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Len Penzo dot Com

The offbeat personal finance blog for responsible people.

Consumer Alert: Qualia Free Coffee E-mail is a Scam

By Len Penzo

QualiaAny time I get an email offering me a free anything just for clicking on a link, I get suspicious.

I know.   I’m just paranoid that way, but it usually saves me a lot of heartache down the road.

Not five minutes ago I got an email from ā€œJā€ who sent me a free coffee from Qualia coffee courtesy of ā€œThe Home Run Team.ā€   All I had to do was click on the link!

The first flag was that I never even heard of Qualia coffee.   The second flag was the guy (or gal) who supposedly sent me the email had an email address that I didn’t recognize.

So I instantly googled ā€œQualia Home Run scamā€ and I discovered that, guess what?   It’s essentially a scam!

Whatever you do, please don’t click on the link or you’ll be started down a process that ultimately ends up launching a program that contacts every member in your email address book with the same slimy deal – and that’s really no way to treat your friends, people.   You’ll also be asked to give your credit card number.   (Why would you need to do that for a free coffee?)

I’ll spare you the dirty details, but the bottom line is you should just stay away from this ā€œdealā€ — whether you might ultimately end up with a free coffee or not.

If you’re interested in reading a little more on this topic, click on this helpful link: What’s the Deal with Home Run?

We now return you to our regularly scheduled program…

November 20, 2010

Comments

  1. 1

    Tom says

    Thanks for the heads up, Len!

    BTW, Googling the phrase Len Penzo Scam turns up 57,800 results… Makes you wonder šŸ™‚

  2. 2

    Len Penzo says

    Interesting, thanks for the tip, Tom! That actually returns slightly more results than ā€œLen Penzo sucksā€. What’s really scary is I occupy the top three positions on the first page for ā€œLen Penzo sucksā€ but the other seven positions are occupied by some of my other so-called blogger friends. (Yeah, I’m talkin’ to you Wisebread and Barbara Friedberg!) šŸ˜‰ LOL

  3. 3

    Darwin's Money says

    I got the same email. I was wondering who this person’s parents were that they gave them a single letter for their name. Then I wondered how they planned on sending me a coffee through my iphone. Bizarre attempt.

    And no doubt Len, you do suck :>

  4. 4

    Barb Friedberg says

    Len, Of course if you are offered something for free, it will be crap. In fact, we are still waiting for our ā€œfreeā€ mp3 players from our ā€œscamā€ internet marketing seminar! At least we got dinner šŸ™‚

  5. 5

    Len Penzo says

    I agree, Barb. There really is no such thing as a free lunch (or dinner)! šŸ˜‰

  6. 6

    robert says

    Folks HOmerun and Qualia has used my name twice to spam my contact list under my name despite multiple attempts writing their main office to remove me and my lists. I have now countered with a BOYCOTT QUALIA group on facebook. Lets give Qualia a piece of our mind for using this kind of advertising.

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