Acai Berry scams have been rampant for more than 18 months now, and they are constantly evolving to fool ever more unsuspecting victims. In general, there are 2 very different categories of scams:
By far, the Free trial offers are the worst. The excitement of getting a free sample causes the victim to overlook fine print at the very bottom of a website that actually signs them up for a VERY expensive monthly subscription ($80 a month or more), that is VERY hard to cancel.
These scams have been going on a while, but the techniques used are getting trickier all the time. In particular, the sales pitch used by the free trial scams. The most prevalent used to be the personal experience blog, like hilarysweightloss. Before and after pictures showed great results, but were actually from a stock photo web site, and not of an acai berry user. This web site was copied thousands of times and used to rip off hundreds of thousands of desperate dieters.
Now, and even more insidious pest is popping up – the fake news report. Websites are made to look like a news site, with lots of generic news articles. One well written article is planted “reporting” on the acai berry trend and linking to a certain free trial they want to push. Julia miller news 6 is one such fake site that looks like a real news station’s website.
Visitors that stumble across one of these fake news websites are often fooled into believing it is a real news site, so they trust the link, and soon sign up for the nasty monthly subscription. I’ve heard many people express disbelief that these sites are legal, and to tell you the truth, I don’t really know. But I suspect it is much like the free trial offers themselves. These scammers know the loopholes in our laws and skirt the edges. And if they do cross the line and get in trouble, they simply close up shop and pop up next week with a different company.
A website isn’t the same as a physical store that you can come back to if you have a complaint, so do a little research when in doubt. In this case, if you google Julia miller news 6, the top listing takes you to a page on our website warning that it is a scam, so we have been able to help some people avoid the scams. Remember, the web can be a dangerous place – be careful out there.
Where to Get REAL Acai
The free trial scammers don’t bother to send you a quality acai product. They don’t plan on satisfied customers, so just use cheapest, heat processed, worthless product they can find. Sometimes they even use the ground up seed of the berry, which has no health benefit, but can then legally claim it is Acai Berry!
You can purchase REAL quality Acai Berry products safely at the BBB certified official Acaiberry Store, where you’ll find the best prices on all the top brands, but NO FREE TRIALS! Click the **ONLINE STORE** in the left sidebar.
Diet News
I was on a web site for free supply pay shipping $2.69. But , got a call from credit card company saying there was chages for .95 and $169.99. When i got my o order it was not what I ordered and of course I was not charged correctly. The company didn’t want there product back and when I asked how I could be on a web site that says $2.69 and be charged something else and recieve something she said that was impossible , I had to be on there web site, and then I was called a liar, when I said I could remember where I was. Watch out for swiss sciences
I saw the healthy news watch with Katherine Miller and she was the guinepig. The colo clense was from coloblast and the acaiberry was leanspa. they both came at the same time but the one from coloblast arrived a week after ordering it and it was a saturday, the tenth would be monday I could not call until then sice their business hours are monday-friday. I called monday to cancel and they had already taken the $88 they count the day you order so my tenth day was sunday and they would do nothing they kept asking if I read the agreement. This is a scam
I ordered these products and I too fell for this scam. With in 3 days of ordering these products my account was charged $87.13. I wish i would have seen this site before i ordered. Im not even going to bother with the company, i am going straight to the bank tomorrow to cancel my cards. I did receive the pills but am not going to take them. I am so upset that people can get away with stuff like this. We will see what my bank says in the morning.
I ordered the product and it came in the mail but it wasn’t the same bottle as in the add…it was Maximum Burn xtreme which is a totally different product. Im forsure thinking I got ripped off. Phoning the credit company now!
DON’T ORDER THIS PRODUCT – CHARGES WILL KEEP POPPING UP ON YOUR CC. I CANCELLED WITHIN MINUTES OF ORDERING IT AND CHARGES STILL APPEARED EVEN A MONTH LATER!
Just thought I’d let you know that I am one of those unfortunate people who bought into the News6 Scam. And I seemed to have gotten trapped on my MSN homepage. It was an article listed on MSN’s top stories as a new weight loss program that works..read the article written by Julian Miller of News 6. I clicked onto it, read the article and clicked on the journalists’ links. I ordered the colon cleanse first and was charged shipping and handling. Then I ordered the Acai Berry but without not having to sign some kind of Acceptance Policy for the 30 day free trial. What happened next made me realize this was absolutely a scam.
