AG Curtis Hill: Beware ads suggesting you’ve won a prize

Attorney General Curtis Hill is warning Hoosiers to beware of advertising pitches that mislead consumers into thinking they have won prizes. This tactic is often employed to lure people to locations where they are subjected to used-car sales pitches.

Last month, the Office of the Attorney General won a judgment in Marion County Superior Court against The Car Center LLC in connection with such a ploy. Approximately 35,000 people received a deceptive mailing from The Car Center indicating they had won $5,000.

“Remember the old maxim that if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is,” Attorney General Curtis Hill said. “In their efforts to make a quick buck, far too many money-minded schemers stoop to deceptive marketing practices. We will always work to enforce the law and impose penalties against anyone violating the rules, but we also urge Hoosiers to exercise vigilance to avoid becoming victims in the first place.”

Attorney General Hill offered consumers these three tips:

• Be skeptical. It is highly unlikely you won any significant prize. Even if your mailing contains a game piece showing you won a significant prize, it is likely that every mailing sent contained an identical “winning” game piece. Checking the fine print on the mailing will likely reveal that the odds of winning a significant prize is one in tens of thousands.

• If you wish to see whether you have won a prize, be prepared to handle a sales presentation for a vehicle. The mailing was sent to get you into the dealership to sell you a vehicle. If you’re not in the market for a vehicle, inform the salesperson of this fact and request your prize. Be prepared to say no and walk away if the salesperson continues to push a sale.

• If you do end up deciding to purchase a vehicle at such a sales event, take your time and consult various resources such as vehicle history reports and the Attorney General’s “Purchasing a Vehicle” checklist. The salesperson will likely push you to buy immediately, but doing your due diligence on a used vehicle purchase is almost always the better option.

As a result of The Car Center’s prize mailing, one consumer attended a sales event and was subjected to a six-hour sales pitch. The Car Center made multiple misrepresentations that convinced her to purchase a vehicle, including misrepresenting the value of the vehicle (inflating it by $5,000), misrepresenting the MSRP of the vehicle when it was new (inflating it by about $17,000), and misrepresenting that the consumer received a $2,000 discount as a result of the prize mailing.

The Car Center also represented it would pay off trade-in vehicles as part of three consumer transactions and failed to make the represented payments. Additionally, The Car Center took possession of a consumer’s vehicle for repairs and failed to return the vehicle or the consumer’s deposit.

Finally, The Car Center agreed to sell a consumer’s vehicle at auction and remit the funds to the consumer. Instead, The Car Center gave the vehicle to another consumer as a loaner vehicle while that consumer’s vehicle was being repaired. It lent out the vehicle without the consumer’s knowledge or consent, resulting in an additional 6,000 miles on the vehicle by the time the consumer was able to recover his vehicle.

The court judgment orders restitution in the total amount of $28,187.76 for six consumers. The judgment also orders The Car Center to pay civil penalties in the amount of $108,500, for a total monetary judgment of $136,687.76. Additionally, The Car Center is enjoined from operating as a motor vehicle dealer in the state of Indiana.

The Office of the Attorney General also has pending lawsuits against three promotion companies that design and send advertising mailings deemed deceptive by the Office of the Attorney General. These companies are Traffic Jam Events LLC, Xcel Media Group and Prophecy Marketing.

Anyone who believes they have been the victim of a scam or targeted by scammers should file a complaint with the Office of Attorney General at indianaconsumer.com or by calling 1-800-382-5516.

Attached are two documents — the complaint filed by the Office of the Attorney General against The Car Center and the resulting court judgment.