Telephone psychic Miss Cleo and her employer, Access Resources Services, are in trouble with the law again, this time in New York.
Just two months after paying the Missouri Attorney General $75,000 to settle a lawsuit for calling people on that state’s telemarketing do-not-call list, the firm has been slapped with administrative charges for allegedly violating New York’s do-not-call law.
The state’s Consumer Protection Board alleges that the Ft. Lauderdale, FL-based company called 112 people on New York’s do-not-call list.
In addition, the firm deluged these consumers with phone calls, e-mails and literature, and made misleading statements to sell alleged psychic and tarot card services to both adults and minors, the state charges.
Access, which operates operator of the Psychic Readers Network, uses direct response ads, print and broadcast, to attract callers to its toll-free telephone number for a “free psychic reading.”
However, callers are directed to a 900 number and charged a $3.99 a minute for a “reading” that ends up costing “hundreds of dollars,” according to C. Adrienne Rhodes, executive director of the Consumer Protection Board.
Access, which faces fines of up to $224,000, denied the allegations.
Sean Moynihan, a lawyer for the firm, told the Associated Press that 86 of the calls did not violate New York’s do-not-call law because they were calls to people who had previously called for a psychic reading.
The lawyer added that the law allows calls to people, even on the do-not-call list, when there is a prior relationship.
Last July, Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon sued Access for 94 alleged violations of the state’s do-not-call law.
Nixon accused the firm of operating in the state without a license, and with billing residents, some of whom were dead, for calls to its toll-free Miss Cleo hotline.
The suit also alleged that the firm charged customers for calls that were never made or calls made by underage children.
The suit was settled a month later after the company agreed to change its practices.
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