the following request. I have included as much documentation as I currently have available to save you the time of having to do a lot of research.

To begin with, I was laid off from Bank of America in January, 2009, after 21 years of extremely dedicated service. I was a GWIM employee that was one of many that had fallen victim to the business decisions of the bank. This layoff resulted in my being unable to afford my primary residence and we ended up having to complete a short sale to avoid foreclosure. We completed the sale of the property on August 25th, 2009 and Bank of America received the payoff funds on September 1st 2009. Please see pages 1-5 of the attached documents for verification. In addition, page 6 shows the letter from Bank of America acknowledging that my loan has been paid in full.

I assure you the story that follows is 100% accurate and true, however one can only think it to be fiction because it sounds so absurd. From the date the bank received my payoff, and all the way up to today’s date, my nightmare with Bank of America will never seem to end.

It began with the deficiency balance left after the short sale. I am fully aware this would happen and am also aware that I am responsible for that deficiency. The issue is that Bank of America relentlessly called me daily at 4:00am for weeks at a time. This is covered in Case number xxxxxxxx filed with the Office of the Comptroller of Currency. Every time they called, I simply asked if they would call at a more reasonable time and they never would. They only wanted to talk about collecting the deficiency at 4:00am. It was relentless and I finally sent an email to Ken Lewis at the end of September asking for relief and a phone call at a decent time to work out an arrangement. Well, I am sure this email was read by someone in executive relations and not Ken Lewis which I fully expected. The problem you will see comes from page 7 of the attached documents. They obviously had no idea how to read as their response had nothing to do with what I was asking about, and it was talking about my letter to some website I had never heard of in my life.

Since this got me nowhere fast I called executive relations to get someone to understand the issue. They forwarded me to Michelle McCall who handles the mortgage side of executive relations. She listened to my story and said she would handle it. Well, her way of handling it was to put a cease and desist order on my account and turn me over to a collection attorney. See page 8. I never said I was not paying; I only wanted a call at a decent time to work something out. Since these were robocalls, there was never a number I could call back on. After calling the bank again, I was finally able to have the file retrieved from the collection attorney and the representative and I have worked out a payment arrangement. It is very small but you have to remember, I am sending you part of my unemployment check and I am barely able to keep my head above water as it is.

While all of this has been happening with my deficiency balance, I am still receiving tons of mail from Bank of America in reference to my mortgage secured by the property I sold in August. It is October and they still had not paid off my loan. See pages 9 and 10.

Then I start receiving these letters telling me that I do not have insurance and unless I provide proof they will force place insurance. Well, I think the insurance industry frowns upon insuring items you do not actually own or have an interest in. See pages 11 and 12. Each time I received a letter, I would call the bank and try to get them to understand that I sold this property in August and they have had my payoff since September. I was told either that was not their department or some reps would actually look and verify that they did in fact receive my payoff check in September and would open a case to get it resolved. I probably had a total of 10 cases opened from my calls just to get someone to clear this loan off the books and it has still never happened. All of those cases fell into some black hole never to be seen again.

The next wave of mailings about my loan that was to be paid off 3 months earlier started again. This time they were more upsetting than ever. I was now receiving legal notices telling me I owed $423,572.92. See page 13. Can you imagine, after closing on this property in August, now in November I am receiving threatening legal notices knowing that you have been in full receipt of my funds this entire time. Can you imagine my level of frustration and grief over this issue, knowing that I have called on a weekly basis for months just trying to find someone to take ownership of the situation and get this loan off the books?

