Be Wary of Free Trials of Acai Berry Products

Online scammers have been setting up websites to lure consumers in with “free trial offers” of various acai berry products. With demand for acai berry supplements constantly rising, so has the number of people looking to cash in on the trend. The best way to avoid being scammed when it comes to acai is to stay away from free trial offers and stick with reputable dealers, said Bryan Nettles of Bryan Nettles Pure Acai Products.

“Hundreds of thousands of people have been ripped off by companies who claim to offer free trials, tarnishing the good name of what is still a wonderful health food. As a general rule, people should stay away from any company offering free trials. We see these scammers putting up dozens of new websites everyday offering the free trial offers. Of the hundreds we have looked at, we have yet to find a single one that is a legitimate business,” said Nettles.

Although Pure Acai Products has never offered free acai trial, the company receives dozens of emails every day from people who have been scammed by tricksters. Many of these emails are mistakenly directed at Pure Acai Products because buyers have been unable to contact the companies they originally made orders with.

“These people email us thinking that we are the ones who stole their money because there’s no way to contact the con artists,” added Nettles.

One bemused customer wrote, “I was charged $89.31 for renewal on the acai berry vitamins and I never even received the sample of vitamins I had requested. I want my account refunded and I want nothing else to do with your company.”

The acai berry is touted as being the world’s newest superfood. Native of Brazil, the berries are said to contain high levels of fatty acids, fiber, antioxidants and other nutrients. The popularity of acai berry products is partly due to stars such as Rachel Ray and Oprah Winfrey featuring acai on their shows. Interest levels spike after each mention on television, but unfortunately the scammers are always aware of this.

On January 6, the Better Business Bureau (BBB) issued a warning about acai free trial offer scams. Tricksters tempt customers with offers of free trials, but problems ensue when people find out they are signed up for all sorts of products and subscriptions they don’t want.

Steve Cox, spokesman for BBB, said, “Many businesses across the country are using the same selling model for their acai products: they lure customers in with celebrity endorsements and free trial offers, and then lock them in by making it extremely difficult to cancel the automatic delivery of more acai products every month.”

There are hundreds of company names that people have filed complaints about. One of the most common is FX Supplements, which supposedly offers risk-free trials that involve buyers paying for nothing but shipping.

Customers have until the end of their trail to cancel their subscription or else find themselves lumbered with monthly charges of $85.90. What most people miss is that the trial begins from the day of the order.

Another company in the firing line is Central Coast Nutraceuticals, which again offers free acai trials of everything from acai supplements to acai tea. Buyers who don’t act quickly enough to cancel their subscriptions are then charged $40 a month.

So why don’t people just cancel their subscriptions? Likely they would – if they could ever get hold of the companies they ordered from. Customers who phone the hotlines are put on hold for anything up to 75 minutes – and even then there is no guarantee that they won’t be disconnected.

Dozens of new acai websites are unleashed on the Internet daily. Scammers move from one domain to the next, using pay-per-click advertisements to generate traffic. In November 2008 Google recorded more than 1.5 million searches for acai products. Sales of acai products were more than $15 million last year.

Nettles continued, “Sales of acai berry products are still growing. People haven’t been dissuaded from the actual products, but now they understand they have to be a bit more careful where they order from.”

Any offer of a free trial of acai products is likely to be a scam and hundreds of thousands of people have already fallen victim. Acai products come in various forms – juices, powders, capsules, jams and so on – and their popularity is showing no signs of slowing, despite the presence of fraudsters.

If you want to order acai products, find a reputable source that doesn’t push any too-good-to-be-true offers on shoppers.

Acai Berry Free Trial – How to Protect Yourself

I was inspired to write this article after seeing too many people post that they got charged because of the acai berry free trial they’ve ordered. Seeing how I somewhat disagree with the responses those questions receive – which are mostly screams of “it’s a scam” and complete denial of any responsibility for their own action. And so, this article was written, it will tell you exactly what you need to do so you don’t end up getting charged when you order your trial.

As you may know many companies producing acai berry capsules offer a free trial. It’s a pretty good deal, you pay for shipping and handling and then send you a month worth of capsules to try. However, unless you still believe in Santa you already know that there is nothing free in this world. So the question here is two fold: What’s the catch? And, do you care about that catch? There are many reasons for a company to give their product for free, but being nice or wanting you to get a free product is not one of them.

In this case the catch is that when you order your trial you are signed up for an auto shipment program, you will be sent a bottle every month and your credit card will be charged. Some companies will even do it as 3 month in advance, that is you are charged for 3 months worth and send 3 months worth of capsules, and you would be charged once ever 3 months obviously. The reason for this is because it’s fairly hard to return unused bottles for a refund, so i assume a lot of people don’t do it (kind of like mail in rebates)

Also, many companies will also sign you up for one or several additional, lower cost programs – weight loss newsletter or some such, sometimes they are listed on your order page as “free bonuses” but in reality they are just trials for those products, again, if you fail to cancel by a date specified, you will get charged. Last but not least, the trial period in most cases will start when you order, not when you get the product.

Now, all of these terms are clearly laid out in the “Term of Use” section of a web site that you buy from (ie. the site that will be asking you for credit card number) and is also often displayed on the page where you input your credit card numbers. And while hiding important details like this in terms of use section may be a bit shady, and probably isn’t the highlight of honest business practice, it isn’t much different than a cable ad I just got in my mail. In large letters it says “get cable for 29$ a month” than in smaller letter it says “for the first 3 months” than in even smaller letters it says “after that 60$” Advertising is advertising, it’s main purpose is to sell product, it’s up to the customers to make sure they understand all the conditions.

So, what you do to protect yourself from getting charged when you order a free trial of acai berry? It’s actually pretty simple. First read the terms of use section and note how many add on products you’ll be signed up for, and the time given to cancel those (some will only have a 7 day trial ) Look at the capsules themselves, how long do you have to cancel them? Are the phone numbers provided (they should be) for you to call to cancel?

Ok, now go ahead and order your trial. Wait a few hours (or you could try to do it right away, but I am not sure if their processing is that fast.) So, wait a few hours and call all the add on products you were signed up for and cancel them. This may result in you never getting those add on products though, to somewhat fix that you can wait a few days and cancel then. Now for the main product itself, as soon as your bottle of capsules arrives, call and cancel your trial. Don’t wait till 14th day of a 15 day trial, do it right away.

If you like the product (it’s pretty good) you can order it once more, cancel add ons but keep the main product’s auto shipment program. If you don’t like it, well, everything is canceled and your credit card is safe. Get your free trial of acai by following this link. You may also want to read this post on how to protect yourself from acai berry scams.