FTC Files Complaint Against Independent Sales Organization and Sales Agents for Alleged Credit Card Laundering Charges

Consumer Finance Credit Cards FTC UDAAP Telemarketing Sales Rule Fraud

On August 7, the FTC issued a press release announcing charges against 12 defendants, comprised of an independent sales organization (ISO), sales agents, payment processors, and identified principals, for allegedly violating the Federal Trade Commission Act and the Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR) by laundering credit card transactions on behalf of a “telemarketing scam” operation (operation) through fictitious merchant accounts. According to a July 28 complaint filed by the FTC, the defendants engaged in a scheme with the operation to process credit card charges through merchant accounts set up by the operation under fictitious company names instead of processing charges through a single merchant account under the operation’s name. This type of practice, the FTC claims, is known as “credit card laundering” or “factoring” and violates the TSR. The defendants purportedly (i) underwrote and approved the operation’s fictitious companies; (ii) set up merchant accounts with its acquirer for the fictitious companies; (iii) used sales agents to market processing services to merchants; (iv) processed nearly $6 million through credit card networks; and (v) transferred sales revenue from the transactions to companies controlled by the defendants. The FTC seeks “permanent injunctive relief, recession or reformation of contracts, restitution, the refund of monies paid, disgorgement of ill-gotten moneys, and other equitable relief.”

Notably, in 2013, the FTC accused the same “telemarketing scam” operation of allegedly promoting “worthless business opportunities” to consumers and falsely promising that they would earn thousands of dollars. A 2015 summary judgement resulted in over $7 million in consumer injury. (See previous InfoBytes coverage here.)