Your comments about Rodale Inc.

Ty Stebbins   Madison Wisconsin

Posted at 1:47pm on Monday, April 6, 2009

My wife and I just ended our subscriptions to Men's and Women's Health. Rodale's marketing strategy is bs... I'm sure its making them a ton of money because most people are to lazy to mail the books back, but still!!! Now the books are great, but in no way did I ask for them.

I waited almost 30 minutes to get through to Rodale's customer service and shocking enough the rep's english was weak. It then took me more than 30 minutes to cancel... wtf??

I'm glad I saw these posts and if they bill me again I'm taking it up with the Better Business Beareau.

Unfortunately, I will still buy the magazine off newstands because it is a great magazine. It just falls under a shady publisher.

Cindy   Southern California

Posted at 2:54pm on Saturday, April 4, 2009

I ordered Men's Health, but never any other books. In fact their sales guy called me one evening trying to send me these two books to preview for free. I told him no thanks, and he was very annoyed with me. Well, today in the mail the dang books came anyway. So now I have to send them back, and I am very po'ed. I think this is a horrible tactic because they probably figure that most people will just keep them and pay. Shame on Rodale :-(

Doris Deneys   Green Bay.WI

Posted at 12:35am on Friday, April 3, 2009

According to my records I am paid in full. After readind some of the other letters I will not order from you any more so take me of your mailing list that goes for my husband too James Deneys

PizzdOff   Colorado

Posted at 5:13pm on Sunday, March 29, 2009

This crap company is now the number one source of spam.
Scumbags.

Julie   Mountain View

Posted at 12:19pm on Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Same thing happened to me. Contacted the post office and was informed that you do not need to return merchandise that you didn't order. End of story.

Joyce   Smyrna

Posted at 5:54am on Monday, February 16, 2009

Check out our comments.. Some of our words have been changed into a web site for more selling.

Joyce   Smyrna, DE

Posted at 8:27am on Wednesday, February 11, 2009

I contacted Rodale December 3rd, of 2008, reference the books that were mailed to me without my authorization nor did I ask for them. The books were mailed back to them as per their instructions, however, I am still receiving bills for the books I hand delivered to my post man to send back. Even told him I am canceling all magazines.
I have asked the Prevention Magazine, that I want them out of my life and I will never, ever buy anything from them, nor any other magazine.
All of this has been very frustrating and I want to be taken off their list as well.

What ever connection Rodale has with prevention I feel it was wrong on their part to automatically send books I did not authorize them to send.
I took time out of my busy schedule to do the right thing and send them back, now they need to do the right thing and take me off the list. I did my job, now I want them to do theirs. And yes, it was around Christmas time.

Just the other day I received this e mail from Rodale:

As mentioned in the reminder letter sent to you, your previous purchase entitled you to a preview of this year’s edition. Please be assured we have cancelled that program effective today.
Return shipments take approximately 3 - 4 weeks for us to receive and process. As of this date, we do not have a record of your return.

This was my reply:

Entitled me? Or forced me. It takes 3 -4 weeks for you to receive and process and as of this date you do not have a record of my return? I hand delivered it to my United States Post Man Wednesday, December 3rd, 2008. It's been 10 weeks today the books were mailed back and you still do not have any record of my return? The company e mailed me a return label as she said that is what I had to do. I put all the paper work in the box as instructed. I went on the net today and found I am not alone in this manner. I did a copy and paste to this e mail of just a few comments. I did get information as what I can do if I continue to get a bill. Not only do I have the United States Post Man remembering me handing the package to him I have the web site of all the negative feed back.

Not only should they be turned over to the BBB, Attorney General, and Senator they should be exposed to the News on ABC, CBS or whatever news channel.
Why should I pay $50.90 for books I returned and pay for poor record keeping this company evidently has?

AG   LosAngeles,Calif

Posted at 5:36pm on Saturday, February 7, 2009

Rip Off
Ordered Men's Health.
12 issues $12.
They sent me 3 books unsolicited.
Then I had to wait for a shipping label. Took 8 working days.
Then had to pay for a shipping envelope..
Invest my time.
Now I recieved a statement billing Me for $55.10
And I spoke to there operator who assured Me this wouldn't happen. I have since stopped buying all there magazines.

Lisa Swenson   Minneapolis, MN

Posted at 1:55pm on Wednesday, February 4, 2009

I AM VERY HAPPY WITH THIS COMPANY AND FEEL LIKE THEY HAVE A GREAT COMPANY AND FAIRLY GOOD CUSTOMER SERVICE....I have always enjoyed Rodale/Prevention, and they have always handled any questions or concerns well. I was not happy to receive an "automatic" shipment of books to preview, and sent them back. When I called customer service and could not get through, I entered through the guise of making a new order, and then did immediately get through to a rep. The rep told me that my return had just been received, and she told me she would make sure to flag my account so automatic shipments would NEVER re-occur unless I personally authorized automatic shipment in the future. I am happy with this company!

