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Report: #878236

Complaint Review: TopSeo.net - Sarasota Florida

  • Submitted:
  • Updated:
  • Reported By: Scott — Boston Massachusetts United States of America
  • Author Not Confirmed What's this?
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  • TopSeo.net 6877 Whitman Way Sarasota, Florida United States of America

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Tim Mathews (d/b/a TopSeo.net) offered a list of 6 billion E-mail addresses for $850.  I do research on Internet domains, and fell for his offer.

He sent a package with lots of files, but only 200 million E-mail addresses.  He admitted it was not what I ordered.  Yet he did not refund my money (as required by law, as he was unable to deliver the product I ordered within 30 days).

He kept making claims that he was going to send out new data, but he clearly doesn't have it, and did not send it (he said several times that he had sent a new package, but I never got it, and he could not provide a tracking number).

The most important red flags before I ordered:

[1] When I ordered, I tried paying via credit card (as it is the only method that gives you some protection), but his site claimed that the card was declined.  I now believe his site automatically states that cards are declined, as he has no merchant account.

[2] He requested that I pay via PayPal. That sounds OK, but he had me send it to a "Robert Smith" using a generic gmail account, not to an @topseo.net E-mail address. Some people use multiple PayPal accounts if PayPal suspends one.

If doing business with them, you should NEVER send payment except via credit card, and be sure to count what you get.

This report was posted on Ripoff Report on 05/04/2012 06:42 AM and is a permanent record located here: https://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/topseonet/sarasota-florida-34243/topseonet-tim-mathews-refuses-to-refund-product-he-does-not-have-sarasota-florida-878236. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year. Ripoff Report has an exclusive license to this report. It may not be copied without the written permission of Ripoff Report. READ: Foreign websites steal our content

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REBUTTALS & REPLIES:
1Author
2Consumer
0Employee/Owner

#3 UPDATE Employee

Tracking information for package proves it was not delivered

AUTHOR: TopSEO.net - (United States of America)

POSTED: Sunday, May 06, 2012

R SCOTT PERRY claims we received the package supposedly containing our USB drive set containing the 6 billion emails data, but it has clearly not been delivered.
It does appear that USPS have lost the package, as the last update shows the package he shipped is out for delivery April 20th.
When we shipped r scott perry's data out to him, we insured the package for $850, the value of the product and data, for piece of mind should anything arise in shipment.
It would appear, r scott perry, in all his infinite wisdom, was not smart enough to do the same.
Now, paypal have refused to refund his payment because he cannot prove he shipped it back.
Looks like the scammer, r scott perry, has been caught trying to steal and paypal aren't having any of his scam.
As we have maintained from the beginning, we would have gladly returned r scott perry's money once the data and usb drives were returned. Since r scott perry refused to return the merchandise he paid for, we have no choice but to not refund his payment.
It is a shame, really. We typically come across scammers and thieves, but they seldom live in the US, let alone Massachusetts as R Scott Perry does.
Good luck to you, scott.  

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#2 Author of original report

Proof I sent the product back, and am entitled to a refund

AUTHOR: scott1 - (United States of America)

POSTED: Friday, May 04, 2012

Folks, do you want to do business with a company, knowing that if they send you the wrong product, they will neither send the correct product nor refund your money?  And then publish your address, and your correspondence with them?

Tim complains in his rebuttal that I refuse to return the USB drives (worth about $20), and that he will refund my money if I return them.  However, I returned the drives several weeks ago (he even posted a link to the tracking -- https://tools.usps.com/go/TrackConfirmAction?qtc_tLabels1=23100740000017924152 -- that proves I sent them, and they got at least as far as his postal carrier's truck).

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#1 UPDATE Employee

R. Scott Perry REFUSES to ship merchandise back but expects a refund.

AUTHOR: TopSEO.net - (United States of America)

POSTED: Friday, May 04, 2012

We have been in contact with R Scott Perry (who knows why he would attempt to hid his name here, perhaps it is because he is unwilling to have people know how his scam works) about the issue with
his order.

He received over 6 billion emails via USB Drive set (16 gig each drive) AND DOWNLOADING the data through our servers.