I received the Colon Cleanse in 3 to 4 days but kept waiting on the Acai Berry to arrive as you were to take the two in combination. Went on the Acai Berry website and none of the phone numbers worked nor did trying to track your order. It wasn’t until I got a charge on my debit card for 99.95 from the Vitamin Shop out of Los Angeles with a toll free number did I realize that somehow this had to be connected to the Acai Berry. This number did get me through to foreign accented customer service representatives. They assured me that I would be receiving the product soon. I received the product yesterday and to my surprise then I had another charge come through on my card for the Colon Cleanse because it was only a 14 day free trial offer and unless you call and cancel before the 14 days then you are charged for the product. I was absolutely livid! My question to them was that they had to be affiliated with the Acai Berry and how could you take both in conjunction with the other if one comes on time and the other 2 weeks later….by the way it was after this that I did my homework and found there was no News 6 in Los Angeles and found this web page.
I probably won’t get my money back because I did receive a product but I’m definitely going to change my card number so that they have no way of hitting my account for any other bogus charges…..such as not canceling.
BEWARE!
A STUPID PERSON IN SEARCH OF A QUICK AND EASY FIX!!!!
my question is since you did recieve the product did you take it and if so did it work? just wondering…i to recvd the product 2 days ago and just found this today…i was only charged the 99.00 and then 56.00..i am cancelling my card and getting a new one…
I hope we can find a way to get this news out there fast. I am being charged $99/month for the online tracker. Company will not remove the charge. Emails to Julia Miller are not delivered,(invalid address) and now you can not leave a reply on the site. They claim it is for spam reasons. Get this message out there. DO NOT ORDER THE PRODUCT THIS WAY!!!!!
Thank you for this posting. I called the toll free number to cancel, they were friendly and seemed quite accommodating, as she was searching for my order, she asked how I hear about it, I no sooner got the words “an advertisement on the Internet via Channel 9 News”….. click!!!….. the Bitch hung up in my ear!! I immediately called my credit card company…. thankfully there was no charge(s). I cancelled and reopened a new account.
so does the product(s) work? Has anyone tried it?
Thank you for posting this!! I knew it was too good to be true. You were going to be charged an additional 60 bucks a month too! I am so disppointed that this is happening so much. You couldnt even leave anymore comments on the site regarding this story. Yes, I agree. Too many loopholes and laws broken.
Thank you again.
I was just about to get out my credit card after filling in the necessary info
for an acai berry and colon cleanse product on a “News 8″ site, but I noticed
the small print on the bottom of the page–I would be billed monthly…etc.
I also noted that the bottles that were shown were not the ones the “news
lady” named, so I went back to the site to view the product name and I got
linked somehow to “Channel 10″–different girl, different product name, but her script was exactly the same as the one on Channel 8: she tried it
for 4 wks., lost 9 lbs. wk. #1; 7 lbs. wk. #2, etc. I never saw the “Channel 6″ site , but I’ve seen enough! One company must own different labels, be-
cause the ads were identical, and each is attempting to appear to be a legit
news channel, which is a deliberate deception. Call the A.G. in your state to help you out if you’ve been scammed. Our A.G.’s office in CT has always been a fantastic advocate for consumer rip-offs. I’m calling, just to report it in my state. And pass this on to anyone you know in your state or any
other state who got scammed. People have actually had money returned to
them after these scams were made to pay, or shut down, and we could
be talking millions of dollars that consumers have lost to this new “craze.”
I almost ordered this product, but decided to do more research first, thank you for the information. But here is the really scary part, the day after I visited the website (and started filling out the form, before I decided to investigate), another company called me, offering me a better price for the products. I asked if it was the same company, he said no – but they had a better deal. When I asked how they got my information if they weren’t the same company he hung up on me. Scary! Glad I didn’t put in any credit card info.
I saw the Julia Miller News 6 site on Thursday, August 26 and it said if you type in “News6″ there wil be no hidden fees. Absolutely none!! She said she paid a little over a dollar and that was all. TOTAL!! Well, stupid me, I ordered it and got 2 charges of over $99.00 each for the Acai Berry and Colon Cleanse. I called them and they said they could cancel my order but I wouldn’t get my money back!! Then she kept repeating “New” offers giving me 25%, then 50%, then 75% off the next shipment. I am working with my bank now to try and get out of this scam and I’m going to show them this. NEVER AGAIN!!!
I have just got sucked in, I saw the Cannal 7 Stacie Sandler’s news report website and ordered online trial for both Acai Berry & Colon Clease, within 3 hours, the bastard charged my credit account 5 times for up to AUD$233, I realised I have been scammed after I did some online research and I cancelled tracker through Getslimpackage website, and send email to their customer support immediately, and of course I called the credit card company to stop the payment which they said they can’t stop but can only file a dispute, now I’m going to ring them to cancel so called trial, wish me good luck! How can American government let these bastards blood suckers get away with it?
