Carstens Publications has been warning subscribers to Railroad Model Craftsman about this company and several others that are scams, with half page notices for several months now.
It's certainly no secret that magazine publishers sell subscriber lists to anyone who waves dollars in their face.
What's even worse are these store "savings cards" that many of them want you to sign up for. They sell your personal information to all sorts of shady businesses that will start pestering you unmercifully. The biggest problem with these people is, once you sign up for one of their cards and reveal your telephone number, everyone they sell your identity to can ignore the "no caller" list because you have "voluntarily" given out your number and have agreed to accept telephone solicitations. That's one of the provisions in the tiny, tiny, legal mumbo jumbo on the card agreement.
i had a similar occurance a while back and Kalmbach admitted to me that they had sold mailing lists to others and some of them were shady operators. they went on to say that they were working with state's attorney's offices around the country to get the abuse stopped.
another example of our changing times. the bean counters run everything. i doubt if Al Kalmbach would have compromised the integrity of his organization for a few pennies per name. then again, who knows?
it's all b.s. anyway. these outfits preach security and privacy etc. blah blah blah and then when you try to deal with them, they want to know what color sox you are wearing.
grizlump (grumpy german)
I'm wondering how they knew you had a subscription with MR and how they got your name and address?
Jim
Watch out for bogus "bills" being sent to subscribers to MR. I just got one from a firm called PBA, 1350 E Flamingo Rd #749, Las Vegas, NV 89119 phone 1-888-301-3483. They sent me what looks like a bill for MR for 39.95, wanting response by 8/31/2009. My real subscription doesn't expire until 2012. In fine print at the bottom of the bill it says Not a Bill. What a scam. Fore-warned is fore-armed.