Toronto Dating Scene » Dating Site Administration

iChurch Billing Scam – Their Response, Sorta

Toronto Dating — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 04:48:30 +0000

After posting about the iChurch scam, we received a comment from a reader. Basically, when they contacted iChurch to ask for an explanation about the ‘fine print’ (‘validate’ for $1.95 and then get dinged for a three month membership within a few days if you don’t cancel) our reader got an email back canceling their account accompanied by a ‘God Bless You’. There was no explanation, they were just shoved aside (profile removed, actually). This iChurch billing scam story gets better and better. This is the stuff we expect from True.com, not a Christian dating site… or am I wrong?

Christian Dating Scam: iChurch

Toronto Dating — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 19:35:06 +0000

How about this for a dating site scam?: You pay Christian dating site iChurch $1.95 to ‘validate’ yourself on the site (so that ‘everyone has the assurance that all iChurch members represent themselves honestly’). Without validation you basically can’t do anything except search profiles (no photos however!) and create your own profile. But wait, that $1.95 will get nicely rolled over into a three month membership if you don’t cancel within the first three days after you ‘validate’. Sure the fine print is there but it’s scammy none the less. So, iChurch wants validation to ensure honesty among it’s members but when it comes to billing practices the honesty gets thrown out the window. The actual verbiage is as follows:

“Validated members are automatically enrolled into a three month membership that cost one hundred and forty nine dollars and ninety seven cents and that is billed upfront after the initial three days has expired if they do not choose to cancel before then as explained in the Terms of Service”

Lovely.

FriendFinder Layoffs

Toronto Dating — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 14:58:34 +0000

Friendfinder has apparently laid off marketing staff, due to their troubled financial situation: ‘A tipster tells us the company recently laid off eight marketing staffers in an effort to cut costs.‘ says Valleywag.

Toronto Speed Dating – No Password Required!

Toronto Dating — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 14:50:37 +0000

TechCrunch has the scoop about how, for a limited time, SpeedDate.com (an online speed dating service) had a major security breach. The site allowed anyone to log in as anyone else, as no password was required. Yikes! The problem has been fixed but if you’re looking for an online speed dating service to use, you may want to stay away from SpeedDate.com.

Plenty of Fish: Plenty of Arrogance?

Toronto Dating — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 06:02:30 +0000

News is filtering in from those who attended the Internet Dating Conference down in Miami. Apparently the Markus Frind (genius behind free Internet dating giant PlentyOfFish.com) workshop on Free Dating wasn’t exactly well received by the audience. Most questions were shrugged off with non-value responses (I suppose you can’t blame him – why give away your secrets; but then why agree to speak?). Between that and sneering at other dating sites, the audience wasn’t amused, apparently. Any other stories from iDate? Feel free to comment below.

Dating Site Advertising Keywords Getting Cheaper

Toronto Dating — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 17:24:03 +0000

The average CPC for dating site ads has decreased from November 2008 to December 2008, as noticed by Clickz. The average cost per click is now 30 cents (from 33 cents).

FriendFinder, Adult FriendFinder, BigChurch to go Under?

Toronto Dating — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 19:36:30 +0000

If you go by this analysis then that’s a possibility. It appears to keep Adult FriendFinder, FriendFinder, BigChurch and the rest of their sites operational they need to raise funds. Now not being the best time to do so could cause an interesting situation. I’m sure someone would scoop up Adult FriendFinder and FriendFinder possibly, but do their niche sites like BigChurch and the rest make any money?

Dating Site Censors Not Quite As Intended

Toronto Dating — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 19:34:47 +0000

I just stumbled upon one of the many dating sites online and noticed this attempt on the part of the site to censor out people providing their email addresses (because, of course, then they don’t have to pay the dating site to communicate). It seems this one went a little hard core and thus any mention of ‘at’ got the ‘star’ treatment. So, for example, if you write ‘relationship’ it becomes ‘rel****ionship’. Nice! All that work the the person still managed to get the address in there. It seems everyone and their mom is running a dating site now a days (and it sure shows?!)