I was just about to sign up for my “free” trial when i noticed that they didn’t ship to Northern Ireland, my County wasn’t on their County List & none of the other counties in NI were either. So i stuck Northern Ireland in the address and picked an English county. When it went through to the next stage I noticed this at the bottom of the credit card confirmation page:
‘Your Shipment is estimated to arrive by Aug 31, 2010Offer Details: By placing my trial order today, I will get BONUS access to the AcaiOptimum Online Weight Loss Plan and agree to the offer terms that states my credit or debit card will be conveniently billed today £65 (plus s&h) for the first payment, but after the Mail-In Rebate is processed today’s order will be £0.00 (plus s&h). I agree to be billed the second installment payment of £65 in 30 days. Today’s charges will appear on my credit card as NTR*acoptimumcs.com. Cancel by calling 0808-168-3410.
After seeing that i quickly left and started checking out scams. I’ve been caught out before on other stuff and it was a nightmare to claim my money back so i’m very wary of what i sign up to now. Thanks for the other warning posts on this page!!
As the offer ends Aug. 20 I fell for the scam. My bank isn’t opened yet, for me to check the damage. The order conformation stated only a $1.95 s/h charge. It also gave me a ph # 877 825-1528 to cancel w/i 14 days. I didn’t go for the clense scam [yeah me], if the charge is more than $2 I will cancel my credit card and call the number.
I will cancel the card anyway.
I just ordered the FREE trial of Asia Optimum.
The order form showed only a $1.95 charge and a ph#
877 825-1528 to cancel within 14 days. do I stand a chance of not being ripped off?
Dear Bill,
I’m not sure who you are but I have a ignorent question. How is it that the news channel let this site be posted without seeing it? Does any webpage wheather from a reputable site such as news sites have this kind of scams without having some kind of employee position in the organization for a job that does nothing but make sure their main web page is void of links to scamming. As you can tell I’m just a layman at understanding how all this works. and the sad thing is our knowledge of tecnology is so not knowledgeable that it is a harmful NESSESITY to our society and we don’t even see it! It is shamful to be a human being now-a-days! Dogs are smarter than a human being. (in my opinon)
Oh my god how could i be so stupid, Ive been conned instead of the £2.38 for the free trial i thought they were taking I may end up paying £260 for both acai optimum trial and the colon cleanse.
I have cancelled my bank card but they already have half the money now.
In this day and age how can these people get away with this?
This site isn’t all that great either. I looked at the Acai Burn. First it isn’t obvious right away how many tablets you get in each bottle and they do not tell you what the recommended dosage is. If you take 3 at each meal this is way more expensive than if you take 1 a day.
I was scammed by this news story. I spent two hours with the customer service and explained to them they are committing credit card fraud by saying they will charge nothing that charge $100. They kept offering me discounts, which I did not take because then I am accepting the new price. I kept saying NO until after two hours they agreed to give me a refund. They will tell you that the system is not able to give refunds, which is also a lie because their agreement with the credit card processing company requires them to give refunds for false charges. The best thing to do is to report this to the FTS and the Consumer Protection Agency. These people need to go to jail for what they are doing. You can then wait until the charges appear on your card and tell your credit card company that you did not authorize this charge and that this is credit card fraud.
I just saw this ad. It claims to be channel 6 Ft Lauderdale. Julia Miller is not a reporter for Channel 6 (which would NBC, here in Ft Lauderdale where I live). A fake advertising. If it would be real, NBC or whatever channel that makes a claim like this, would have it on their own website.
I just got scamed today … sadly … after I clicked the button I had a feeling I did something wrong then I noticed this website. After I finish reading this website I called “acai optimum” to cancel my order, turns out I canceled my account and won’t receive a 2nd reaccuring bill, but I wasn’t able to cancel the shipping order. I’m just stuck payiin $100. I fell for the News 6 scam. To make sure my “account” was canceled I called again and turns out it is. Now I don’t know what to do to avoid paying $100 that is going to show up.
I wish I had researched this before ordering the “free trial”. I am out $202.30 for nothing. There is no way to get your money back from these companies. They have reps with fake American accents that repeat the same thing when you try to deal with them. I wish there were tighter controls on these type sites.
I’m posting info on my Facebook site in hopes of warning people against this scam, ugh!
Will say , never paid much attention to it ..until I seen the Channel 6 reports but
became a bit skeptical after I noticed The reporter JULIE didnt include her last name ..
