Active Network review: active advantage trial membership scam 144

I also received a charge on my debit card for $59.95 and after doing some research found that it was a charge for some crazy membership that I supposedly signed up for while registering for a race in Jan 2012. I called today to find out what exactly it was and like so many others found out that it is a big scam. Still not really sure what the membership is for even after listening to the representative try to explain it. When I asked if this was legal I was told that this was a universal company (like that makes a difference). I was told that I would receive my $$ back in 3 - 5 days, but I won't hold my breath...

This company is using deceptive business practices and knows it. It will only be a matter of time before various State Attorney General Offices and private attorneys begin to sue them. I usually hate to see companies forced out of business, but can't wait to see this one reap what they have sown. On a humorous note, the event that I was taken advantage of at was sponsored by a large corporate law firm. Now the participates, attorneys, and their relatives are all upset at this company. :) Do I smell blood in the water?

So my husband reseves an campsite on reserve america and we get charged 59.95 for an service we didnt even get. We dont run. I will be complaining to Bank of America and listing this purchase as fraud. Probaly ask for a new card too since this is identity theft pure and simple.

Dear Active Advantage, this is a very deceptive method of enrolling racers into your $59.95 yearly program! I am a long time runner. I love racing! I want to be able to sign up for what I want, when I want, without having to always worry about un-checking the stupid little "trial membership" box. Unfortunately, when registering for races on line, it is almost always through Active these days. I am usually extremely careful about un-checking that box, but this time you got me! It has become more of just a bit of an "annoyance" now!

I received an email Friday night about my trial ending soon and I would be getting charged the $59.95 if I didn't cancel. I immediately called your customer service. Well, guess what? Your customer service was closed when I called Friday evening. Apparently it is closed Saturday morning too...oh yes, and Sunday...ALL weekend! I had NO chance to cancel after your email! I was absolutely shocked to find out you have absolutely no customer service on weekends! You have no idea what kind of financial situation this now puts me in! My checking account went into the negative because of your charge and I now have hefty fees associated with that! I am so disappointed in your company.

I have 2 more races this fall that I need to sign up for. But if I am not refunded my full $59.95, I will NEVER even consider going through Active.com again. I will request each race director to mail me a paper registration form, just like in the honest olden days. I will also make sure to spread word of this scam throughout my own running community and the gym which I instruct many group fitness and running classes at.

Please do the honest thing, keep a long time, loyal user and contact me about returning my stolen money.

I got charged on my credit card on 07/06/2012 in the amount of $59.95 which I never authorized and I don't even know what this
company does! I am wondering how this company got my credit information & Charged to my account!
Trisha,

So everyone who has had a similar issue, please file with the BBB, the FTC and your State's Attorney General.

In my case, active was quietly taking money from my account which is absolute fraud. Again, I never signed up at any point, nor could they give me any kind of confirmation, be it an account number, member number, email or receipt. They could not prove that I signed up other than to say "We have your email so you must have signed up."

I have every single active.com email and confirmation since 2004 (May 7th 2004 to be exact), so this is not a mistake on my part, I have 0 confirmation from them about any sort of trial or membership to anything. Additionally, I was listed on the site as "not an advantage member" despite having been charged for 2 years.

Fraud should be investigated:
BBB
FTC
and
State's Attorney General.

I understand that some people here have mentioned about rushing through the process and not clicking on "no thanks." The problem is, saying "no thanks, " is exactly what I did. I always say "no thanks" and I've signed up for several races.

This time, however, saying "no thanks" did not stop active.com from charging my card. They claim I signed up for the advantage membership free trial and was charged when that trial ended. Some people here got emails about the free trial, I received no such confirmation from them. I have all my race confirmations from the past few years, and I have my confirmation for the 2011 Chicago Tri registration but nothing else from active.com with regards to any sort of membership. I have no email confirmations about an advantage active membership, I was not informed I was signed up nor was I ever informed that my card would be charged.

They couldn't even provide me with my "advantage membership number" even though I've been paying for it for two years. Their website listed me as not an "advantage member" with a big sign up now button next to it, even though they've been charging me for two years.

When I called they said, "You provided your email address to us and that's all the confirmation we require." I told them I had to provide my email for race registration and asked that they kindly resend any sort of active membership confirmation showing that I authorized them to charge my card. I even asked them to resend my confirmation email or let me know what date it was sent, which they were unable to do. All I want is for them to show me at what point I willingly gave them and signed up for an additional membership, which they cannot do. Not even tell me my membership number.

