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The Worldwide Brands Home EBiz Newsletter: "Getting Refunds from Scammers"

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This Week's Radio Show News:

Air Date: Monday, May 16, 2005:

• Do you know how to Sell Seasonally? Father's Day is coming up fast. Have you added specific products to your eBay Auctions or Web Site? Selling Seasonally and keeping Holiday sales in mind are very important to your business. Contributing Editor Lisa Suttora will be with us to talk about how to stay on top of the various Holidays throughout the year, using Father's Day as an example.

• Product Source of the Week! You can get a one week jump on your competition in this segment! Chris and Rob will be Interviewing someone from a real, live Wholesale Supply company each and every week, a full week before the wholesale supplier is listed in our Directories! Each week, we'll talk with a Wholesale Supplier that has been fully verified to be included in our Drop Ship Source Directory or our Light Bulk Wholesale Directory, but will not be listed in the Directories until a full week after the Radio Show! We'll talk about their company and products, and tell you who they are and how to contact them.

• Listen Live Monday, May 16, at 9 AM Pacific, 12 Noon Eastern Time!

• Click Here to listen to the Archived Show after Monday May 16!

This Week's Featured Newsletter Article:

"Getting Refunds from Scammers"

by Chris Malta

Been burned by an Online Scam recently? Been a victim of really poor service? You CAN get your money back.

The other day, I spent nearly an hour on the phone with a man who had been taken for nearly $6,000 by one of these "Pay us and We'll Create Your Whole Internet Business For You" people.

He paid them, and now they don't return his phone calls and are not providing the services he paid them for.

This is SUCH a common occurrence! There are maybe a small handful of companies out there who DO provide those services well, but the vast majority of them are just one or two guys sitting on their home computer pretending to be a big Internet Hosting Company. They collect enormous fees, and by the time enough people are complaining, they've shut down, changed their name, and re-opened under another name to rip off another round of unsuspecting customers.

However, I talk about that all over our web site, and that's not really what this article is about.

This is a really nice guy that I was talking to the other day. As I said, he had lost $6,000 with these people. He was recently injured on his day job, and not able to wok at that career any longer. So, like so many of us, he took the plunge into Internet Business, and got burned by a scammer.

He wasn't complaining. He wasn't blaming them. He was blaming himself for falling for their scam. That's something I respect a great deal. It's easy to take credit for your successes, but hard to accept responsibility for your mistakes. I could tell, after talking with him for a while about all the specific work he had tried to do to set up his EBiz, that he was a dedicated and hard-working individual.

Still, though, he had lost most of the money that he had in savings to these scammers, and didn't know were to go from there.

Imagine his delight when I told him that he could get his money back, even if he could not contact the people who took it.

Now, you may already know what a Chargeback is. Some people do, but I'm always surprised by the number of people who have never heard of it, so that's the reason for this Article.

This is something that is true for every major Credit Card company in the United States that I know of. Maybe somewhere there's a CC Company or a bank that won't do this for you, but if there is, I have never come across them. So, please read the next paragraph carefully:

Within 6 months of any purchase you make with your Credit Card, you can file a Chargeback with your Credit Card Company, and get your money back. With Subscription Services, or purchases that are broken up into more than one monthly Credit Card payment, that 6 months is often extended even longer.

Of course, you have to have a reason for filing a Chargeback, and you should first go to the company you have a problem with and ask them for a refund, before filing a Chargeback. If, however, you've purchased something that really does not work or is not as advertised, and the company will not consider a fair refund, your Credit Card Company will go after them FOR you.

Here's what happens: as soon as you file the Chargeback, the CC Company immediately takes that money away from the Merchant Account of the company you want a refund from.

Then that company has to prove to the Credit Card people that you should not get a refund. If they do not provide satisfactory proof, quickly, that you don't deserve a refund, you get the money back.

Chargebacks are VERY difficult for any company to fight, and they almost never win. Most companies don't bother to fight them at all. It's very time-consuming, and they will most likely lose anyway.

In a case like the one I talked about above, involving one of these "Instant Internet Business" jokers, it's virtually guaranteed that your CC Company will return your money to you.

So, remember to pay for EVERYTHING related to your business with a CREDIT CARD (don't write any checks at these "Instant Internet Seminars" that travel the country!), and you'll almost always be able to get your money back within six months if something turns out to be substandard, or a scam.

HOWEVER, keep in mind that this is a double-edged sword! This policy can hurt your EBiz! Any disgruntled Customer, whether right or wrong, can file a Chargeback against YOU! Two lessons there: (1) Don't ever become a Scammer!, and (2) Take good care of your Customers, and always refund them according to the Refund policies you set in your Site or Auctions. :o)

Chris Malta
Founder/CEO
Worldwide Brands, Inc.

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