Magnetic Delusion
By: Source: AARP Bulletin Today Date Posted: 2003-06-30 14:10:05
Gwen Price of Citrus Heights, Calif., will never forget the most expensive meal of her life: the "free" dinner during which she was lured into paying $1,200 for a magnetic mattress pad.
Price, 70, hoped that the high-priced mattress pad would make her chronic joint and back pain disappear—just as the salesman at the dinner promised. As it turned out, however, the mattress pad did nothing for her pain.
Where to File a Complaint
Los Angeles County Department of Consumer Affairs
The department is collecting complaints nationwide for its investigation into the business practices of companies that sell magnetic mattress pads. To report complaints (whether or not you live in California), write to:
Los Angeles County Department of Consumer Affairs
500 W. Temple St., Room B-96
Los Angeles, CA 90012
Federal Trade Commission (FTC)
File a complaint via the FTC's online complaint form. Or, call toll-free (877) 382-4357, or send your complaint via mail to:
Federal Trade Commission
CRC-240
Washington, DC 20580
Consumer protection authorities across the nation report a surge in complaints from people who, like Price, say that magnetic mattress pads don't deliver any of the myriad health benefits their sellers promise—relieving everything from high cholesterol and diabetes to Alzheimer's and heart disease.
What's more, many buyers—enticed by the promise of a full money-back guarantee if they're not satisfied with the product after trying it for 90 days (or sometimes, 365 days)—find the company they paid has gone out of business or disappeared by the time the trial period is up. By then it's also too late for them to dispute credit card charges for "unsatisfactory" goods.
"It's a relatively new scam," says Pastor Herrera, Jr., director of the Los Angeles County Department of Consumer Affairs, which has launched what he calls an "intensive investigation" of the industry.
Magnetic mattress pads typically contain an inch or two of foam and several hundred inexpensive quarter- or domino-sized magnets. Consumers can end up paying more than $1,200 for a mattress pad the manufacturer sells for $140.
The pitches are typically wrapped in mumbo jumbo. One manufacturer, for example, says the magnets in its mattress pads are arranged "to minimize field fluctuation."
Rich Cleland, an assistant director of the Federal Trade Commission, told the AARP Bulletin that the agency has found there is "inadequate scientific evidence to support therapeutic claims for static magnets" [the kind used in mattress pads]. And the Food and Drug Administration says bluntly, "Any magnets promoted for medical use are in violation of the law."
preview