I only found out about said membership when I got an email from them today telling me my membership would be renewed. The number listed on the email was disconnected. I assumed it was a phishing scam, and was furious to find out it's real. There are just too many "mistakes" from active, oh we "mistakingly" didn't send you an email confirmation or reminder when your trial was up, and we "mistakingly" have a disconnected phone number on the email when we renewed your account. Phishy, phishy.

I'm very interested in what a class action lawsuit would yield and I'd love to know how widespread this problem is. Again, I'm familiar with the "no thanks" part of the process and I always click it so I'm not sure where they gained authorization to charge my account. Even with the "no thanks, " I find it to be highly mis-leading. In the meantime I've filed with the BBB, the FTC and am filing a complaint with the Attorney General here in Illinois.

I take unauthorized withdrawals from my bank account very seriously and the fact that they cannot prove to me or show me any confirmation of where and when I agreed to this, as well as having a disconnected number attached to the renewal email, makes me highly suspect of their business practices.

I was signed up some how by reserving a NY state campsite through Reserve America. There weren't any pop up ads for Active advantage
yet when I completed my reservations for the state park I received a conformation email from Active Advantage thanking me for signing up for a 30 day trial. I just assumed that by reserving a campsite I was automatically signed up because I never saw a screen with Active Advantage any wheere on the Reserve America site. The only information I entered at the time was the information Reserve America required to reserve a camping site, car model, type of camping equipment, and charge card information. Now I just received notification that Active Advantage will automatically charge my charge card for a membership fee. They had to get my charge card information from the reserve America site somehow.

Somebody needs to take these guys to court over this crap. It is FRAUD regardless of what they say. They said they would refund but it has been 3 months with nothing and when I called they said whoops we will try again. Then the next week low and behold I see three new charges from them and they now say we ordered magazines too. if anyone is interested in filing a class action let me know as I would be all for it.

useful service, however, merged with unscrupulous business practices. A website that has this level of complexity and the ability to charge a credit card, has absolutely NO REASON at all in 2012, to not have an easy online cancel option. Crooks.

I've signed up for a couple of races recently, but I don't recall signing up for an active.com trial membership (which just became a full membership yesterday). I'm usually careful about reading fine print and opting out of junk offers, but apparently this one slipped through. The company is obviously aware that this is an issue, they must be making $$$ charging us witless athletes! Regardless, it was easy enough to cancel. Reading through these complaints, it looks like we're all going to have to be sure to review our bank statements NEXT year as well...looks like at least one person was charged the following year after cancellation.

Active.Com Active Advantage. I would advise no one use this service ever! They have been near impossible to get in touch with and the $59.95 charge to my bank was cryptic to say the least. After waiting over an hour on hold three weeks ago, the customer service rep was easy to deal with, and said she would cancel my membership and refund my money in 7-10 days. I still haven't seen my refund! I have emailed them, so we'll see if I have to call back. The site says you will be notified in advance of an automatic membership renewal, but that is false false false. This is unacceptable conduct!

Just happened to me! Found an "ACT*Registration" transaction for $59.95 on my bank statement. When I googled it thankfully I found this site because otherwise I would not have known what it was! I haven't ran a race, or hence used the site, in over two years!

I can't believe they kept my card information (which I don't remember agreeing to because I usually make sure not to store that info on websites) for so long! And just randomly charged me!

I called and they didn't fight me on it AT ALL which seems atypical when you ask for a refund. This makes me think it happens all the time.. such a scam!

Just happened to me! Just saw a transaction titled "ACT*Registration" for $59.95 and when I googled it I found this page thankfully! I wouldn't have known what it was otherwise! I haven't ran a race, or hence used the website, in over two years!

I can't believe they have my credit card info on file (I don't remember agreeing to that since I usually make sure not to store my info on these sites) and they kept it for so long! Money is tight for me right now and if I hadn't of noticed a check would've bounced! This is a scam!

But when I called they didn't fight me on this at all which makes me think it happens all the time.