I was at my wits end when they started calling again day and night relentlessly. It was the robocaller and when the rep comes on the line they start telling me I owe them $25,000.00 in back payments and when can I send in the funds. What???? Are you kidding me I am thinking, and start to tell them the same thing I have told for months now that I sold this property, someone else lives there and has a mortgage on it. They would apologize and hang up. But then the next day the calls just keep coming and coming again. I had finally had enough of being called for payments and insurance so I faxed two short letters pertaining to these matters asking you to cease and desist. See pages 14 and 15. You can see I was quite frustrated with this ordeal. I thought relief was finally on the way as I did receive correspondence back confirming receipt of my letters. See page 16. The calls kept coming so I thought I would reach out to Michelle McCall again as I had her name from my previous dealing with executive relations. She looked and agreed my loan should have been paid off in September. I told her I was extremely frustrated that no one would take ownership of this issue. She said if I received more calls just have them call her. Well, obviously she did nothing because I have received 10 more calls since then, and every time I ask them to contact her they simply ignore the request and it goes back to some queue for them to start ringing my phone again day and night. The fact that my loan has still not been paid off leads to OCC case #xxxxxxxx

As the days go by and the phone keeps ringing, I am finally sent over the deep end when I open the mail and see that Bank of America has actually managed to force place insurance in the amount of $4,242.00 dollars on a property that I sold in August. See page 17. Can you tell me how it is possible to buy insurance on a property you no longer have an interest in? This leads to yet another OCC case #xxxxxxxx.

So, it is now January 17, 2010. A year since I have been laid off from the bank and 5 months since I sold my home that you cannot manage to remove from your books. Can you stop for a minute and think what it felt like for me to lose my home because I could no longer afford it when I lost my job? Can you imagine having to have your credit ruined via a short sale after being a banker for 21 years?

Well, let me tell you it sucks. But to make it worse, it will not go away. Every phone call and piece of mail I receive is just a reminder of what I have lost because I was laid off for doing nothing wrong. The emotional toll is astounding and Bank of America is doing everything possible to keep it going.

I have been seeking legal advice as to what course of action to take next, but it will take awhile. I simply do not have the funds to hire an attorney yet to pursue this matter. I went from earning $100,000/year to $100.00/week. I really have nowhere else to turn but to you and to the media. I have sent this story to all of the major news networks in hopes of someone hearing my plea for assistance. This story sounds so absurd that you would think it cannot be true. I am just one man, but I wonder how many others you have done this to? I will tell you the same thing I told the story editors,” I spent 21 years doing my due diligence for the bank and then I get laid off because they did not do theirs.”

In closing, I am asking you to please take ownership of this issue and finally clear this loan off of your books. As stated earlier, I am paying a very small amount to you monthly to help cover my deficiency balance left from the sale of this home. I will never recoup the funds I once earned and will have to go back to school to earn 1/3 of my previous salary. If there is any way you can forgive this deficiency it would be greatly appreciated. I would also ask to have our credit restored back to normal in relation to the 2 mortgages surrounding this short sale. This is the only derogatory item I have and my credit has always meant a great deal to me. A charge off has killed everything I have worked so hard to maintain.

Thank you for your time and I look forward to your response.

Sincerely,

Vince K.”

Fix your ship, Brian Moynihan. Who’s the culprit? Laggy databases? Lost papers? Is Vince just not getting something right? And if so, what should he do? Or does at just come down to basic human indifference and incompetence?

Reached for comment, a Bank of America spokesperson said she would begin tracking down where the calls are coming from.

Why should banks have all the fun monitoring consumers’ purchases? Bundle is a nifty service that lets you drill down and see what people are buying in your hood.

Essentially, it’s an appealing graphical interface plopped on top of the info warehouses provided by the All-Seeing-Eye of Citi and other 3rd-party data harvesters. Just plug in the age, household type, income and geographical location you want to explore and let shopping peeping begin. For instance, dudes in my area are spend an average of $141 on electronics, mostly from Best Buy, Apple, and Tiger Direct. [Bundle]

A man was found dead inside the landing gear of Delta airplane landing in Tokyo enroute from New York. Doctors speculated that he froze to death and had a shortage of oxygen when the plane reached over 30,000 feet. Sheesh, we know the seats are cramped but this is ridiculous. What happens when you climb into an airplane’s fuselage and it takes off? This clip from “1000 Ways To Die” explains:

[AFP] (Thanks to GitEmSteveDave!)