Yellow Page Marketing B.V.

A fax that looks like a listing you already have

Since 2009 the defendants sent unsolicited faxes to churches, doctors’ and dentists’ offices and local retailers in the United States, Canada, Australia and possibly elsewhere. Each fax carried a name matched to the recipient’s location, such as YellowPage-Illinois.com, and a “walking fingers” logo resembling the one associated with local yellow pages.

The form contained the organization’s own details and a Yellow Page ID number, and asked the recipient to confirm or update them and fax it back by a deadline.

Buried in fine print at the bottom was the only indication it was a solicitation: returning the form ordered an $89 per month, two-year registration, payable a full year in advance. Many people never saw it, and signed believing they were updating an existing listing. Often the person who signed was not authorized to buy services for the organization at all.

The collection

Those who returned the form received a faxed invoice for $1,068, payable to a New York City address. Anyone who tried to cancel was told the cancellation period had expired and the contract would be enforced. Refusal brought faxes demanding late fees and threatening referral to a collection agency and damage to credit. Some paid simply to end the harassment.

The operation ran from Palma de Mallorca, Spain, through corporations based in England and the Netherlands.

The judgment, and what was in the mail

In November 2012 a federal court entered a default judgment of more than $10.2 million, permanently banning the defendants from marketing internet directories, from collecting payments from previous customers, and from benefiting from customer information.

Under the 2011 temporary restraining order the FTC had intercepted and opened mail sent to the New York address, finding nearly 800 checks totaling more than $460,000. It determined consumers’ information would be best protected by destroying the checks and wrote to those affected.

The FTC also warned that several organizations were still contacting people to collect on Yellow Page Marketing invoices, and that any such collection violates the court order.

The Canadian Competition Bureau secured its own judgment in March 2012, and the Australian competition regulator had previously acted against the same operation.

What is not established

The judgment was entered by default rather than after a contested trial.