Pinnacle Finance, Inc. Pinnacle Finanace, Inc. may be an advance fee broker scam! Raleigh, North Carolina

I was contacted by Lauren Hall from Pinnacle Finance, Inc.  via email on October 10th and was told that I was approved for a $10,000 loan at 7% for 60 months, with a  payment of $200.38/month.  They sent me a contract to sign that had these details as well as information about loan insurance ($750  for standard coverage or $1500 for premium coverage).  If I was interested in the loan, I was to fax pages 2 and 5 signed back to her along with a pay stub, drivers license and government ID (e.g. SSN).  She also mentioned that the insurance premium must be paid up front in order to process and release the loan.  I questioned her about that and she said they asked for it up front due to my credit (I had a poor credit score).  She said the money is to be placed on a GreenDot MoneyPak card and I was to give her the number.  Once she has the "insurance" payment, the loan would be processed and released to the bank and I should have it within 12 to 24 hours.  I complied with all of this and then waited. I told her I was trying to be cautious in asking a lot of questions and this is what she replied:

"I completely understand where you are coming from, especially with the horror stories that I have heard from clients. I have sent the information to accounting for processing. I will send you a confirmation email before the end of the business day verifying that the payment has been received and we have deposited the $10,000.00"

When I didn't hear from her at the end of the day, I contacted her and she responded:

"The accounting department has processed your payment and issued the release of the full $10,000.00.  Unfortunately, because the payment was processed in the afternoon we did not make the deadline for the midnight deposit. You will see the funds post to your account anytime after 3pm tomorrow afternoon."

I tried to email her the next day and my emails bounced back, indicating that the receiving server though my address was spam.  I kept on trying throughout the weekend to send emails and finally I emailed her from another account.  I then checked my account on Monday and - nothing.  I  called twice and left messages but got no response.  Then I get an email
from the Accounting Department  (Alex Mithers, 800-597-4017 x8123) which says that they have my loan file now and let them know a good time for  them to contact me.

After calling and leaving messages, I finally spoke with Alex Mithers (ext. 8123) from the Accounting Department and sure enough - he says they use a 3rd party insurance company and the insurance company wanted $1500 dollars instead of $750 dollars to secure the $10,000 loan and release the funds. He said he negotiated the amount down to $1000, so I only need to pay an additional $250 dollars to satisfy the insurance payment and have the funds released. I told them I am not paying any more money for "insurance" and either they can reduce the amount of the loan to $5000 so that the $750 insurance payment I already paid would be enough to cover the "insurance" for that amount, or I want a refund of my insurance money
since I am not getting the loan. He said he would start processing the decreased loan amount of $5000 dollars and get back to me.  I have been monitoring their page on the BBB website and recently they changed the phone number to the 800 number (the other number on the page showed up as disconnected).  I have also reported them to the local BBB in Raleigh and will file a report with the FTC to get these people caught.