Thats not likely at all , as we all know its their calling or sign off to use their full name ..
always look for first and last names , and phone numbers prior to purchasing anything …….
this site has a full contact listing and phone numbers included
its this sites intention to alert you of scams that sell the product 5 times higher than the product is worth , or selling for ..
this site seems to be trust worthy
Thank You!–I was about to fall for it!
I don’t get it there are multiple post on THIS website talking about the scam and how it doesn’t work. Then you turn around and look at THIS website and they sell this stuff?? lol…. I know they are BBB but seriously…. hard to sell a product when you have a dedicated page to the acaiberry scam.
I too fell victim to the channel6reports/health scam and ordered both Acai Optimum and the Advanced Cleanse free trial offers.
The free trial page clearly said 1 charge of 99.95 with a rebate. Nothing about a second charge of 99.95, per their general terms and conditions.
I called them but they refuse to refund. I have since called my bank to block the charges. Will update later.
thankyou for your warning i did almost fall for it if it were not for puttin one digit wrong on my card detailes i would have been conned as then the small print came up saying i would be billed $80 a month i am so glad i did make the mistake with my detailes there must have been someone watchin out for me. it is so easy to be fooled especially when you think a a news reader has tried it. and they get you hooked thinking you are getting something to try for free…oh well back to the drawing board for me… thanks for your warning
What tipped me off to its fakeness is I saw the same add by two different “news reporters” from two different “channels” with the same exact add word for word about their “wonderful experience.” Give me a break.
I saw the ad too and thought it was fabulous til I looked for it again and saw the same esact ad WITH THE SAME NAME AND A DIFFERENT PICTURE of “Julie”!!!! What a scam.
I fell victim today to the channel6reports/health scam for the Acai Optimum and the Advanced Cleanse free trial offers. I managed to get a promise for refund of $99.96 for the Acai Optimum but not for the $99.96 for the Advanced Cleanse. I requested the credit card company to refund the charges to my account and am waiting to hear whether they did cancel the charges. I am only sorry I did not check your site before hand.
Acai Berry ok scamer are there and will be there all the time.but this warning say nothing about that actual product, well!!
Yes, I got taken as well. It is almost impossible to make contact with anyone you can understand. BY the time I hung up, I wanted to pull out the phone cord.
It’s the companies doing this scam.
Remember, you need to keep on this to cancel because the banks will consider this a reocurring charge and will still hold you responsible. You can’t shake the charge by cancelling the card.
Don’t forget, these guys are selling the maximun burn xtreme and the colopure. Botrh connected but with different numbers.
fyi the picture they use for Julia Miller is actually of a french journalist named Melissa Theuriau. It’s amazing how they get away with these scams.
The typos in the “article” tipped me off that it was fake. I seriously doubt an actual reporter would publish such mistakes.
Gina – The email confrimation they sent you has the order number and the phone number. You did keep the email order confrimation didn’t you?
I’m very confused, because they send you the product with no billing slip nor is there a contact number. Can I get a contact number for th AcaiOptimum?
I forgot to add to my post that my credit union called me immediately after I clicked ‘ok’ for the order. They asked me if I had made the purchase. As I was answering their question, I read the so-called ‘confirmation’ email. I voiced my complaint that it wasn’t the correct amount, but they only directed me to file a dispute. Sigh. Lord Jesus, please forgive these people cause I’m having a REALLY hard time.
What was I thinking?!!! I’m not an internet novice and I fall for this?? My “$1.49 shipping” turned out to be $101.45 and a link to get a rebate of $99.96. Oh my word! I turned in a complaint to the AZ BBB and found that they’ve received 580 complaints in the last year. Of that, 553 were resolved – so I’m optimistic. I’m also filing a credit card dispute with my credit union. Good luck to all victims out there!!!!
I too was sucked in by this bogus report. I notified my credit card company and I also called the customer caRE nimber. The operater was a jerk and said he would refund half and the other half when I sent the product back.
Oh No!! I have been scammed!! I am very worried. Don’t know what steps to take to cancel this.
I received both Acai Optimum and Advanced Colon last night and something told me to do some research on it. I came across this page and did a few investigation. I click on the Acai optimum terms & conditions and their it was, $79.95 subcription fee. I have to admit that news 6 article got to me i honestly thought it was real. anyway, after reading all you guys comments, i called my bank n cancelled my debit card because i dont want them to scam me anymore. this site is very helpful and i am glad i came across it before it was too late. but i have a question, does it work? i two and i dont want to take anymore if it doesn’t?