I was assessed a $59.95 fee nearly 6 months after the last race for which I registered online. The website was sort of difficult and balky, so some things didn't seem to display right, and I thought I made clear that I was not signing up for anything but the stupid race I ran. I paid the extra fee that is assessed for those of us who didn't want to join anything. I always log on as a guest. I distinctly remember declining registration for special stuff. I pay extra fees for being a non-member.
I found the fee in with my Christmas purchases. For a minute, I thought that someone had registered me for the ACT, which, since I'm 7 years out of a PhD program, would be pretty redundant.
I could not connect it with any 30-day-trial that had expired. The only thing I can figure is that, when I was using an old computer or a Mac in October of last year when registering for a half marathon, I missed that button. It's not very clear, to be sure. And, since that time, I have been registering as a guest, so I have NOT recouped any of their "membership fees" with their special discounts.
Rest assured, I will be very, very careful when registering for any more runs.
Sadly, this seems to be the service that most of the organizations in the area like to use.

I can add even worse--I was double billed for this feature, which I wanted, so I could get discounts. They gave me the run around on refunding my money, then finally took the extra off--along with my subscription! So i've paid and have nothing. They won't help me and I'm still paying full cost for races. It really concerns me to think that they are handling so much money for charities and organizations if this is how poorly they run things.

I had no idea I had signed up for this. All I thought I signed up for was the race I was registering for. I was charged 59.95 extra for the active.com membership.

I just called about the issue and they were extremely helpful and speedy. They answer my call in about a minute. I told them the issue and they even informed me that I had been charged this same thing last year. I told them I had no idea about the membership and they are in the process of refunding me for both 59.95 charges.

So although they someone scammed me, im happy how helpful they were. I'll be checking back in 3 to 5 days to see if they actually refund the money.

It's even worse for me - I never signed up for anything EVER (I am on disability and not buying things, completing runs, etc.) Today I got an email in a mail account that I am pretty careful with from activeadvantage@yourproductupdates.com via bluehornet.com - and at the bottom it says I was added on September 21, 2011. So I have to go to an unknown to me site to 'opt out' so I'm basically confirming my info to someone I never wanted to do business with. Now that I see you are all getting bogus charges, and I have no idea where they got my info, I guess I need to watch all my credit cards for the random $59.95 charge. If you click to go to their privacy statement in big letters it says they changed it on 9/15/11 but the verbiage on the front page is still from May 2009 (an honest company would have the "new" one showing, not an old one with a disclaimer).
Here's the privacy stmt:
If addition, if at anytime, you no longer want us to send you any regular communications, you may “opt-out” of such future communications, clicking on the “unsubscribe” link at the bottom of the newsletter or email. To “opt-out” of products, programs, services, or offers from our trusted partners, please contact privacy@activenetwork.com.

I tried to call but of course got vm - so no way was I going to leave my phone # so they could sell that too! I hope others have filed complaints - I am on every opt out list and privacy org opt outs and yet these bozos keep going.

In the same boat - got me on the 30 day trial - didn't remember until too late. Then they just got me again with the surprise removal of $59 from my account a year later. No advance warning or reminder. Almost put my account over the limit. No benefit from the membership - was cheaper to mail a check to race organizers. Am now pregnant and unlikely to race more in the coming year so would not have renewed even if I had been satisfied with the service. Also had huge difficulties whenever I wanted to log in and enter their giveaway competitions. Hope they give me a refund.

My husband signed up for a 5k in August and we got charged the 59.95 without any idea of why. This is very unethical and deceptive of active.com. They should be ashamed of themselves for running such a scam. Yes, I understand that as consumers we need to be careful, but it is a sneaky and underhanded way to get people to sign up for their site. My husband ran for a charity event and apparently no good deed goes unpunished.

Technically it is not a scam but it is very bad business IMHO. Anyone planing events should choose a different vendor for taking entry fees as these guys are weasels.

Same thing here. They signed me up with no real warning and used credit card info that was meant only for my registration fees. They make it sound like they are just going to send you an email with info about activeadvantage but it is really a membership agreement.
I like using active.com, this is the third time I have registered through their site, but will be extremely careful in the future. I will register at local running shops when possible.

I completely accept responsibility for not reading the fine print. I knew I was signing up for a free trial. But, I did not understand that I had to pay in 30 days nor did I realize I had the option to opt out of it. The thing that sucks is when I tried to login to the Active.com website and view the race I registered for, there wasn't any races listed under my events. Then I tried to view something else and it told me I was not AUTHORIZED to view this webpage. So, I never thought another thing about it.

My husband just noticed the charge today, it was charged last week. I called and the woman said she would refund it. But, the thing is: she had NO record of my email account. When I logged in, it stated I was not an Active Advantage member. So, why was I charged $59.95 for a membership that Active.com has no record of my email address and my profile states I am NOT a member?!

