THE LOCKSMITH HAS NO KEYS

People often don’t look for a locksmith at their leisure. People often need a locksmith in an emergency, such as when the keys are locked in the car, when their keys are lost, or when their home has been burgled. The services are often needed asap, leaving no time to comparative shop or evaluate the credibility or expertise of the locksmith. The circumstances create an environment for consumer abuse, fraud, and bait and switch.

On February 5, 2016, Attorney General Swanson announced the settlement of a lawsuit against the owners of Fuson Solutions, Inc., a Florida company claiming that it had locksmiths licensed, bonded, and located in Minnesota.

The company advertised on the internet as a local business, such as “Woodbury locksmith,” “New Prague locksmith,” “Duluth locksmith,” or “Minnetonka locksmith” etc. The State alleged that rather than being local, home-grown businesses, the company was an inbound telemarketing center in Florida, misrepresenting online that it was a local company.

When a distressed customer called, the company would upcharge the service over the phone and then contact local repairman, some of whom had criminal records, to fix the locks to customers’ homes in Minnesota.

Confronted with a lawsuit, the company agreed to a court order to not do business in Minnesota.

Another company, based out of New York, used similar techniques to entice customers to have unlicensed and unbonded “technicians” work on the security of their homes. The company would quote a reasonable charge over the phone, but when the “technician” arrived, the price was substantially increased.

In another case, the company claimed to have an address in Sun City, Arizona. In fact, the address was an empty lot. Another advertised as an “Eden Prairie Locksmith Service” and used the address of a car repair shop.

In a number of cases, Swanson secured settlements agreement in which the companies agreed to not do business in the state of Minnesota.

But Swanson recognized that these shady companies could only lure customers because their phone numbers and websites were elevated on internet search engines. On February 10, 2016, Swanson contacted Sundar Pichai, the chief executive officer of Google, and asked him for help in stopping locksmith scams. In response, Google de-elevated in its search engines locksmith companies that were not actually based in the advertised location.

References:

“Minnesota Attorney General appeals to Google to stop deceptive locksmith ads,” Star Tribune, February 20, 2016
Shiffer, James, “Beware not-so-local locksmiths,” Star Tribune, February 21, 2016, page B2.