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On January, 2013 ripoffreport.com opened a service, Corporate Advocacy Program (CAP), to the general business public. It turns out if a business joins CAP and pay quite a bit of money Ripoff Report will alter the negative complaint(s) into “being better” (their words) or remove it. And if a report has not been published the company again pays a lot of money and the complaint is never published. BUT before you become a member of CAP it seems you already have to be a member of ‘Verified Business’ aka Verified, at $89.00 per mth or more as I’ve found out. Thus a complaint against a bad business gets a very toned down complaint to a good review or never gets published. Also it seem CAP, in their own words online, “was carefully developed and conservatively used since 2003”. “Conservatively used” – what does that mean? They only took BIG money payoffs from medium size companies? (From my undestanding Ripoffreport.com never went after large corporations; probably because they could afford to chew him up and spit him out.) Read about CAP on their site: Ripoff Report Corporate Advocacy Business Remediation & Customer Satisfaction Program | Verified Businesses Verified Business was launched July 18, 2013. For the $89.00 or more a business pays a monthly fee and the business is given the opportunity to see the complaint 14 days/2 weeks before the compliant is published. AND from what I’ve read on the net if the business doesn’t like the complaint it never gets published. Here is a link to RipoffReport.com Verified Directory. I’ve decided to use this directory to insure I don’t use the companies listed in it. If a company is a good company why would they join Ripoff Report’s CAP or Verified. Let’s start with the reports about Ripoff Report on the BBB (Better Business Bureau). Tempe, AZ Rating – F To be clear: Ed Magedson is the owner of Ripoff Report, which is part of Xcentric, Inc. I found this site to be absolutely shocking – Ed Magedson tried to shake down his own neighbors for $8,000.00!!! That is so tacky. I found several examples of Ed Magedson’s pitch stating he would defame a victim’s character and why Mr. Magedson felt they should his: list a lot of situations just like the neighbors, and after you see the neighbor’s filing you may also feel Magedson has some mental behavior disorders. These sites speak of cases filed against Magedson for trying to shake companies down, email examples of him trying to exploit up to $30,000.00 to remove complaints from ripoffreport.com and his threats of defaming a victim’s character if they didn’t join is Advocacy service – the (CAP) membership. He lost all the cases listed on the site As for the exploiting money from companies Magedson wanted all these companies to pay by checks; payable to badbusinessbureau.com. Why not a credit card? Is he trying to avoid paying the IRS? Seems like it http://www.bad-business-rip-off.com/ A Florida state court Judge affirms Ripoff Report’s practices are “appalling”. Unfortunately the “Communications Decency Act” protects Magedson. What is so decent about him blatantly tries to exhort money in emails? Maybe I missed something, but either way this law needs to be changed so that sites are responsible for postings. Here are some sites that tell the truth all about Ripoff Report, CAP, and Verified Businesses: #1 Unlike the others listed this first business does digital branding. I included it because after looking at so many sites to find the truth I came upon this site and it made me laugh when describing ripoff report’s CAP. The owner says “Imagine a company going out and planting bombs in buildings and then charging the building owner to remove the bombs.” It makes total common sense. Ripoff Report is a Ripoff #2 Scam Fraud Alert April 24, 2014 #3 Daily Finance Aug 26th 2008 #4 Complaints.com Aug. 21, 2008 #5 ezripofflawsuite.com No date given. #6 Complaints Board No date given, but based on the replying ‘Comments’ 2010. #7 The People’s Credit Bureau No date given. #8 Consumer Affairs Multiple dates; 2009 to 2014. If you want to find more sites do a search for “complaints against Ed Magedson”. Threre a bunch of sites. AND if you are a victim of ripoffreport.com then go to RipOffReport Victims Unite for Justice. BTW, here are some of ripoff report’s other domains; most are mirrors of the original. Though some are about a particular business. Why would a new domain be created for a particular business?:
http://www.trendsexpressinc.com/ (read the title at the top of the window; has nothing to do with the site) You can do a WhoIs search on any of these sites and see the owner is Ed Magedson. I use NetworkSolutions.com as they are the original database for all domain names. This site has an interesting article called “Google Your Honeymoon with Rip Off Report has to Stop” |
If you are interested in what started my search about Ripoffreport.com click HERE. If not use the ‘Close This Window’ button below.