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By MoonFlower, January 19, 2010 9:46 pm

Scam. Fraud. Ripoff. These are the words being used by thousands of people who found “surprise” charges on their credit card or bank statements after making an online purchase. Consumers say they were unwittingly duped into third-party “e-loyalty” or “rewards club” programs, often costing $14.95 per month or more. Most people were unaware of it until they checked their bills.

FTD and 1-800-Flowers were summoned before the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee to explain their involvement with these so-called “post-transaction marketing” schemes. Many consumer complaints have also been lodged against another major flower seller, Pro Flowers, over the same issue. These companies sold out their customers to various loyalty marketing firms, including Affinion, Ezsaver, Webloyalty, and Vertrue.

It’s not just limited to the flower business. Other companies cited as making money from the scheme include Buy.com, Priceline, Travelocity, Avon, eHarmony, Hertz, Pizza Hut, Victoria’s Secret, and others.

Here are links to more information, which in turn have further references.

• Online Florists: Whither the ethics?, Real Florist Blog at flowerchat.com
• Feds: Top e-tailers profit from billion-dollar Web scam, by Greg Sandoval, cnet.com
• Lawmakers Slam Deceptive Web Marketers, by Thomas Claburn, Information Week

Note that MoonFlower Florist is a member of the Teleflora network, which is not involved in these nefarious goings-on. In any event, since we have our own website, MoonFlower.ca, we have complete control over our own database. We absolutely do not sell or pass on any website visitor or customer information to anyone. At MoonFlower Florist, we truly value and appreciate your business.

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By MoonFlower, October 9, 2009 10:30 am

MoonFlower has just posted Guys’ Guide to Flowers for Her. Yes, it’s a man-ual! It’s full of easy, practical advice and tips on how to give flowers to the woman in your life. And that in turn can move your love life up a few notches. So if you’re a guy, this bud’s for you. Here’s a quick tour.

• First there is a “Compressed Version for the Impatient“.

• Let’s get to the bottom-line: Flowers = Romance. There’s more to it of course, but first you have to know why flowers work.

• By the way, if you don’t have a clue about flowers, guess what? It’s no problem!

• Make sure you avoid the biggest mistake many men make, and that you understand why quality is critical.

• Never forget the big 5 occasions, but also take advantage of the power of the surprise.

• Oh no, not red roses again – they’re nice, but show some imagination. Also, a relationship goes through many stages, so be sure to keep it appropriate.

• Flowers say a lot by themselves, but if you include the right message, you can tone things up or down. Speaking of messages, what about an apology? Flowers can really help you get out of the doghouse.

• Some finer points — learn how to conquer the corsage and master the boutonniere. And don’t forget the other ladies in your life.

• And last but not least, a couple of notes for the women out there.

Get the full story at MoonFlower Florist’s Guys Guide to Flowers for Her.

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By MoonFlower, March 2, 2009 8:03 pm

Okay, so what the heck is a Beanstream? Actually, it’s Beanstream Internet Commerce Inc., a leading high-end secure electronic payment and credit card authentication company, that MoonFlower Florist uses to keep both our customers and ourselves safe for online purchases. Not only do they speed the transaction along, but they also apply a whole list of anti-fraud measures that checks things out for both of us.

Beanstream has upped it’s efforts of late, and now provides easy and direct merchant (that’s us) authentication, accessible by anyone who visits our main website. All you have to do is click on the badge image shown here, which appears in the bottom left of every page on MoonFlower.ca. A new page will then open which will show you that MoonFlower Florist is indeed a Valid Merchant. They’ll even tell you how to check if the page you’re looking at is the real thing.

Cool, quick, easy. Good stuff.

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By MoonFlower, September 18, 2008 1:58 pm

So you’re on a website, you see a security seal image, and they tell you it’s secure because they have SSL which stands for “Secure Sockets Layer”.

Huh?

Unfortunately, the topic of website security and SSL always seems to be discussed in techno-babble. Yet it’s important to understand what this is about when you’re shopping online, or transmitting personal information in any way for that matter, even when you’re a non-techno-geek and don’t speak the language.

So we wrote a “plain English” mini-guide called About Security and SSL for the rest of us. Key points:

• Just because you see a security seal, like MoonFlower Florist’s above, doesn’t really mean anything because these can be easily faked.
• Even SSL Internet transmissions can be intercepted. The real difference is that they’re encrypted and go to the site that holds the security certificate.
• “Secure website” is actually a misnomer. SSL works on a page by page basis, so it’s really about “secure webpages”. And hopefully the right webpages, the ones that involve your personal information.
• SSL has to be specifically “on” for any particular webpage.  There are easy ways to check, but you have to know what to look for depending on how your web browser handles it.
• What about “128 bit” encryption? That refers to the number of possible encryption codes or keys. And, yes, 128 bit is indeed extremely secure.
• And then there’s a practical example of how to check security on our website, MoonFlower.ca.

One day this may save you a lot of money, your credit rating, and a world of trouble! So read all about it at About Security and SSL.

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By MoonFlower, August 8, 2008 11:09 am

The second installment of “Consumer Beware!” has now been posted on the MoonFlower Florist website. More to Watch Out For is about misleading claims, deceptive practices, and other spin that some “flower sellers” use on their websites. But the flower biz is just a case study – the same sort of thing goes on all over the Internet. Our advice to online shoppers: be suspicious!

Some of the main points are as follows.

• What you see may not be what you get. One deception is that the vase you see is actually not included and only available at extra cost.
• Beware of hidden and extra charges that are only revealed after you start into the order process.
• Beware of superlative claims like “top”, leading”, “premier”, “nationwide”, and so on. These are almost always bogus or detrimental to you as a consumer.
• Don’t trust even the small claims. It’s easy to put up an image that looks good but that has nothing to do with where your flowers are actually coming from.
• Free delivery? There’s no such thing. It really means “delivery included” at best.
• Free vase? Same thing, see above.
• “We buy direct from the grower” is another claim that’s just loaded with spin to the brim.
• Courier box delivery of your order may sound okay, but it can actually cause big problems, like dead flowers. And it doesn’t make for a great presentation – see the video.
• There are some links for further info and reporting problems if you’ve been ripped off.

Read the full story at Consumer Beware! Part 2, More to Watch Out For.

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By MoonFlower, July 7, 2008 5:58 pm

We have just posted the first installment of “Consumer Beware!” on the MoonFlower Florist website. This was more work than we had first thought, but here it is! Part 1 is on The E-Marketer Scourge, and it’s about what consumers have to look out for when shopping for flowers on the Internet. Actually, there’s some very good advice when shopping for anything online.

Here are the key points.

• It’s up to you to watch out when shopping online, because consumer protection legislation that applies in the bricks and mortar world doesn’t work the same way on the Internet.
• There are a lot of flower e-marketers (order-gatherers, telemarketers, virtual florists, etc.) online. They’re not primarily in the florist business – they’re in the sales and marketing business.
• E-marketers will pass your order on to a real local florist, but only after they skim off a 20% (or more) commission that they don’t tell you about. You will get much less for your money than you thought.
• There’s a whole list of suspicious signs to watch for that indicate an e-marketer.
• The main thing is to verify location, and there are some simple online tools you can use for this.
• Things got this way because traditional florists were slow to get online, but some are now fighting back, like us at MoonFlower.

Read the full story at The E-Marketer Scourge. And why “Part 1″? That’s because it’s such a long and twisted tale. Look for “Part 2″ coming very soon to a website near you!