Do a search for his name and you can clearly see he has been involved in several lawsuits.

Here is our most recent correspondance. He paid via paypal, disputed it after copying our data and refuses to send the hardware back to us, yet INSISTS we refund him. 

I can understand an unhappy customer, it happens from time to time. But how is keeping our merchandise AND demanding a refund acceptable? We informed him on several occasions that we would gladly refund his payment once we received our USB drive set back. 
R Scott Perry REFUSES to return our merchandise and thus we will not refund him. 

Scott,You seem to be under the impression we received the package you mailed. We did not. 
If we receive the items we shipped to you in an original, unaccessed state by 1pm tomorrow, we will have no problem issuing the refund.
There are over 6 billion emails in our database server. A great portion off these emails were sent to you on the USB (albeit you claim there were far less) drive set along with you downlading additional emails from 2 of our servers. After your continued undermining of the quantity of the data, the complete sql database was exported to the 500 GB SATA drive, per your requirement we sent to you that you claim you never received. You cannot tell me that all of the emails you did receive were duplicates of the emails you already have.
I have examined several hundred of the files you claimed to have run your scripts and queries on and the numbers I personally reached drastically mismatched yours. From the correspondence regarding your exporting data from the sources we provided to you, to me it looks like you seem to be running the query to remove emails based on parameters you set, whereas I personally ran the query in the simplest form. To export all before and after "@". This would be the simplest way to achieve an accurate count of the emails in the data you received. Perhaps if you restructure your query to this simple form, you would have an exponentially higher number. Then you could run a query to count the duplicates and remove them.
You seem to be an educated person and I wouldn't think you would be the type of person that would intentionally steal from us. 
We did not send the SQL export drive package track-able, this is obviously our mistake. We have prepaid priority postage and assumed since the first track-able package arrived to you sans error. We bubble wrapped it and sent it to you in the small priority box.
Had you not insisted we refund your payment without sending the items back we would have been more receptive to communication with you to ultimately resolve the issue. Your demands and insults made us feel like you were only attempting to rip us off and gain something for nothing. Not only did you demand a refund, you demand to keep our data and hardware. That is theft. Again, we have no problem issuing refunds for defective items, but you cannot keep it and get your money back.
You also mention filing a dispute with your credit card company if the paypal dispute does not go in your favor. You will lose this because the item was shipped to you and it has not been returned. You cannot buy something, keep it AND get your money back unless the merchant agrees to such a circumstance. Such cases are primarily seen when the cost of return shipping far outweighs the cost of the item.
You inferring that our Paypal account is disposable is insulting. We do not have disposable anything and seldom accept Paypal due to fraudulent overseas consumers (primarily African region, but we have been burned from darn near every country) and only offer it to select customers.
You claim you did not receive the 500 GB SATA hard drive with the sql db, yet it has not come back here.This concerns me, If it was not deliverable, why would it have not come back? You claiming we did not send the SATA drive to you as we had previously discussed is also insulting. We ship between 50 and 75 packages a week, be it a single CD, DVD Set or USB Drive sets... Of the 200+ packages we ship monthly, we seldom have more than 1 claim it wasn't received.
We do want your business and we want you to have the data you paid for. I have a couple ideas, I am thinking about dumping the sql db once again and putting it on another drive AND dump the emails into plain .txt files, one address per line at 1m emails per file. This would create several thousand txt files, but the simplicity of use would most definitely ease your querying of the data. This would require just over 120 gigs +/- for the txt files plus the sql db of 260 Gigs. The db is 64 bit.
I would like this to be resolved. Be it a refund or your having the data you paid for. 

Hi Tim,

Thank you for explaining your side.

What I did get from you amounted to about 350 million unique E-mail addresses, or about 6% of what I paid for.  And, since most of them duplicated E-mail addresses I already had, much had zero value for me whatsoever (whereas if you had supplied 6B E-mail addresses, only a small percentage could have duplicated what I already have).

If I saw someone advertising 350M unique E-mail addresses, I likely wouldn't pay more than $20 or so (as I would know that they could quite possibly all be duplicates to ones I already have).

