USA Discounters settles disputes in Virginia

| October 2, 2016

Over two years ago, NHSparky wrote about USA Discounters which had a business plan that seemed to be all about ripping off the troops. Hack Stone sends us a link today about their settlement with Virginia victims;

Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring said in a statement Friday that the settlement with USA Discounters includes more than $10.5 million to over 8,000 Virginia customers. The settlement includes 49 states and the District of Columbia. Though the company settled, it denies any wrongdoing according to the agreement.

State officials alleged that USA Discounters engaged in deceptive advertising and abusive debt collection practices. Certain consumers will have remaining debt wiped out; others will get a $100 credit. The settlement’s terms also include a $40 million penalty.

Category: Crime

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Hack Stone

$100 credit. Great, they can use that $100 to purchase something from the USA Discounters catalog. Does anyone know if they happen to sell mailboxes?

A Proud Infidel®™

BUT do said mailboxes have DOORS or are they sold separately?

Hack Stone

Doors are an after market add on.

2/17 Air Cav

“The settlement’s terms also include a $40 million penalty.” Virginia made out well. The attys made out well. The victims? Fahgetaboutit.

Hack Stone

I heard that USA Discounters will be rebranding themselves, and start selling software to the federal government.

2/17 Air Cav

I heard that, too. I also heard that the business plan calls for overcharging the gov’t and investing a portion of the exorbitant overcharges in anticipation of the day they’re caught and agree to pay millions in settlement. It’s just one of the expected costs of doing business with the gov’t.

Hondo

Why not? Seems to have worked out pretty well for Total Call with respect to “ObamaPhones”.

http://valorguardians.com/blog/?p=65280

MSG Eric

Let me guess, they’re going to make home servers for Democratic politicians and their staffs?

Badum-tish!

Sparks

I always love these things. “No we admit doing nothing wrong at all. But hey, here’s $40 or $50 million for stopping by to ask.” Yea, no wrongdoing my ass. Just ripping off the ones who keep you free and are paid the least for doing it.

Shitbags!

Hack Stone

Bill Clinton never did anything wrong, he just decided that a bunch of women who claimed to be sexually harassed or sexually assaulted by him could use a couple of hundreds of thousands dollars.

Skippy

WTF !!!!

Hondo

Oh, and don’t forget their (possibly now former – I didn’t check) VP and General Counsel’s rather interesting career history.

HMCS(FMF) ret

They declared bankruptcy last year – I’d guess at about the time that this case was forwarded to the court. I’m surprised that a certain disbarred lawer that we all know didn’t hook up with USAD back in the day, since they share the same lover for suing people.

lily

Some Brits aren’t happy about this guy taking money from a veteran’s charity.

http://www.chortle.co.uk/news/2016/09/26/25852/jim_davidson_draws_salary_from_veterans_charity

Hack Stone

Maybe this is how Timothy Dorsey ended up working for USA Discounters:

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/1440554

Hack Stone

Surfing AGAI (Al Gore’s Amazing Internet), I came across this gem from 2003, where the Rent To Own (RTO) industry published a rebuttal the National Consumer Law Center (NCLC) claim that the RTO industry specifically targets military personnel. They had a particular issue with the NCLC featuring a photo of business named Everybody Rents located near Kings Bay Naval Base. The owner of Everbody Rents is a retired service member, and retired service members never use their prior service to take advantage of active duty personnel.

(Sorry, I should have issued a spew alert for that prior sentence)

http://www.rtoonline.com/Content/Article/May03/CryingGame052803.asp

Silentium Est Aureum

We finance E-1 and up!

And that $100 won’t do jack to help the credit of those idiot Joe’s who thought they could get lots of free shit with but a stroke of the pen.

Yes, USA Discounters, et al, bear some responsibility, but so do the brain dead morons who didn’t look beyond their wants at what the REAL cost would be.

Hack Stone

It’s not their fault. They all had dental appointments when they showed that training film during basic training. I actually know a Marine that purchased (on installment payments) an entire set of encyclopedias for his kid. And yes, his kid not only could not read, she was still in the womb. Money well spent by a PFC with a terrible credit rating.

2/17 Air Cav

Well, the 40 million penalty and settlement were not b/c the company treated its customers and potential customers fair and square. How many used car lots are there outside of Army posts? First real job + young + inexperienced = SUCKER.

justsayin

Shame this wasn’t Annunziata aka Bendandante or whatever his new name is now!
http://valorguardians.com/blog/?p=67477

FatCircles0311

Why isn’t the full settlement going to the victims instead of the majority of it going to government which wasn’t the victim?

What a joke.

Hack Stone

Usually in these types of lawsuits, an overwhelming majority of the money goes to the lawyers that filed suit. Uncle Sugar gets his cut. Whatever is leftover gets split among the hundreds, thousands or millions of victims. When the dust settles on the eventual lawsuit(s) against Wells Fargo for those fake accounts that were set up, the aggrieved parties will be lucky to see $35.

streetsweeper

its called “justice” when that settlement gets split amongst them lawers and victim’s…

rger769

Ubetcha. That is why plaintiffs’ class action “lawers” make millions and the lion’s share of every settlement goes to them. They even invent cases sometimes, paying the shill class representatives to sue. A big time class action lawyer was prosecuted and disbarred for such activities. But he is the exception.

rgr769

Sorry Jonn, I am rgr769.

Veritas Omnia Vincit

Somewhere in school along with teaching diversity, tolerance, and a strict adherence to the new code of the SJW perhaps we could take an hour or two and teach kids about money….being the way I am my kids knew more about money by the 6th grade than most of their teachers know to this day (my kids are in their 30s now for reference). A great many young people have no idea how credit really works or how bad some of the rates are and what it means to them long term. They lack the discipline to realize that building credit should never be considered access to free money. Especially at 26% for a new credit card for someone without a previous credit history.

These RTO places are all scams if you take 30 seconds and do the math. I mean JHC most of these places will charge you double for the convenience of payments. Who pays $3000 for a $1500 computer? If you can’t afford the $1500 maybe a computer isn’t your highest fucking priority right now…just a thought.

Shit happens to everyone, but some of this self-inflicted shit is really awful because the turds that operate these places know these kids don’t know shit about money and take advantage of that by selling them on the payment.

It’s no different than giving someone a mortgage with a giant balloon payment at the end when everyone involved except the poor bastard getting the loan knows they’ll never be able to make the final payment.