Guest Column: Use caution before buying prescription drugs online
The FDA says you may be putting your personal and financial information at risk when you deal with unsafe online pharmacies.
Columnist
Randy Hutchinson is the President and CEO of the BBB of the Mid-South, serving 28 counties in Tennessee, Mississippi and Arkansas. He graduated from Western Maryland College and has an MBA from Wilmington College. He can be reached at rhutchinson@bbbmidsouth.org
There are 78 articles by Randy Hutchinson :
The FDA says you may be putting your personal and financial information at risk when you deal with unsafe online pharmacies.
More than one in four people who reported to the Federal Trade Commission that they lost money in a scam in 2021 say it originated on social media, an 18-fold increase over 2017.
While the apps are a legitimate payment method, using them involves some risks that are greater than paying with a credit card.
A recent survey found that 77% of consumers “always” or “regularly” read reviews from other consumers. That was up from 60% in the prior survey.
From July 2020 to June 2021, 96,000 people reported an Amazon scam to the FTC. Only a small percentage of people report scams, so the actual numbers are much higher.
The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act governs collection agencies and other third-party collectors.
“Be cautious dealing with someone who knocks on your door offering to help repair damage after a storm, including removing trees or limbs.”
In an initiative called Operation CBDeceit, the FTC reached settlements with seven more companies it alleged were making unsubstantiated claims about their CBD products.
The fundraising companies kept as much as 90 cents of every dollar raised and, according to the FTC, very little of the money they actually delivered to the charities was used for the purposes they claimed.
Opinion: Even Tom Selleck would agree it’s important to carefully consider all the pros and cons of a reverse mortgage.
‘I can’t say that every offer to buy an extended auto warranty that comes via a robocall is deceptive, but separating out the good ones would be a challenge. Postcard or letter solicitations are almost as problematic.’
More than 6,900 people filed a complaint about home security companies in 2020, ranking them No. 32 among the thousands of types of businesses receiving complaints.
Even if an MLM opportunity is legitimate, AARP and the FTC say most participants still make little or no money.
Some companies may have a short-term cash flow crunch that makes them vulnerable to deceptive lending practices.
You want to be sure that your credit information is accurate and current before you apply for a loan, buy insurance, apply for a job, or try to rent an apartment or other housing.
The FTC and BBB recommend discussing with experts plans to invest in any real estate development outside the U.S.
RoboKiller predicts that scammers will design even smarter, more believable phone scams in the future. Spam calls could reach 70 billion and texts 90 billion by the end of 2021.
Nigerian letter scams now reap only $700,000 annually, but the same crooks get billions of dollars from more sophisticated scams: ‘That Nigerian prince has grown up, has gone to college, and has found a new, lucrative career,’ says an expert.
The FDA has found hundreds of dietary supplements containing ingredients that weren’t listed on the label.
The variety of COVID-19 scams we’ve seen since the beginning of the pandemic are overwhelming.
You’re entrusting a tax preparer with sensitive information, so it’s important to do your due diligence in choosing one.
Some of the biggest breaches include one at Marriott that affected over 5 million customers and one at Nintendo that compromised 300,000 user accounts. At least five state unemployment databases have been hacked.
According to Black Knight, a mortgage technology and data provider, mortgage delinquencies almost doubled in April. That’s fodder for mortgage relief scammers.
Millions have advanced their careers attending for-profit schools that operate virtually as well as through physical campuses. But the industry has a checkered history.
Consumers who were exposed to a cryptocurrency scam were far more likely to fall for it and lost far more money than the average for all scams. The median loss in a cryptocurrency scam was $3,000 compared to $160 for all scams.