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	<title>Comments on: 757-990-8980</title>
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	<link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/</link>
	<description>I am an astronomer, writer, and skeptic. I likes reality the way it is, and I aims to keep it that way. My real name is Phil Plait, and I run the Bad Astronomy blog.</description>
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		<title>By: Jack</title>
		<link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/comment-page-1/#comment-111623</link>
		<dc:creator>Jack</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Wed, 13 Aug 2008 04:26:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/#comment-111623</guid>
		<description>This comment is in response to the one from Jim Vandiver.

You are a liar and a shill for National Auto Warranty Services located in Wentzville, MO. We have seen your numerous posts all over the internet and we are on to your lies on behalf of the scumbags at National Auto Warranty Services. We will not let you or your scumbag company rip people off.

(Note: to everyone: the following refer only to the company National Auto Warranty Services located in Wentzville, Missouri. There are many other companies with a similar name that may be legitimate. Also, there is a company known as &quot;Dealer Services.&quot; This is the company that sends warranty expiration letters to your house with a logo that is a copy of the one used by General Motors. Guess what? It is the same company!)

National Auto Warranty Services is one of the biggest auto warranty scammers and crooks in the country. There is no way they are legitimate in any sense of the word.

Want proof? View this link, a press release from the Attorney General of Missouri:
http://ago.mo.gov/newsreleases/2008/030608.htm

They are currently being sued by Missouri for fraud and numerous violations of the state&#039;s &quot;No Call Law.&quot;

In addition, they are part of a national crackdown on telemarketing fraud from the Federal Trade Commission. This press release clearly shows they were involved in both the state and a federal action:
http://ago.mo.gov/newsreleases/2008/National_crackdown_on_telemarketing_fraud_includes_three_cases_filed_by_Nixon/

You can lookup this company&#039;s listing at the Missouri Secretary of State website. Be sure to click on the &quot;Filed Documents&quot; link at the top of the page. If you look under the Annual Report dated 4/3/2008, (and previous filings) you will see the home address of  both the President and Vice President of this company. This is public information:
https://www.sos.mo.gov/BusinessEntity/soskb/Corp.asp?411719

In addition, this Jim Vandiver, or whoever this person really is, has listed more than one location under his profile for different posts. For example, under this post, he is from Council Bluffs, Iowa.
http://www.topix.com/forum/city/rocky-hill-ct/T3S758L7945R8ND2M

But in the following, he lists himself from Troy, NY.
http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/201/RipOff0201058.htm 

Guess Jim Vandiver will have to refund the $7.50 that National Auto Warranty Services paid him for his post. Good luck on your next career. Or perhaps Jim Vandiver is really Darain Atkinson, the President of National Auto Warranty Services, or Cory Atkinson, the listed Vice President. In that case, good luck in prison.

Here is how to contact these crooks:
www.oneautowarranty.com/
800-724-8510 

Here are the owners&#039; addresses as listed in their Missouri corporation filing. This is public information:
Darain Atkinson (President)
1009 Hawks Landing Drive
Lake St. Louis, MO 63367