I'm just glad they said they would refund my money. I can't imagine how paying $59.95 annual would be worth it. Especially if you don't sign up for enough races to get any kind of discount.

Thank you for posting this complaint. It was very helpful to me when I too needed to contact Active Advantage to cancel my "subscription" with them. Luckily because I checked my credit card statement the same day the charge came through "Nathan" with customer service said that I will receive a full refund within 3-5 business days. Thanks again for looking out for all of us!

I agree, I was shocked to receive an email that they were going to post a $59 charge on my credit card. This should be illegal.

I agree with the prev comments. I am carefull to read everything before hitting accept. I dont' recall ever saying sign up for a free trial. Any time I see a free trial I say no. However when calling their number it took all of 5 minutes to have someone tell me that they would refund the money. Even though it was an easy process, i wonder how many people dont look at their statemtns and lose that money

HERE IS THE EMAIL REPLY I GOT FROM ACTIVE.COM. NOW THEY TELL ME IN ORDER FOR THEM TO REFUND THE 2ND CHARGE OF $59 DOLLARS, I WILL HAVE TO FURNISH PROOF WITH BANK RECORDS. I FIND IT AMAZING THESE JOKERS THINK THEY CAN SEND ME AN AUTO RENEWAL NOTICE, OK AFTER I CATCH THEM NOW THEY ARE WILLING TO REFUND THE $59 DOLLARS BUT THE BURDEN OF PROOF FOR THE FIRST FRAUD CHARGE OF $59 THEY WON'T! I AM CALLING THE BETTER BUSINESS BURUOU TOO. Hi Jeffrey,

I received your email about cancelling your ActiveAdvantage membership and I have taken care of that for you. Our offer of a 30-day trial of the ActiveAdvantage program was presented to you after your activity registration through the Active Network and required two steps of acceptance to start the trial. As mentioned in the 30-day trial offer details presented after registration, and also linked to from the trial-membership confirmation email (ActiveAdvantage offer details), customers are always protected by our money back guarantee—if someone is ever dissatisfied with the program during the trial period or after, they simply have to contact us about a refund. We apologize for any misunderstanding about the details of the offer and we have canceled and refunded your membership. IN QUOTES:
" Below is a screenshot to show confirmation that I have canceled your membership as well as refunded the $59.95 membership fee back to your credit card. It looks like you were canceled and refunded last year on 11/17/10. Were you charged again? Could it be under a different email address? I know sometimes customer’s sign up under a different email address and end up with two accounts. If you do not show another email address it could be under and you were charged recently I will need proof with a bank statement showing the charges. You may cross out everything except the ActiveAdvantage charge and I will have to do a check request for that amount if that is the case. "

ATTENTION! I TOO HAVE BEEN VICTIMIZED BY ACTIVE.COM. WE NEED EACH AND EVERYONE OF YOU TO CALL THE FTC AND FILE A COMPLAINT AGAINST THEM AND ANY OTHER ORGANIZATION THAT USED THEM TO GET YOU TO SIGN UP. [protected]. THE FTC ONLY TAKES COMPLAINTS AS A GROUP. PLEASE CALL AND COMPLAIN. WE NEED TO FIND A STOP TO THIS.

You are all idiots! If you READ the web page it clearly states that you are opting in to their offer. Quit being victims and be accountable for YOUR actions!

The same thing happened to me! Thank you to all who have written and called Active. Also, thank you for the article and blog post to help people like me figure out what the heck is going on. When I called Active the representative simply said "Hi, are you calling about the $59.95 charge to your credit card?" This let me know I was not the first to call and complain and made the process quick and painless. I work at a financial institution and could easily get the charge covered under provisional credit until Active refunded me the registration fee. I received an email confirmation today that my account will be refunded.
Thanks again!

I have had the same problem only I never signed up for any races or anything else. I have no idea how these people got myt credit card number or any other information.
I guess buyer beware really comes into play when dealing with this company or anyone affiliated with them.

Active.com (aka Active Advatange) is a SCAM! Yes, Active Advantage is a SCAM! They trick you in to signing up by sneaking their "offer" in. After getting the email that I will be charged and my membership will continue, I went to their site to check my profile settings. Wouldn't you know I did NOT have a profile and the email they sent the charge to isn't even registered with their site. How is it possible to charge me for being a member when I don't even have an account? Scam. I am so pissed! What a terrible, corrupt company. I am also complaining to the company I signed up for the race with so they are aware.

