Obtained my Debit/Credit Card Info from other site

Complaint

0
Olga
Country: United States
Has withdrawn over $100 from my account under other assumed names.  The phone numbers are just recordings of which they do not respond to messages I've left or the phone number is not activated.The withdrawals have been from SEOB, CONEXM, SEO2Prompts, and WEB PROS 6. I have tried looking up an address but have not been successful.  How can they get away  with this.  How can the government allow this.  Someone told me that once a co. gets your card info they sell the information to others.  Everyone makes out accept the card holder.

Comments

  • 0
    tj
    Immediately contact your bank to dispute all fraudulent charges, and close the account to prevent additional fraud.  FRB Reg. E allows disputing of unauthorized or fraudulent EFT charges to checking accounts, and FCBA allows disputing charges to credit cards.  Your bank should reverse the charges.

    There is no point in trying to track down the "companies" hiding behind the acronyms.  They intended to make fraudulent charges, they got your account information illegally, possibly buying it from some crooked merchant but also possibly through hacking merchant or payment processor computers, and as you have observed they use multiple names to work around attempts to block them.  They will keep taking your money until you make that no longer possible.

    I searched on the acronyms as well, with no results.  None of them appear to be connected with any actual business that might have created such charges.  You are dealing with credit card or EFT fraud.

    This is a typical "micro-fraud".  They break the charges up into small charges to slip them by consumers, knowing that many banks will do no real investigation on charges under around $50, maybe even paying back their customer with no repercussions to the scammers.  They use multiple names to hide the scope of the fraudulent operation and fly under the radar.  

    The alleged "businesses" are often claimed to deliver intangible "ebooks", "web templates" or other "products" of no actual cost, but there isn't really any product for sale anyway.  In many cases, such systematic payment system fraud involving small charges funnels the money out of the country.  A non-working phone number, or one already stuffed with voice-mail is typical, since the phone number only existed to maintain enough appearance of a business to get the merchant account needed to get access to the payment processing system.  

    One large operation has been operating for years, with connections to the eastern block and Russia.

    File complaints with FTC, OCC, and IC3.

    It does help to post the phone numbers associated with each name, as others  can find related reports tied to the same phone numbers.
  • 0
    Sue
    I have had a similar situation with this company.  Unfortunately, my visa was a debit card and there is nothing the company will do for me so I am out the money
  • 0
    Ang
    The same thing happened to me with the same company to the tune of $179.40. PNC Bank filed a dispute against them and I'm currently waiting for the results. They gave me the phone number for this company and the recording said that the normal business hours are 9AM- blah blah blah...It was 10AM when I called on a Wednesday... The message was weird because it was unprofessional- the person who recorded it made a few mistakes while recording. I left a message and am now expecting a return call--I'm not sure I'll be getting one back. I got a new debit card with new numbers, and all of the money was replaced back in my account. I'll post the results after I know them myself--perhaps that will be helpful to everyone else.
  • 0
    Brenda
    Same thing here, crazy me just wanted to check it out. They state that they would charge 1.95 and then give me a certain amount of time to cancel or proceed. I immediately cancelled after seeing how much they were going to charge, it was an outrageous amount! I saw where there was a pending transaction on 1-12-2010 in my bank account for 179.40. I was hoping that it would not actually post, but it went through last night at midnight 1-16-10. I have contacted my bank to dispute this transaction now that I have a reference number. I too called their phone number got the same message. I left explicit instructions that I would fight this very hard and that they will refund my money and there had better not be any more charges in my account. I can't believe as savvy as I am that I actually did this and believed they were legitimate in any way!
  • 0
    John
    Connections in Russia? LOL you dumb ass these people are in Utah. Google "Alma Snowden Tuck" or "Alma Tuck" he owns these companies and lives in Utah, Utah County to be precise.
  • 0
    Jeremy
    | 2 replies
    I worked for this company. they are FRAUD!!! We are trying to take them down!!! me and my friend recently got ahold of Alma Tuck...we want to take them down HARD!!! please help with any information. we didn't even know that the companies official name was conexm. we were told seobloghost.com
    • 0
      Allen replies to Jeremy
      Get a hold of me.  I think I can help.
    • 0
      Allen replies to Jeremy
      Steve Bullpit was his partner in crime and new everything that was going on,  I was going into business with him myself and 2 days after opening I left after I found out he was a scammer.  Both of them.  Steve Bullpit denies any part of this but I have several withness that know he was a partner with Alma Tuck.
  • 0
    Scotty
    Jeremy, if you worked for them why not post their physical address so anybody who has a complaint can visit them in person rather than allow Conexm to hide behind a fake phone number of PO Box!  