Cory Atkinson (Vice President)
20 Signal Hill
St. Charles, MO 63301</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>This comment is in response to the one from Jim Vandiver.</p>
<p>You are a liar and a shill for National Auto Warranty Services located in Wentzville, MO. We have seen your numerous posts all over the internet and we are on to your lies on behalf of the scumbags at National Auto Warranty Services. We will not let you or your scumbag company rip people off.</p>
<p>(Note: to everyone: the following refer only to the company National Auto Warranty Services located in Wentzville, Missouri. There are many other companies with a similar name that may be legitimate. Also, there is a company known as &#8220;Dealer Services.&#8221; This is the company that sends warranty expiration letters to your house with a logo that is a copy of the one used by General Motors. Guess what? It is the same company!)</p>
<p>National Auto Warranty Services is one of the biggest auto warranty scammers and crooks in the country. There is no way they are legitimate in any sense of the word.</p>
<p>Want proof? View this link, a press release from the Attorney General of Missouri:<br />
<a href="http://ago.mo.gov/newsreleases/2008/030608.htm" rel="nofollow">http://ago.mo.gov/newsreleases/2008/030608.htm</a></p>
<p>They are currently being sued by Missouri for fraud and numerous violations of the state&#8217;s &#8220;No Call Law.&#8221;</p>
<p>In addition, they are part of a national crackdown on telemarketing fraud from the Federal Trade Commission. This press release clearly shows they were involved in both the state and a federal action:<br />
<a href="http://ago.mo.gov/newsreleases/2008/National_crackdown_on_telemarketing_fraud_includes_three_cases_filed_by_Nixon/" rel="nofollow">http://ago.mo.gov/newsreleases/2008/National_crackdown_on_telemarketing_fraud_includes_three_cases_filed_by_Nixon/</a></p>
<p>You can lookup this company&#8217;s listing at the Missouri Secretary of State website. Be sure to click on the &#8220;Filed Documents&#8221; link at the top of the page. If you look under the Annual Report dated 4/3/2008, (and previous filings) you will see the home address of  both the President and Vice President of this company. This is public information:<br />
<a href="https://www.sos.mo.gov/BusinessEntity/soskb/Corp.asp?411719" rel="nofollow">https://www.sos.mo.gov/BusinessEntity/soskb/Corp.asp?411719</a></p>
<p>In addition, this Jim Vandiver, or whoever this person really is, has listed more than one location under his profile for different posts. For example, under this post, he is from Council Bluffs, Iowa.<br />
<a href="http://www.topix.com/forum/city/rocky-hill-ct/T3S758L7945R8ND2M" rel="nofollow">http://www.topix.com/forum/city/rocky-hill-ct/T3S758L7945R8ND2M</a></p>
<p>But in the following, he lists himself from Troy, NY.<br />
<a href="http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/201/RipOff0201058.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/201/RipOff0201058.htm</a> </p>
<p>Guess Jim Vandiver will have to refund the $7.50 that National Auto Warranty Services paid him for his post. Good luck on your next career. Or perhaps Jim Vandiver is really Darain Atkinson, the President of National Auto Warranty Services, or Cory Atkinson, the listed Vice President. In that case, good luck in prison.</p>
<p>Here is how to contact these crooks:<br />
<a href="http://www.oneautowarranty.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.oneautowarranty.com/</a><br />
800-724-8510 </p>
<p>Here are the owners&#8217; addresses as listed in their Missouri corporation filing. This is public information:<br />
Darain Atkinson (President)<br />
1009 Hawks Landing Drive<br />
Lake St. Louis, MO 63367</p>
<p>Cory Atkinson (Vice President)<br />
20 Signal Hill<br />
St. Charles, MO 63301</p>
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		<title>By: Jim vandiver</title>
		<link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/comment-page-1/#comment-107513</link>
		<dc:creator>Jim vandiver</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Thu, 31 Jul 2008 16:33:30 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/#comment-107513</guid>
		<description>Alot of people are confusing Dealer Services or National Auto Warranty Services with other companies. They do NOT dial outbound to their customers. The best way to figure out who is calling you is to do something like this:

1. Answer the call nicely and sound interested
2. Play along with the rep, the first person you speak to is probably just screening calls so you may have to agree to speak with specialist or a sales person.
3. Go through the sales pitch and tell them you need to call them back with your credit card
4. Get their callback number and post it here. I&#039;ll check back every so often. I can look to see who the phone number belongs to and also verify it with the utility company.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Alot of people are confusing Dealer Services or National Auto Warranty Services with other companies. They do NOT dial outbound to their customers. The best way to figure out who is calling you is to do something like this:</p>
<p>1. Answer the call nicely and sound interested<br />
2. Play along with the rep, the first person you speak to is probably just screening calls so you may have to agree to speak with specialist or a sales person.<br />
3. Go through the sales pitch and tell them you need to call them back with your credit card<br />
4. Get their callback number and post it here. I&#8217;ll check back every so often. I can look to see who the phone number belongs to and also verify it with the utility company.</p>
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		<title>By: Jake</title>
		<link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/comment-page-1/#comment-89641</link>
		<dc:creator>Jake</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Fri, 23 May 2008 13:51:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/#comment-89641</guid>
		<description>My dad keeps an old referee&#039;s whistle next to the phone for just these types of calls. I&#039;m sure the phone system has a volume limiter, but it makes him feel better to think that the person interrupting his watching of &quot;The Price is Right&quot; will have to take a break while their hearing returns.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>My dad keeps an old referee&#8217;s whistle next to the phone for just these types of calls. I&#8217;m sure the phone system has a volume limiter, but it makes him feel better to think that the person interrupting his watching of &#8220;The Price is Right&#8221; will have to take a break while their hearing returns.</p>
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		<title>By: Tod</title>
		<link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/comment-page-1/#comment-89640</link>
		<dc:creator>Tod</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sun, 18 May 2008 06:54:24 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/#comment-89640</guid>
		<description>Heh.  We should wish that we still had the electro-mechanical telephone switching systems of yore - specifically what was known as the Strowger switch (or step-by-step).