Nick   New River Valley, VA

Posted at 9:27am on Monday, January 26, 2009

I got a magazine subscription as a gift and after the subscription had ended, I got a box of 3 books. I had no idea why I got them or who they were from. It was right before Christmas so I figured they were Christmas gifts. When my brother came to visit he was reading them and I told him he could have them. A month later I get a bill from Rodale for $50.90 for the books. It states that I had 21 days from the time I received the books to return them in order to avoid having to pay for them. I called the number on the bill (8008206077) and hit '0' to talk to an agent and was told that their call volume was too high and they hung up on me. I tried back 10 minutes later and got through. I stated that I got a bill for books I did not order and I would like them to remove me from their list so that I no longer receive books or bills. The agent informed me that when I subscribed to the magazine I elected to have some books sent to me to preview (I later confirmed with the person who bought me the subscription that they did not elect to have books sent to me). I told the agent that I never elected to receive any books and the books did not come with any paper work saying who they were from, no account information was included, and nothing was included that indicated I needed to return the books if I did not wish to keep them. I told her that I no longer had the books so I can not return them and I am not going to pay for them because I did not order them. She said that just this one time she would cancel the bill, as if she was doing me a favor. RODALE- Do me a real favor and don't send me anything I did not order!

Mohamed   Maryland

Posted at 9:20am on Thursday, January 15, 2009

Thanks for the tip Lisa! I hadn't been able to get through for a while, then I called 1-800-820-6077 and pressed 1 to place a order, and talked to a real person.

One other tip that could be helpful - when I opened the package and realized I was duped, I resealed it and wrote "REFUSED, RETURN TO SENDER" in red on it, and took it to the post office and they shipped it back.

I have a feeling this isn't the end of it.

Eric   Park City, UT

Posted at 11:45am on Monday, January 12, 2009

I talked with the customer service rep who was horribly rude. She tells me to go to the website and click on customer service and proceed to print out the shipping label. I say well this label isnt pre paid. It requires postage she argues with me and said that it should say "free if mailed in the United States" It doesnt. Even the people in that company have no clue what to do.

Pia Tripathi   phoenix, az

Posted at 10:51pm on Sunday, January 11, 2009

I have just recieved two mens health preview books that i did not order. this is very upsetting.

Leo Friedman   Honolulu, HI

Posted at 10:57am on Friday, January 9, 2009

Just to let everyone know, I was in touch with Rodale, Inc. I called the number on my statement and they were sooooo nice! I can't believe everyone had difficulty!! They canceled the billing for me and 'walked' me through the process to retrive a postage-paid return label from their website!!! Soooo easy!!

All you need to do is to visit:
www.rodalestore.com. Click on customer service. At the bottom, there is a link that reads return a book. [Canadian and US labels available, you will get the correct one when you place our address where asked]

The phone number for Linda Frey is no longer valid.....Just follow the directions above and you can return the books free of charge!!

So very easy! Very Customer Service Friendly!
Have a great day!

Leo Friedman

Dylan   Halifax, Canada

Posted at 2:22pm on Thursday, January 8, 2009

I've had the same problems...got a book I didn't want but was lucky enough that I rejected the delivery so Canada Post returned it. Now I've spent the last 3 days trying to reach a real person in this company to sort the invoice out...not to mention I'm 100% convinced that they have sold my contact information out to junk mailers (publishers clearing house and such)

Fon   Toronto, Canada

Posted at 8:11am on Wednesday, January 7, 2009

I wonder what they got from doing this. It doesn't sound like a smart tactic. Do people actually pay for it? I expect most of people pay to post office to return the book so they get nothing but the useless book back. It's the post office who got the business. More to that, they lose customers for their magazine subscription? OR do people actually buy that stupid book unwillingly? Tell me those revenue from this far exceeds those loss from unsubscription? What a dump dump?!?! Anyone who actually find the book worth buying?

Geoff   Nanaimo

Posted at 11:58pm on Tuesday, January 6, 2009

We are in the same situation. We ordered Runners World, and they shipped a calendar even though we explicitly checked not to send it.

We will never order anything from Rodale again.

Margo   Wentzville, Mo

Posted at 7:21pm on Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Thank you everyone for posting this info. I paid for Prevention magazine at around $11.00 and 1 month later received 2 thick books and several booklets. At first I thought maybe I had ordered one of the 2 books I received, but certainly not both. Then I realized there were more to come. I NEVER agree to book-club type offers. The "free" gifts got my "fraud feelers" started as well. I suspect Peter Pan's suspicions would be correct on the accounting fraud, maybe granddaughter aspires to government service!

Fon   Toronto, Canada

Posted at 3:41pm on Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Thanks Lisa! That works for me! I just called them and press 1 to place order and got through REAL human after many times of trying! They sent me prepaid postage to my email. I also unsubscribe the magazine and have them remove my name from the mailing list! Make sure you do that! They said, when you subscribe to women's health, you are automatically subscribed to that 21 day preview. wtf! What a rip-off! No more Rodale for me!!! I can't believe that this practice is not being stopped!! Is there any justice?!?

Lisa   Saskatchewan, Canada

Posted at 12:13pm on Tuesday, January 6, 2009

I had the same problem as everyone else here and finally got through and very quickly I might add on the 1-800-820-6077 number by pressing the option to place a order. Hope this helps some of you get through to them. Will never order anything from this company again!!!