There has been an ongoing scam in Spokane, WA that relates to small businesses and credit card services. It seems it has been going on for more than 10 years all over the country. The company? Northern Leasing Systems (they have several other names). They are associated with I payment they are also full of bad business practices.
Seemingly offering a good solution to the rising costs of offering credit card purchases; the hook? Wholesale prices for swipes. The reality? Three times the costs and then once the company has access to your business account they start taking out extra amounts that repeat and increase each month.In some cases double billing customers and forcing the merchant to be responsible for reimbursement.
Customer service calls cost more than ten dollars per each call. Then there are the unexplained costs. The $70.00 on the first of the month then the $16.99 and then $12.99 and then customers getting double charges and the $69.99 formiscellanea, and other charges which because they will not answer questions I could not find out what they were for and then they sent another notice, mind you to the wrong addressthen the demand for paying taxes every other month of $27.99 this is all before the cost of the swipe. How do I know? Myself, and several other companies were scammed right here in Spokane.
Conning all of us with my poor children, and pulling out the: my wife died and I am left with 3 children to raise by myself, Gene and his brother Dwight Olson raked in several business persons before we caught on and began passing the word.As with other complaints against them they were fast talking pushy and very cagey.
Unfortunately, we have had to go to the police because of the fraud.
In my case they did not even bother to fill in the correct address of my business, when I got the contract back it was suddenly quite a few pages long and it had white out all over it. This Gene person ran in and threw it on my desk and tore out the door really fast after I called and demanded a copy of the contract. When I finally got a copy I noticed this Gene Olson's name was not even on the contract. Hunting down the name on the contracts we found out that this Gene Olson had been fired from the company months before and the person by the name of John Tortola who supposedly signed the contracts was in Oregon so he could not have signed the contracts so this Gene person or his brotherDwight filled in his name as the official salesperson. This John Tortola person did not even know who I was when I called and would not talk to me.
So my contract iscompletelyfraudulent.
Then I began to notice the constant extra amounts that were coming out of my account with no explanation. When I tried to talk to the company they just hung up on me. Then on December 23, 2010 the machine stopped accepting credit cards and they still would not answer my calls. Up until that point in time I was not only paid in full up front because they were taking out the money directly but because they took all kinds of money out of my account and were describing them as 'extra charges', and call here for explanation. So, I tried to call again and nothing they would not speak to me. It was like I did not exist. So, I went to my bank and closed out my account figuring that would be the only way to keep them from continuing to take money that did not belong to them. Now, they are calling every day and sending out notices for more extra charges. I also noticed that my signature had been forged on one of the contract pages that I did not originally see, it was obvious it had been practiced and there was a different pen used. Anyway from the phone calls it seems all of us are in it for the long run but we are pursuing a police complaint and are going to the Attorney General of Washington. If there are any other small businesses in Spokane and CD'A who want to join us in this quest to end our nightmare with this company don't hesitate to respond to this post and we will include you in the support group and help you get on the police report and get you into the papers for the Attorney General.
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