A little known &quot;feature&quot; was known as &quot;called party hold,&quot; where the called party could simply leave the phone off the hook during a call and the calling party wasn&#039;t able to disconnect the call.

Call me with a scam/spam?  Just a minute while I lay the receiver down and go wash the dishes.  The guy at the other end simply could not disconnect the call.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Heh.  We should wish that we still had the electro-mechanical telephone switching systems of yore &#8211; specifically what was known as the Strowger switch (or step-by-step).</p>
<p>A little known &#8220;feature&#8221; was known as &#8220;called party hold,&#8221; where the called party could simply leave the phone off the hook during a call and the calling party wasn&#8217;t able to disconnect the call.</p>
<p>Call me with a scam/spam?  Just a minute while I lay the receiver down and go wash the dishes.  The guy at the other end simply could not disconnect the call.</p>
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		<title>By: Buzz Parsec</title>
		<link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/comment-page-1/#comment-89639</link>
		<dc:creator>Buzz Parsec</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sat, 17 May 2008 07:59:02 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/#comment-89639</guid>
		<description>Sir Eccles - nice Mel Brooks reference...

I get the same &quot;car warranty about to expire&quot; about once a month on my land line.  I get the &quot;Credit Card Services&quot; spam a couple of times a week.  I get one or two &quot;Unknown Caller&quot; hangup calls a day, on average.   I&#039;ve been on the &quot;do not call&quot; list for years.  (Fortunately, I&#039;ve only ever gotten one spam call on my cell phone.)  Not to mention the &quot;legitimate&quot; charity/political/opinion poll calls, mostly from groups or candidates I&#039;ve contributed to in the past.  I&#039;ve taken to telling those groups that if they don&#039;t take me off their call list, I won&#039;t contribute to them any more.  Seems to mostly work, i.e. they stop calling.

Last time the &quot;Credit Card Services&quot; crook called, I tried to ask them why they were wasting time calling me when I had told them many times to go away?  Did they think I might change my mind if they annoyed me enough?  When I asked them if they were stupid, they hung up.  Oh, well.  Usually they hang up as soon as I mention the FTC, the dnc list, ask to speak to a supervisor, etc.  One time I got into an argument with one of them when I told her what she was doing was illegal and she ought to be in jail!  She insisted it wasn&#039;t illegal to call me, and kept arguing!

I used to just pick up and immediately hang up on any call without a caller ID (to stop the ringing), but then my brother in Australia sent me an email asking why I kept hanging up on him.  Turns out his calls looked exactly like a blocked caller ID spam call, so I had to start answering them, or at least let them go to voicemail.

Last time the &quot;car warranty&quot; spammer called, I asked him why he didn&#039;t already know what kind of car I have, and he claimed he did know, but he was asking me for security ID purposes.  As if...  He called me, I didn&#039;t call him, he should know who he called, it&#039;s me as the recipient who should need to confirm the identity of the caller.  At that point I lost it, called him a liar and hung up.

My theory about hang calls...  The spammer has a big room full of telemarketers, waiting to talk to victims, and time is money.  They don&#039;t want them sitting around waiting for someone to answer the phone, so they set up their automatic calling machine to do speculative dialing (much like speculative execution on a high-end CPU.)  The dial a whole bunch of numbers and when some one answers, they put the calls in a queue and if none of their telemarketers becomes available in a second or two, they drop the oldest call from the queue.  This way there is always someone wait when a telemarketer hangs up and is ready to deal with the next victim.  If things bog down, and no one is ready for a call, they just hang up.  This way, they externalize the cost of idle time.  So not only are they harassing us, we are paying for the privilege!  Of course, this strategy is blatantly illegal, but these people are crooks anyway, so they don&#039;t care.

