AUGUSTA, Maine — Attorney General William J. Schneider is warning schools, businesses, municipalities and other government agencies about a mailing that appears to be a bill for services rendered but is a disguised solicitation that may mislead recipients to pay for services that were neither ordered nor received.
The mailings, from a California-based company called UST, appear to be bills requesting payment for telecom maintenance agreements in the sum of $425. The billing invoices contain no product information and no indication that a contract is offered, giving the misleading impression that the service has been rendered and payment is now due.
“We have heard from local school and city purchasing agents who received these invoices but had never done business with this company,” said Schneider in a statement. “This solicitation is a ruse and organizations should not be fooled into paying for something they never ordered.”
U.S. postal regulations do not allow the mailing of a bill-type advertisement or solicitation without a clear disclaimer. The disclaimer must be in very large type and must be in boldface capital letters in a color that contrasts prominently with the background against which it appears.
What the AG is again failing to do is direct anyone or organization that recieves one of these phony invoice’s to immediately notify the U.S. Postal Inspector’s and file a compliant with their local law enforcement authority’s, and with the closest Postal Inspector’s, for fraudulent use of the U.S. Mail for purposes of Larceny. While Mail Fraud may not seem real nasty or particularly ugly, it is a major crime that affects us all. And once these people are identified, well, Mail Fraud is a particulary nasty one to get tired and sentenced under, namely each individual count (or complaint) is up to 15 years and up to $ 25,000 in fines PER COUNT under the Federal sentencing guideline’s. Given how the local Federal Judge’s in Maine have recently been sentencing folk’s, I for one would not want to be caught with my ‘short’s’ down in Maine if the USPS Inspector’s come calling with a warrant.