I have to respectfully disagree with the perception that Active.com is deceitful in their annual trial membership offer. I've been signing up for events through Active on occasion since 2004. I remember seeing the trial membership offer more recently last year and after READING the page, declined.

When I realized that I would be signing up for more events this year, I opted to try the trial membership in order to save on processing fees. I received a confirmation email on 9/13/2010. On 10/13/2010, I received the following email from Active:

"Dear ActiveAdvantage member,

Congratulations on joining thousands of Active members already saving with ActiveAdvantage. This is a quick reminder to let you know that your trial membership has expired, and we have extended your membership for a full 12 months as stated in the original offer. The annual membership charge of $59.95 will appear on your next credit card statement. If you have any questions about your ActiveAdvantage membership, please don't hesitate to email us at ActiveAdvantage@active.com or visit the Contact Us page on the member website. "

Pressing on the "Contact Us" link in the email leads you to the following page:

"ActiveAdvantage is the premium membership of Active.com. ActiveAdvantage provides members with discounted Active.com event registrations, discounts at hundreds of retailers, hotel and rental discounts, and some of the best gear discounts available. The list of benefits is always growing!
Please contact us if you are having difficulty redeeming an offer, would like more information about ActiveAdvantage, or would like to provide feedback on how to make the membership work better for you.
Phone:
[protected]
Email:
activeadvantage@active.com"

Since joining, I've saved about $33 on processing fees. I've been able to sign my boyfriend and sister up for events under my account and save on their processing fees as well. The membership has its advantages if you participate in a lot of events.

In any case, I just wanted to make a point that I've enjoyed their service. I never felt that they were attempting to scam people. I've contacted them once to update my address and they were courteous and professional.

I'd also like to state that I am not associated with the company, nor do I work for them.

Bottom line is, with any thing you buy online, read before you click through!

This membership is not sneaky, deceitful, or thieving in anyone shape or form. You have to opt into this by selecting yes and enter in an email address. The reason people are getting this is that they DON"T READ.. and zoom through a registration.. I learned this the hard way when my husband signed up for some events.. then we got the charge I called and they canceled it... My husbans said he never read anything and wanted to get it done uuggg.. However we did outright buy the membership this year since we now save up to 10 bucks a registration and get our movie tickets for 7 bucks .

I had a very pleasant experience getting a refund. I noticed the charge on my credit card statement on 11/30/10. I found the toll-free number to call. I forget what day I called but there was no hassle/problem and my credit card bill got fixed on 12/6. Very easy. Hopefully others will have the same experience. Thanks.

This happened to me too and I do NOT do races of any sort. I haven't ever heard of this site ever in my life. I was checking my credit card statment and this merchant caught my attention. I disputed the charge and they will follow up an investigation. I emailed customer service for ACtive.com warning them about a police report I would file if they do not produce proof of how I signed up for anything with them.
If you filed an Identity Theft charge against Active.com the police will get the IP that produce the so call "sign up".
Fraud charges may be another alternative.
Thank you for these postings, now they are evidence for my investigation.
Thanks,
Sincerely
Celsa Canedo

I have just experienced the same thing! You would think since so many people have complained about this, that they would change it. I would like to keep using Active, but not if I don't trust the them. They were really nice about refunding my money, so I do appreciate that. I am glad I looked this up and am not the only person this happened to. I hope they change things so others don't need to deal with this.

I work at a class action law firm and we are investigating Active.com’s use of consumers’ credit cards without their permission or prior notice. I am interested in talking to people and hearing about their experiences with the company. Please contact me at Chuck2010DC@gmail.com if you’ve been charged for any unwanted services, products or memberships by Active.com or its parent company, The Active Network, Inc. Thanks, Chuck.

I absolutely hate these guys. I am from Canada and even though they did give me a refund both times they charged me (yes, both times!) I lost money on the exchange fees which they didn't reimburse me for. They held on to my credit card information for a whole year and then charged me renewal fee for my cancelled membership from last year. I think anyone who has experienced this company's abuse should boycott all events that have anything to do with them!

Just happened to me as well. Same story as all before, it was easy to cancel and refund, but still a pain to have to do. And the fact that the first option on the voice recording is regarding this charge and any questions you may have regarding it completely confirms that it's the MOST COMMON issue for which they receive calls! For all of us that notice the charge, I wonder how many people don't pay enough attention to their accounts to catch it? Sneaky, sneaky and bad business.