Dating Franchise It’s Just Lunch Fined by NY Attorney General
October 25, 2007 by Sean Kelly
Filed under Business
(FranchisePick.Com) While researching our recent post on the controversial dating franchise It’s Just Lunch (It’s Just More Allegations Against It’s Just Lunch), we ran across a reference to another incident earlier this year involving the New York IJL franchise.
In July, 2007, the New York Attorney General’s Office settled against the nationwide dating service It’s Just Lunch International and its three New York State franchises for exceeding the limit a consumer can be charged for social referral services. Here’s Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo’s press release issued July 6, 2007:
“IT’S JUST LUNCH” DATING SERVICE OVERCHARGED CUSTOMERS; SETTLES WITH ATTORNEY GENERAL CUOMO
International HQ, NY franchises will pay fines and change contracts to comply with state law
ALBANY, NY (July 6, 2007) – Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo announced today a settlement with the nationwide dating service It’s Just Lunch International and its three New York State franchises for exceeding the limit a consumer can be charged for social referral services. The company will pay fines and costs to the state and reform its business practices.
“State laws limit how much a dating service may charge, and also require that consumers be provided with numerous other protections,” said Attorney General In-Charge of the Buffalo Regional Office Russ Ippolito. “With this agreement, It’s Just Lunch will change its business practices and offer fair contracts that clearly spell out rights to New York consumers.”
Many of It’s Just Lunch’s clients paid $1,500 for two six-month contracts that were signed at the same time. The contracts ran consecutively and the Attorney General’s Office found that this practice was merely a device for circumventing state law that limits the amount a consumer can be charged for a social referral services contract at $1,000 per year. The It’s Just Lunch contracts also violated state law by prohibiting consumers from filing lawsuits against the company and by failing to include many consumer-friendly provisions, such as a guarantee of a specific number of social referrals per month.
The New York franchisees are located in New York City, Albany and Williamsville. They have agreed to stop exceeding the $1,000 statutory limit and make necessary changes to bring their contracts into full compliance with state law. They must also provide three free social referrals to clients who paid over $1,000 and simultaneously signed two contracts on or after January 1, 2006. All three franchises must pay a $6,000 fine plus $1,000 in costs, totaling $21,000.
In addition, It’s Just Lunch International, based in Palm Desert, CA, has paid a $45,000 fine and $2,000 in costs to the state. The company has also agreed to implement policies and procedures to ensure that future New York franchisees understand their obligations under New York State law.
The Attorney General’s website contains a Dating Service Consumer Bill of Rights, clearly outlining state laws that apply to such services. The case was handled by Assistant Attorney General Dennis Rosen and Senior Investigator Peter Eiss of the Buffalo Regional Office.
WHAT DO YOU THINK? HAVE YOU HAD ANY DEALINGS WITH IT’S JUST LUNCH OR OTHER DATING SERVICES? SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS. LEAVE A MESSAGE.
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Sean,
Maybe it should be called:
“It’s Just a Hunch”
J
It is too bad these lesgislators have nothing better to do with their time. Perhaps there should be a monetary limit as to the amount of money they can get for each bribe?
These idiots must love IMBRA, the feminist drafted law that makes it illegal to introduce yourself to a foreign woman without a criminal background check and other violations of your right to privacy like having to tell every place you have lived since the age of 18, a history of any arrests, your maritial info as well as private info on your children. Never heard of IMBRA? That is because it was sneaked into the renewal of another law at the last minute because it couldn’t pass on its own because it was so un-Constitutional. The Iranian religious feminist cult Tahirih Justice Center and their cult leader Layli Miller-Muro drafted the law and got it sneaked in to stop foreign women (aka competition) from coming to the USA and threatening their radical feminist agenda. Google IMBRA for more information on this unbelievably un-Constitutional and anti-American travesty which has been law for over a year now. IMBRA -misandry at its best by Feminazis at their worst.
Frank Johnson said …IMBRA -misandry at its best by Feminazis at their worst.
Frank: You equate feminists with a genocidal regime that exterminated 6 million Jews and caused a world war with 72 million fatalities? More than 400,000 Americans died in WWII. You really think it’s appropriate to use the word Nazi to describe a social view you disagree with?
No wonder you’ve got to leave the country for a date on Friday night. God knows what your background check would reveal.
Sean, You are right, feminists are much worse than the Nazis ever could be, especially since they use our tax dollars to pursue their goal of putting all men on leashes. You sound like your leash must be pretty tight. (Or are you really just another Tahirih Justice Center feminist out trying to do IMBRA damage control? You sure sound like it.)
I have a date every night as I’ve been happily married to my foreign wife for well over 20 years unlike marriages to feminists which have a 50% failure rate.
My “background check” would consist of a laughable jaywalking ticket along time ago.Sorry no arrests for torture, murder or abuse – not even a pedophile charge or two as your feminist brainwashed mind assumes.
Of course, since I know you have nothing to hide, you would have no problems with the Nazis, I mean feminists requiring you to have a background check to say hi to another man or woman depending on your situation? Hey this is America right? You’re guilty until proven innocent right?
Too bad you can’t see the forest for the trees or you would realize IMBRA is just the beginning of regulation of ALL men but then again you sound like a “regular” fellow.
You’re a bore, Frank. Railing against them feminists, them queers, them uppity negroes, them communiss is so… 1962. Take your medication, go back into your bunker and rant yourself to sleep like a good fellow. The adults are talking.
Like a good brainwashed feminist you are pretty presumptious Sean. Did I say anything about Black-Americans or Communists (the correct ADULT spelling of the word)?
Boy, you Tahirih Justice Center brainwashed Bahais are everywhere on the internet trying your best at IMBRA damage control, aren’t you?
Too bad your efforts are in vain as word is getting out or as you call it “unwanted public scrutiny” and it will be fun to see the backlash you so strongly earned and deserve come back and slap you in the bank account.
I guess the reason you are trying to infiltrate this site is because you are trying to sell “franchises” of Tahirih Justice Center. Sorry, but your price is too high as most non-feminist Americans happen to like the Constitution and America’s disappearing freedoms (thanks to laws like IMBRA), something you obviously hate if men get to share them also.
Guess you won’t read this until tomorrow since it is past your bedtime.
“Go to sleep my baaaby, my baaaby,……..” Or should I just call you Layli or Pinky?
Thanks for your input John. Goodbye.
It’s Just Lunch (IJL) in Atlanta proposed a match for me in June 2008. The described him and told me he was divorced. He told me he was divorced, as well. Our first date was June 27, 2008. Long story short, I just obtained a copy of his divorce decree from Cobb County, GA Superior Court (issued last week, by the way!) . It shows that he was NOT divorced at all the entire time we dated. He was separated on or about January 22, 2008. Again, his first date with me — at which he and IJL represented him to me as a divorced man — was June 27, 2008. The divorce decree shows that he filed for divorce July 21, 2008, and that his divorce was final ABOUT A WEEK AGO: August 14, 2009. He told me that he had dated other women IJL set him up with before he met me, too. For more details visit http://dontdatehimgirl.com/posts/231349/ .
The good thing about this whole, sordid situation is that I learned that checking the court files and background of a person you’ve met is pretty easy, fast and inexpensive. So why use IJL?