My Unhappy Experience with Intellius Identity Protect.

In August, my daughter started getting phone calls, every hour on the hour. My daughter is fairly brave, but she had been stalked a few months earlier, and she was starting to get worried after the third day that the stalker, who had moved away finally, had somehow gotten her cell number. She called me and asked if there was a way to find out who the number belonged to. She had tried to look it up, but was unable to find anything.

I had looked up several phone numbers on reverse look-up sites before and felt confident that I would be able to find out who her mysterious caller was. Well, every site I used this time boasted "free" look ups, but took me to a site that cost money. Each site, though appearing to be run by a different company, ended up taking me to the Intellius Identity Protect website. The site did talk about their service and had a link which said "Learn More" about the free trial. But, since i knew I didn't want their service, I didn't follow the link. The site also had two options. You could sign up for the service and get multiple look-ups, or you could purchase one look-up for $.99. I chose the latter.

After I submitted my debit card info, they were able to tell me that the mysterious caller was MCI. I'll write an article about what I think of a phone company calling every hour on the hour later. What Intellius has done, in my opinion, is so much worse! I really hope people will read this article and know what they are getting into. I actually hope anyone reading this article will decide not to patronize their business. Why? Because I think what they do is unethical. Here's what happened because I used their "one look-up" offer.

A month later, on 9/16/09, even though I had watched my checking account carefully, it was overdrawn. When I investigated what caused the overdraft, I found a charge for $21.47 from Intellius Identity Protect (such a laughable name) had been taken out of my checking account! I figured I had probably missed something and somehow signed up.

I got on the phone and called Intellius right then. They DO put their phone numbers on their little blurb that shows up with your charges. I guess they do one thing right. The young woman who answered the phone was pleasant enough, even after finding out I wanted to cancel. When she asked why I wanted to cancel, I told her I had NEVER said I wanted the service, that I had taken the one-time look-up option because I didn't want the service. She then explained to me (in that tone of voice that told me she thought she was talking to someone who was senile) that they had not cheated me (mind you, I had never said they did). She explained clearly and slowly (I guess in case I had a hard time keeping up) that the "learn more" line was right on the page where I made my selection about the one-time option and had I followed it, I would know that they were going to give me the free trial whether I wanted it or not AND, then they would start taking out the monthly charge.

After biting my tongue so that I didn't tell the girl that I thought she was a bimbette, and I didn't believe "free trial" or "learn more" was the same thing as "warning," I said I wasn't saying they cheated me, but I wanted her to cancel my subscription. She told me she was taking care of that as we were speaking and if I wanted to change my mind, I could just call back. At which point, I did lose my patience and exclaimed "I NEVER WANTED your service, so I'm NOT going to change my mind!!!" To which she once again reassured me that they did not cheat me and I once again explained, I don't care one way or the other, as long as she cancelled my account.

Sure enough, on 10/15, Intellius took another payment from my checking account. This time, I got on the phone and tried to call, but no one answered the phone. They were closed and wouldn't be open for 3 days. Rather than wait, I found their email address and wrote a long, nasty email telling them in no uncertain terms what I thought of them charging me after having assured me that they cancelled my account. It's now November 2 and I haven't heard from them. I'll call again tomorrow or the next day and try to get a human to talk to. But, really, I shouldn't have to. A business that is ethical and honest should cancel your account after the first phone call. you shouldn't have to call, email, and call again.

So PLEASE, beware using reverse phone look-ups if it takes you to an Identity Protect site through Intellius. If you want the service, fine, use them. But, how well is a business going to protect your identity when they don't even acknowledge that you have the right to cancel? If they do take another payment out of my account this month, I'll close my bank account and open another one. How ridiculous that I'd have to do that. But, you do what you have to do.

I hope this article helps someone out there NOT have to do it. I feel Intellius took advantage of my concern for my daughter's safety to get me into their system. Please don't let them do this to you.