In case PayPal did not update you, https://tools.usps.com/go/TrackConfirmAction?qtc_tLabels1=23100740000017924152 shows that the package made it to Sarasota, FL, and was out for delivery by the local postal carrier, who never got a signature.  I've sent/received thousands of packages, and this is the first that "disappeared" -- and also the first where the recipient had a lot to potentially gain ($850) compared to the value of the contents ($20 or so).

Also, you were required by law to issue a refund about a month ago, but did not.

You also claimed that you sent the hard drive, but I never received it -- and you never were able to provide a tracking number for it. Clearly, you never sent it.

I understand you do not like this situation any more than I do, but you run a business, and offered a product that you could not provide.  I have not sent E-mail to any address on the lists, nor will I.

Again, if I receive the full refund by 1PM tomorrow, I will consider the matter resolved.
                   -Scott


R, Scott or Perry,
We have not received your return, thus will not issue your refund. You
cannot have the product and your money back. That is theft.
Once your product is returned, if you have copied the data or accessed
it, then you will be responsible for it.
Since you claim you only received less than a billion emails, 1/6 of 850
is approximately $140, take that from 850 and you can have back about $720.
You claim you are so honest and holier than thou, so pay for what you got.
Stop trying to be a thief and get our data, drives and the money back
from paypal.
Tim

 I paid you $850 for a product that you admitted that you did not
   send me, and you are not being cooperative with a refund.  When
   something like that happens to me, I pursue it until I get what I am
   owed.

   So, I'd like to give you one last chance to refund my money.  It's
   up to you to decide what to do.

   If you do not refund the money voluntarily at this point, PayPal
   very likely will do so (although the postal carrier not having you
   sign for the package may interfere).  If PayPal doesn't refund my
   money, though, I will initiate a chargeback with the credit card
   company.  Given the circumstances (there is no doubt that I did not
   receive what I paid for), there should be no problem getting the
   refund (and PayPal charges you an extra $20 chargeback fee).  I know
   the Robert Smith PayPal account will likely be abandoned, but I will
   be happy to supply PayPal with the names, addresses, phone numbers
   that I have found for you, so they can take the appropriate action
   (in case they have had similar issues with you before).

   Also, I will go to the "ripoff" sites (you're familiar with them,
   you've posted to them), and explain that [1] if someone tries paying
   you with a credit card and it does not go through, and you ask them
   for other payment, it's a scam, [2] to count what they get, and [3]
   verify what they get (e.g. see if "user@nospam.example.com
   <mailto:user@nospam.example.com>" appears in opt-in lists).

   The Post Office hasn't yet gotten back to me regarding my case about
   the lost package.  I will follow up with that, and if necessary,
   contact the U.S. Postal Inspection Service
   (postalinspectors.uspis.gov <http://postalinspectors.uspis.gov>), as
   if you did not receive the package, it is clear a crime was
   committed (e.g. someone stealing the package, a USPS employee taking
   a bribe, etc.).

   I most likely would also contact the BBB, to add another complaint
   to your file.  I will also consider filing a police report with the
   Sarasota police department, as the USB drives are legally my
   property (unless you have received them, but you can discuss that
   with the police if I go that route).  And if all else fails, I will
   consider filing in small claims court.

   So this should be my last contact with you (unless you need more
   information from me for some reason), and if by this time tomorrow
   (1PM) I haven't heard back from you, I will go ahead take the steps
   I mentioned.  Of course, if you choose not to respond, you will need
   to remember it was your decision, and you had the chance to avoid
   the mess.
                                     -Scott

You can see we tried to refund him, he simply refuses to send our drives back. That is all he is required to do, but for some reason he cannot. We are standing our ground on refunding him. 

You can't buy something and say you are dissatisfied and expect to keep the item AND get your money back. Sure, I know McDonalds gives you another burger or your money back, but the burgers aren't $850!

R. Scott Perry
PO Box 821
Westborough, Massachusetts, United States, 01581

SEND THE DRIVES BACK AND YOU WILL GET A REFUND. 




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