Lawrence Fish
Executive Chairman
RBS Citizens, N.A.
1 Citizens Plaza
Providence, RI 02903-1344

Dear Mr. Fish,

Please find enclosed a complaint about your institution which I just filed with the office of the Attorney General of Massachusetts.

You promised me a $50 promotional credit and then never paid it. I spent almost 25 minutes on the phone with your customer service department today trying to get this resolved, only to be told at the end that it would be “researched” and it might take another two months before I am paid what I am owed, if indeed I am paid at all.

When I asked for this to be confirmed in writing, the representative with whom I was speaking said this was not possible. I had to escalate to a supervisor, Ana, who assured me that I would receive a confirmation letter within 7-10 days. Why I had to escalate to a supervisor just to receive such a letter is beyond me. It remains to be seen whether I will actually receive the letter I was promised, or for that matter the $50.

I would like to know what you are going to do to ensure that every single person who was entitled to the $50 promotional credit receives it. Promising a promotional credit which you then fail to pay is unfair, deceptive, and fraudulent. Are you going to let that stand or take steps to remedy it?

Sincerely,

Jonathan Kamens

encl: copy of complaint to Massachusetts Attorney General

Bill McCollum
Attorney General
The Capital PL-01
Tallahassee, FL  32399-1050
E-mail: ag.mccollum@myfloridalegal.com

Dear Mr. McCollum:

I am writing to bring to your attention a fraudulent charity that is operating out of Florida and scamming well-meaning individuals.

I received a solicitation yesterday for an organization calling itself “Macular Degeneration Association” and which identifies itself as “a mission of,” i.e., a front for, the “American Medical Research Organization”.  The address given for the organization is 420 Beach Road, P.O. Box 20256, Sarasota, FL  34276, and the telephone number given is 941-870-4399.  The charity claims to be registered in Florida with the registration number CH18753.

Here is how I know that this organization is a scam:

• There is no presence on the Web for the “Macular Degeneration Association” or the “American Medical Research Organization”.  No reputable charity operates without a Web site.
• The solicitation provides no email address for contacting the organization.  Again, reputable charities always provide a mechanism for contacting them on-line.
• The telephone number is bogus.
• The mailing address is a condominium or apartment building, not an office.
• There is no evidence on the Web that any organization or researcher receives any financial support from this either MDA or AMRO.
• The organization does not appear to have either a board of directors or endorsements from any medical professionals.
• The president of the organization according to the solicitation letter, Michael Alicea, does not appear to be any sort of medical professional.  The only evidence I could find on the Web for what he does with his time seems to suggest that he spends quite a bit of it visiting night clubs in the Sarasota area.
• The contact for the organization listed on its IRS Form 990, Lawrence Hoffheimer, also is not any sort of medical professional; it appears that he is a lawyer.
• There is no indication in the solicitation letter of how the organization spends the money it raises.
• The organization has not been evaluated or rated by the American Institute of Philanthropy.
• The solicitation letter engages in the known tactic of slipping in a little piece of “educational material” at the end of the letter, “P.S. Be sure and make regular eye examinations a regular part of your efforts to maintain a health lifestyle”, so that the cost of the solicitation can be counted as a “program expense” on the organization’s financial reports.

If you investigate this organization more closely, you will almost certainly find that virtually all of its “program expenses” consist of the cost of sending out fundraising letters, and that the rest of the money it raises is used almost entirely to pay salaries to Michael Alicea and others affiliated with the organization.

Please put a stop to this fraudulent activity.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Kamens

CC: Martha Coakley, Attorney General
    Commonwealth of Massachusetts
    E-mail: ago@state.ma.us

CC:    Daniel Borochoff, President
    American Institute of Philanthropy
    E-mail: aipmail@charitywatch.org

CC:    MacDonald Curran, Chairman
    AMD Alliance International
    E-mail: info@amdalliance.org

CC:    Chip Goehring, President
    American Macular Degeneration Foundation
    E-mail: amdf@macular.org

CC: Edmund J. Aleksandrovich, President
    Macular Degeneration Foundation
    E-mail: ed@eyesight.org