Thoughs on Suing Ibill
 

II know that Lens is suing to get his rebills back and this is great.


We are almost at the point where we are going to have to do something as well. What we have done in the past is mass email our members and tell them to rejoin ( at a discount of course ). Then we would also let them know to Charge back any charges for the last month that they have received. We have had to do this before due to processors going under and DID not want them to get any of our money, and we had a 70% resign up rate.

Well my concern here is that Ibill is still getting paid for Web 900, Checks, and Mastercard, and we have not seen a penny of this so far with just speculation as to if and when we will start to see this!.


This sounds like Fraud to me.

So if they are going to Try to stay in business, they will have to be making money. So my question is this . how much longer should we keep listening to there Lip Service excuses and approximations on if and when we will get paid - and when we should start doing lawsuits against them for past due and current funds owed?

I've had my fill as well..

But unfortunately if they are ignoring Lens' lawyers, they will most likely ignore yours as well.. :(

A Class action may be in order, but I'm not a lawyer, so I don't know what conditions would have to be met, or if it's even possible in this case...

:2 cents:

I Highly doubt they will ignore a lawsuit delivered to there door from a Sheriff - Court Representative

Suing them won't do a thing. By the time the whole mess gets resolved, it will be too late to do anything with the data anyway. You can't sit on the data for months and then run the transactions. I believe that is a direct violation of the card association rules.

We just emailed the ibill members, told them their accounts were cancelled, and offered them an opportunity to rejoin at a reduced rate for the first month.

don't teach members to chargeback...:mad:

Well owed me thousands of dollars so i'm with anyone who want to suing them !

Yes this may be the Only option with rebills, but what about money that is owed for Reserve, and for the past month and the stuff they are Still billing? that is my concern as it is in to the 5 figure range for me! and if they have money coming in, I want my money they owe me ( as I am sure many others do as well! )

dont blame you

I agree. This is the worst thing you can do.

If you can mail the members and get them to sign up once your with CCBill and Epoch, that works. If not, tough shit - And next time be careful who you do business with.

I was referring to suing to get the recurring database.

If you are owed a lot of money, then yes of course get your lawyer involved.

It's really a good idea to teach your members how to do chargebacks? Good luck!
:1orglaugh

why wait? sue them today. dont give them time to close up shop.

one word, class action lawsuit

alright, maybe three

Yeah. This is a BIG no no

You want to tell your members to charge back? Have you been paying attention at all?

:(

My intention is not to teach users to charge back - Just Very frustrated! and do not want these people to be able to have Any of My money is all! I worked Hard to get these funds, and do not think that is it fair that if they continue to do business or go out of business, that they deserve to be able to collect money on my hard work!

I knew of another billing company that left the market and took my money ( and many others ) and skipped the country with it!

Some of you do not understand how lawsuits work so I will explain it to you. When you file a lawsuit the defendant will have 90 days to respond depending on the state it is filed in. The after they file their answer their is something called discovery. This is when each side asks for documents from the opposing side. This takes a lot of time because the side that is asked to turn over documents will not give it up so easy and then you will have to go to court. This can take 2-3 years to get all of this sorted out.

You also have depositions & interrogatories. Interrogatories are written questions and the other side has 30 days to answer them.

By the time you go to court 2-3 years after you file then even if you win you still will not get paid. Their will be appeals. That will take anywhere from 3-5 years.

If Lensman has an attorney who is going to file suit right now he should fire his attorney. You might as well just wait to see what happens with Ibill. 2-3 months (if it takes that long) will not matter in the hole scheme of things.

http://www.ibillsucks.info/files/globill1.jpg
Globill gift basket ....

There is NOTHING you can do.... Hit the wall, break the dishes but don't throw good money after bad money ( lawyers will eat you up, as frustrated as you are ).

Move on, let your rebill there, and if lucky the new rebills will give them enough money to pay you the reserve and past due amounts...

At the end, we will loose , no question.

:2 cents:

Good point butttttttttttt,

If they don't chargeback and sign up with another processor they will be billed twice for the same site. Does anyone really believe Ibill is going to pay attention to cancellations at this point?

If you encourage a ton of people to charge back , it goes against your percentage. VisaUSA can then black list you , its not worth it.

Also if you think any of the existing companies have the cash reserves if this happened to them to pay everyone in full, you are living in a fools paradise.

I agree DO NOT TEACH THEM TO CHARGE BACK.

That is one of the major things that got us here in the first place.

If you feel that damn bad for the customer and his lost money, GIVE HIM A FREE MONTH. and then as them to rejoin@!!!!!



Then SUE Ibill later for not only the money that they held, but the extra money that you put out with the free month.

In fact dont sue iBill at all. Sue Visa.

We are basically giving Ibill until the 31st to catch up on all monies owed. After that, we will probably offer our members a discount to move to a new biller, and I will go through them in CMI, one by one, and refund the month they're on and cancel their account. Yes it will take a while, but it's better than having chargebacks.

Remember, the account is in YOUR name, so as far as Visa and MC is concerned, all those chargebacks will be a black mark on you. You could face some heavy fines, or it's possible it could keep you from ever being able to process Visa or MC again, 3rd party processor or not. (At least, this is what we were told on the subject.)

So I would definitely advise against teaching surfers to chargeback. You can deny Ibill the money by refunding your surfers yourself.

Unless refunds count as a black mark too? Anybody know about that?

Just tell them to cancel a day or two before next rebill and then tell them to rejoin at a discount. NOT to chargeback...

You are dead on. It is not worth it to spend the money to sue. Just get your own merchant accounts so you have the control and move on.

Z

you guys have no business sense at all do you.

do not tell people to charge back, simply let their memberships ride untill they are due to expire 30 days after they were last rebilled then cancel it and email them to rejoin with the new service. Make it all transparent, you eat the the cost of their remaining memberships. Its no biggie.

SUE THEM NOW! SUE THEM NOW! DONT WAIT! If you wait the money will be gone before your lawyers can do anything to get it back.

most members wont rejoin a site!

It's always been my understanding that refunds can also raise some eyebrows if there are a lot of them because it is an indication that "something" is wrong; although it's definitely not as negative as chargebacks.

If it were a lot, what would most likely happen is the acquiring bank would be contacted by the CC company for an explanation who in turn may contact the merchant of record (in this case iBill) for an explanation. If they give them a good reason then processing would continue; if not, they could suspend thier merchant account until "the situation" has been corrected.

If for example you were the only webmaster that was refunding his customers it probably wouldn't cause a blip on the radar considering the big picture. However, if for example a lot of webmasters started doing this bells might start ringing by the CC companies and at the acquiring bank in which there would most likely be some negotiation of extra security deposit or withholding of funds due for payout.

:2 cents:

Lawsuits are useful in getting the attention of those you sue as defendants have to respond or face summary judgement. Responding costs money and the end result is that those who sue in many cases get priority in resolution as they are costing the defendants more than those who are not suing. One poster above is right in the fact that resolution can take years but thats assuming the case winds its way through the long route instead of the shorter route of settlement.

Just FYI folks, class action is not the way to go. Getting class action requires that the class be certified and that in itself is a long process. If multiple plaintiffs want to file suit against the same defendant, in most cases its better to file individually and get the cases consolidated in front of one Judge. This has two main benefits, first the one Judge will be more motivated to clear his calender of 10 cases than one and secondly, 10 plaintiffs, all with different backgrounds and businesses, all crying foul, tend to help make the defendant look like the badguy to the Judge.