    I've seen a few of these adds but I dont know anything about this Tuck guy thats what lead me to this thread.  Is the business going under and they laid you off or something.  Sounds more like a disgruntled former employee to me.  If they are going down "hard" publish some more info about their opperations on this thread so when people Google "Conexm" or "Alma Tuck" or "seobloghost.com" they will be able to know that the deal really is with them.
  • 0
    Jeremy
    Of course i'm a disgruntled employee. i am out 1700 bucks because of these guys. i would post the address but nobody is there. they cleared the location 2 days after firing me.
  • 0
    Indie
    Jeremy, What services were you giving them? I worked for them as well. They promised all sorts of things that were never delivered. I have Jayson Langford's phone number too if you want it. These are your typical "mormon-boy" schemers that have wives and kids and go to church but are really the most crooked, corrupted and greedy people you will ever meet. Big Promises, no return.
  • 0
    popps
    "Mormon-boy" schemers to say the least. Just be glad you're only out $1700.  There are a few investors, myself included, that are out tens of thousands.
  • 0
    Scotty
    Man, this is getting interesting.  What exactly went down at this place? Are these guys going to get off the hook or will this stuff stick to them?  Did they break any laws?
  • 0
    popps
    alma tuck set up an LC named conexm and set up some llc's under conexm: learn2promote, llc, seo2promote, llc, & blog2promote, llc.  They'd advertise "how to make money using Google" through affiliates...you'd pay a $1.95 trial fee, then get billed $60-$90/month indefinitely each month after that.  When that failed they set up a blog company with the same business model. Alma was unable to get or keep merchant accounts so the business failed & investors lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Alma will not return texts, email, or calls and hides behind his attorney.  He doesn't own a house and lives in some fantastical world where he is a rebel entrepreneur.  His last venture, Marketstar, failed miserable as well.
  • 0
    popps
    By the way, I can give you Jayson Linford's pyhsical address, but he's just Alma Tuck's goon that bailed out before the company failed.  Alma doesn't own a home and all I can provide is his last two address in Orem & Pleasant Grove.
  • 0
    Scotty
    Popps, sure sounds like you got hosed in this deal.  From the info you and others provided I assume this isnt the first time these individuals have pulled this type of scam.  Its almost like they positioned themselves for this outcome from the very start.  Get investors to pony up the cash, sell a phantom product, pilfer unsuspecting consumers, reap the initial profits and buy themselves nice things still promising investors a return but then when things go south pocket the remaining cash, jump ship before it gets too bad, hide behind lawyers and LLC's, leave investors and employees high and dry and then dont own a home or any real assets for them to go after.  They have probably even moved on to their next scam by now.  Its almost like you, and all those who have been wronged, have an obligation to get the word out on these guys so this doesnt happen again.
  • 0
    popps
    Alma Tuck did business with a handful of people in the internet marketing and affiliate business.  All the ones I've talked to regard him the same way: as an inept failure.  His reputation is already destroyed amongst the big players in the legit internet marketing business.  His background is a programmer, so hopefully he'll only be able to find employment in a cubicle writing code for the rest of his pathetic life.
  • 0
    Shaun (Conexm sysadmin)
    Alma tuck is really good at keeping people fooled.  He is also really good at making it appear that what he is doing is not wrong.  He retains the services of a lawyer that specializes in FTC cases.  When building his offers he looks at what has gotten other people shut down and only shows enough information up front to meet FTC requirements.  seo2promote, blog2promote, and learn2promote were the offers he was running when I was hired.  I have to say I fell for his con job doing his IT work.  I'm also quite certain I have lost more than anyone else posting here.

    SEO blog host was his new company.  When his old offers started having merchanting problems we scrambled to build seobloghost.  I built the first revision of the cPanel hosting platform management helper tool.  I thought we were working on a legitimate hosting product like bluehost or hostgator.  I also got merchanting for Alma for seobloghost (Something I would not have done had I not been lied to about the risks).  I shut down that merchant account in November.  It was being misuesed (billing *2promote sites).  After repeated requests to Steve Bullpit to stop billing the old sites with my account it became clear that it was going to continue to be misused.  In december Alma tried to manipulate me into believing I had done him some great wrong in shutting off the merchant account that he had never paid me a dime for (I was supposed to get 1% for the use of my name and credibility).  It was at this time that it became clear that I was dealing with a dishonest person.  He really had kept me blind to the fact for a long time.  

    Seobloghost went south in February.  In march the Conexm account at Rackspace got shut down (I assume for non payment).  That account had the only up to day copy of the Conexm database (that I know of) with all the credit card transactions.  

    I'm taking a risk by posting this as Alma already claims that I have ruined him by tarnishing his reputation.  However, I feel that the truth about this last year should be told.  It was 12 months ago when Amla contacted me for doing his system administration work.  Conexm owes me just under $10k and I have not been going after them because I have been warned that Alma is willing to use new investment money to fight old legal problems.  

    I have seen mention of Jayson Linford here as being one of his goons.  While it is true that he did work for conexm that isn't the whole truth.  As early as May of last year he was looking at the numbers trying to figure out how to make the finances work.  He was the one trying to make the math work out for sustainable profitability.  He eventually left when Alma kept referring creditors and investors to him for answers.  In the end Jayson didn't want to be the one cleaning up Alma's messes he couldn't stop Alma from creating.  At least two of Jayson's neighbors were negatively impacted by Alma and Conexm.  One as a developer and the other as an investor.  Jayson is just one more person to feel the ruin that comes from working with Alma.

    To everyone who didn't receive what they thought they were signing up for.  I'm sorry that I supported this by keeping the servers running.  I'm sorry that I fell for it.  I started working for Conexm after I lost my job last year.  I thought it was a great opportunity to get my career going again.  It turns out that wanting something doesn't make it so.  It just makes you more likely to get taken advantage of.
  • 0
    Shaun (Conexm sysadmin)
    One more thing.

    You won't find any valid addresses.  The original office at 772 Utah Valley Dr was abdicated in the fall.  The new office that shows up in the Utah business entity search for seo blog hosting was left in March.  I don't even know where to find Alma any more.  

    My number is 801-505-0541 if you are trying to dig up more information.  Though, I've pretty much said everything here.

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