Oh, and someone asked when all this started happening.  Jan 20, 2001 is my guess.  And I think it will only get worse as the economy tanks, and more and more people are desperate enough to take telemarketer jobs.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Sir Eccles &#8211; nice Mel Brooks reference&#8230;</p>
<p>I get the same &#8220;car warranty about to expire&#8221; about once a month on my land line.  I get the &#8220;Credit Card Services&#8221; spam a couple of times a week.  I get one or two &#8220;Unknown Caller&#8221; hangup calls a day, on average.   I&#8217;ve been on the &#8220;do not call&#8221; list for years.  (Fortunately, I&#8217;ve only ever gotten one spam call on my cell phone.)  Not to mention the &#8220;legitimate&#8221; charity/political/opinion poll calls, mostly from groups or candidates I&#8217;ve contributed to in the past.  I&#8217;ve taken to telling those groups that if they don&#8217;t take me off their call list, I won&#8217;t contribute to them any more.  Seems to mostly work, i.e. they stop calling.</p>
<p>Last time the &#8220;Credit Card Services&#8221; crook called, I tried to ask them why they were wasting time calling me when I had told them many times to go away?  Did they think I might change my mind if they annoyed me enough?  When I asked them if they were stupid, they hung up.  Oh, well.  Usually they hang up as soon as I mention the FTC, the dnc list, ask to speak to a supervisor, etc.  One time I got into an argument with one of them when I told her what she was doing was illegal and she ought to be in jail!  She insisted it wasn&#8217;t illegal to call me, and kept arguing!</p>
<p>I used to just pick up and immediately hang up on any call without a caller ID (to stop the ringing), but then my brother in Australia sent me an email asking why I kept hanging up on him.  Turns out his calls looked exactly like a blocked caller ID spam call, so I had to start answering them, or at least let them go to voicemail.</p>
<p>Last time the &#8220;car warranty&#8221; spammer called, I asked him why he didn&#8217;t already know what kind of car I have, and he claimed he did know, but he was asking me for security ID purposes.  As if&#8230;  He called me, I didn&#8217;t call him, he should know who he called, it&#8217;s me as the recipient who should need to confirm the identity of the caller.  At that point I lost it, called him a liar and hung up.</p>
<p>My theory about hang calls&#8230;  The spammer has a big room full of telemarketers, waiting to talk to victims, and time is money.  They don&#8217;t want them sitting around waiting for someone to answer the phone, so they set up their automatic calling machine to do speculative dialing (much like speculative execution on a high-end CPU.)  The dial a whole bunch of numbers and when some one answers, they put the calls in a queue and if none of their telemarketers becomes available in a second or two, they drop the oldest call from the queue.  This way there is always someone wait when a telemarketer hangs up and is ready to deal with the next victim.  If things bog down, and no one is ready for a call, they just hang up.  This way, they externalize the cost of idle time.  So not only are they harassing us, we are paying for the privilege!  Of course, this strategy is blatantly illegal, but these people are crooks anyway, so they don&#8217;t care.</p>
<p>Oh, and someone asked when all this started happening.  Jan 20, 2001 is my guess.  And I think it will only get worse as the economy tanks, and more and more people are desperate enough to take telemarketer jobs.</p>
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		<title>By: Quiet Desperation</title>
		<link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/comment-page-1/#comment-89638</link>
		<dc:creator>Quiet Desperation</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sat, 17 May 2008 05:06:39 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/#comment-89638</guid>
		<description>&lt;i&gt;We don’t even OWN a car. &lt;/i&gt;

That&#039;s OK. I own two.

Hugs,
Quiet &quot;Picking Up The Slack&quot; Desperation</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><i>We don’t even OWN a car. </i></p>
<p>That&#8217;s OK. I own two.</p>
<p>Hugs,<br />
Quiet &#8220;Picking Up The Slack&#8221; Desperation</p>
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		<title>By: HawkeyeMD</title>
		<link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/comment-page-1/#comment-89637</link>
		<dc:creator>HawkeyeMD</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sat, 17 May 2008 04:21:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/05/15/757-990-8980/#comment-89637</guid>
		<description>Dude, I get that same recording every flippin&#039; day, but on my home phone.  And so I went back through my Caller ID...and that same gorram number came up!

We don&#039;t even OWN a car.  And when we did own one, it was an &#039;89 Dodge Colt.  I think any question of warranty was academic...</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Dude, I get that same recording every flippin&#8217; day, but on my home phone.  And so I went back through my Caller ID&#8230;and that same gorram number came up!</p>
<p>We don&#8217;t even OWN a car.  And when we did own one, it was an &#8216;89 Dodge Colt.  I think any question of warranty was academic&#8230;</p>
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