THANK YOU! I got on just now to order the “free trial.” I stumbled upon the story with news 6 last week. I had read the deadline fo the free trial was today so jumped on to order and came accross this website. I’m so happy. I knew it had to be too good to be true and never heard of news 6 but was excited about Julie’s results and thought it won’t hurt, it’s FREE! Thanks again for preventing me from getting ripped off!
hey i got something i want u to look at and i believe it might be another fake news thing but i need to check what u think. my girlfriend found it and sent me the link cause i’ve been looking for a job since last July (2009) so if u could let me know if i’m right or not that would be EXTREMELY helpful.
FREE! Don’t you believe it!
May 30, 2010
I was one of those who believed this was from Julia Miller, news 6. Believed she had actualy tried it & was reporting that she was doing great on it. I though it was kinda strange the way she reported how good it was, but had never really been scammed before. Should have trusted my instinks!
This was my 1st. attempt at trying any “diet” supplements – - – NEVER AGAIN! Boy, did I learn my lesson.
SCAM! WASTE OF MONEY! RIPP OFF!
Thank you so much. I am one of those desperate to diet peeps but I have been burned before by the “free” trial offers as well. I guess we should really stick with the tried and true saying “if it sounds too good to be true…then it probably is (false, that is)”
Thanks again. Trying to find that “magical” pill to aid in my exercising so I can look nice for my brother’s wedding. In case you cared…chuckling out loud. Too much time on my hands that is…
Michelle
I fell into the trap on 4/27/2010 and ordered 2 free trial products offered (the acai berry pills and some colon health pills). The website stated that the offer went until Friday 4/28/2010. I received both of the first 2 bottles without more than 2 days of a wait. Then I went on vacation and forgot about the free trial deadline to cancel, so my card was charged again. Upon returning from vacation, I called on today 5/20/2010 to cancel both products after getting 2 separate 800 numbers from my banking account. After going back to the original link I noticed that the comments are from the same people and in the same order however, the dates were more recent showing that some were made on 5/19/2010 (yesterday) when I specifically remember that the dates were closer to my original purchase date.
To make matters worse when I called the number to cancel the acai product, a female representative named Tiffany took the info and sent a confirmation email. When I called the number for the colon health, a male representative named Oran (spelled how it sounded) came on the line and told me that I had just canceled my account and had been sent out a confirmation email. I asked him which product was he talking about since I clearly hadn’t canceled the colon pills yet and he instructed me that the only product that they have are the colon pills.
Answer me this, how when the products are no where alike, can you have 2 separate numbers and they reach just one of the products. I may still have to deal with this, but I will obviously not be dealing with either one of these companies again.
E – Yes, it is very upsetting what they can get away with. Mostly because the pop up and then disappear.
IMO, google is partly to blame because they take money to show the ads for these scammers, when they could easily stop showing them.
I read the article from Julia that tested acaipure. I was curious so I googled news 6 with Julia and found it again only to see that she claimed to have used acai slim. So I knew it was definately a fake.
Here’s the other despicable issue that nobody has mentioned. MSNBC approved the advertisement apparently. The news media giant ought to be sued for exposing so many people to this scam in the first place. Shame on you, MSNBC. Alot of people lost money, because your advertising sales executive was to busy making a commission rather than validating the claims to begin with.
I just read part of it, terribly printed. Capitals where there should’t be, very unprofessionally made, knew immediately it was a fake. Being a Canadian I knew it was lacking the .ca in the address as well.
I followed an ad to the fake Channel 6 site “channel6reports.com/health.” That was my first clue to be suspicious. I also noticed the typos. Then I thought it was strange how biased towards the products the “reporter” was. Then I noticed that everything on the page was about the acai berry. Hmmm! When I clicked on the site’s link for Home page, it brought me back to the
“report” I’d just been reading. Clicking on other links took me to a completely different news site called “newsvine.com.” Try to go to just “www.channel6reports.com” and the page doesn’t even exist! I’m re-reading the article and laughing at myself for even considering it to be true. A second reading makes it obvious that the scammer who wrote the article did not have the literacy skills that a professional reporter’s writing style would reflect. Bottom line- if it sounds too good to be true, further investigation usually proves that it is!
The typos in the text were my first clues that this report was too good to be true. And, just a hunch that the model/reporter did not need to lose 45 pounds.
Here’s an important sentence from the small print on the page at onlinehealthnews7.com
“Thus, this page, and any page on this website, are not to be taken literally or as a non-fiction story. ”
Caveat emptor. Let the buyer beware. One sentence is all you need.